I covered my last (overland) leg of this trip by train, or more precisely by night train: from Surat Thani to Bangkok.

However, anyone who has followed my blog closely will know that I was not in Surat Thani before, but in Ao Nang. I traveled between these two cities by taxi: more than 160 kilometers (or around 2:15 hours) for just over 70 euros. Only in Thailand! (*) In any case, this taxi ride was superior to a five-hours-long (!) shuttle ride, possibly with my luggage on my lap (at least in my opinion).

I was equally pleased with the restaurant I chose for dinner in Surat Thani: Actually, it was simply the restaurant shown in Google Maps to be closest to the train station. In the end, Baan Rim Nam Riverside turned out to be a little gem on the river bank – complete with beautiful sunset views (at least from the second row).

The night train itself was alright – but no more. It is probably really worth spending a few euros more on a lower berth (if you travel second class, like me), though: The lower berths are significantly wider. I did read about that beforehand, but obviously I did not understand the booking system of 12go.asia well enough. In hindsight, I suspect that I should probably have selected the provider “Thai Railways” instead of “Thai Railway” – my mistake!

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(*) or other countries with similarly low wages