Traveling by Grace: Burma Visa Run

A smooth trip, great hotel, the formality of crossing borders, and Bee getting car sick. That about sums it up. It was an exhausting 3 days but we accomplished it, learned a few things, and made it back to our rental none the worse for wear.
We had to take a ferry from our island Koh Phangan in the Gulf of Thailand over to Chumphorn on the mainland. From there we took a mini-bus across the mountains to Ranong on the west side of Thailand and the Andaman Sea. The mini-bus was FAST. Daniel saw the speedometer going about 110 kilometer an hour and the driver pretty well was on the horn the whole time getting other drivers out of his way. And the poor lady in the front of the bus was sick the.whole.trip. I felt so bad for her. She wasn't even the quiet kind of sick. Oh no...puking, gagging, every-one-knows-she's-throwing-up kind of sick.
Once we made it to our hotel we just crashed. Enjoyed the pool, hot-tubs, restaurant, and slept on the best bed we've had in Thailand. Yes, we could have stayed there forever.
The next morning after a delicious continental breakfast, we were taken over the the pier to begin our journey to the border.
We got to the counter where they took a picture of us and checked our passports and visas. Much to our surprise, we discovered we overstayed our visa by 1 day. We had seen the stamp which had the date of our entry into Thailand....but evidently we overlooked the one stamp which said when we had to cross the border. Uhem....have we not learned our lesson about checking things yet!!!???
So we paid our fine, got our departure stamp and found a guy with a boat to take us over to Burma. And here is where all my blog reading and google searching of travel forums paid off some. The boat guy said he would take all 3 of us to Burma and back for 500 baht. Hahaha, well, nice try buddy. I knew from my reading that we should be able to get someone to take us for 100 baht and certainly not more than 200. He laughed and said he have to have at least 100 for Bee too. "No way! She's a baby and she sits on my lap. ONLY 200 for all of us". Funny guy kept trying for more but in the end he took the 200 for all three of us.
Our trip back to the island was the same as going there, only this time Bee got car sick. Poor girl. She had never thrown up before and was so upset about the whole thing. Especially since it got on her night night which was worse of all. She kept asking for it and I would ask her why she couldn't have it. "Cause it got nasty hot dog stuff on it...but MoM!! I just need to smell it!!" Oh gross. Sorry babe. You'll have to do with your spot pillow for now. (For those who don't know her, she has her Night Night (a special kitty blanket from Gymboree) and her spot pillow, two most prized possessions. She likes to suck her thumb while smelling and rubbing said pillow or night night).
We are back to our little house on the beach now. We were welcomed by a night of arguing followed by making up which not only kept us awake but forced us to cover our heads with pillows so we wouldn't hear everything going on in the room next door. This morning we prayed together that God would allow for one of us to have to move out so that we could have some peace and not hear all the drama next door. The hotel management showed up at our door 2 hours later and said we could move into a new unit today rather than next week. Praise the LORD! We were so excited and have now settled in nicely to a smaller though much more private unit.
Peace....sweet peace.