Koh Mak, Thailand: One of a Thousand Islands

Getting There


The first ferry of the day didn’t leave until late morning the next day, so we lazily drove to the pier and paid for long term parking. The one hour speedboat was a 24-seater with mostly commuters and locals of either the island or the port city. We arrived and disembarked, and were greeted by a stout, salt and pepper haired man with a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. While tossing boxes into the back of a pickup, he asked what resort we were heading to. He chuckled when we replied with the name of our destination, Holiday Beach Resort, and said, “Well, you’re lucky. That’s my resort. Hop in back.”

Ryan Farley / Own Work

Ryan Farley / Own Work

It was a bumpy and relatively scenic ride to our accommodation where we learned that P’Bom, the owner of Holiday Beach Resort, was one of four (count ‘em!) Thai competitive disc golf players. He was excited to learn I was from America, arguably where the sport became most famous, and that I had even played on official courses during my time in university. P’Bom had studied the sport on YouTube and even fabricated his own “holes” by welding chains and baskets together in a perfect imitation of regulation courses. He was a slightly older man, but his eyes had the excitement of a young boy showing his older brother a new toy as he explained that he’d placed a few holes around the resort and a full nine-hole course elsewhere on the island. We were intrigued.

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