🛺 The Nanny Wagon

Old Town, devil monkeys, and a lot of rain

👋🏻 Hello, I’m Anna, an adventurer, speaker and author of six books. Currently slow-travelling the world with my young family, writing about the colour and chaos of a well-lived, unconventional life. 💙 🗺️

Hello Restless Wonders,

Happy Saturday to you from Koh Lanta, where we’re enjoying our last 10 days on the island before we head back to England for the summer. That’ll be us having lived in Thailand for six months… wowsers. I’m feeling a swell of something brewing. I think it’s pride.

In other exciting news, not long after our feet touch down on UK soil, I’m putting a new book into the world. Hurrah!

Bedtime Adventure Stories for Grown Ups 2, will be released on June 16th.

The stories in the book have been shared in this newsletter over the years at some point, so if you’re a paid subscriber on June 16th I’ll be sending you a free copy of the eBook. Fair’s fair. You helped me sit my booty in a seat and write it, after all. Thank you muchos for that. 🙏🏻

It’ll also be released in lovely, sniffable, huggable print format and on audiobook too. Something for everyone? I hope so.

The illustration for the cover by Cai Burton is just… CHEF’S KISS. Check it out below. It makes me want to do the adventures all over again. And eat a giant pasty.

A heads up that there’ll be no story in your inbox next week. This was supposed to be the break week but I didn’t want to leave you having just arrived on Koh Lanta and feeling less-than-jazzed about it.

So onwards we go…

We left our intrepid adventure fam (plus Nanny) in a two-bedroom apartment at Long Beach, in peak tourist season, with an unhappy neighbour… roll what happened next.

Anna xx

🛺 The Nanny Wagon

‘You know, Mum, I’m not really a fan of the beach, there’s just so much sand.’ Storm sighed one afternoon. Which is, of course, a minor point when you’ve decided to live on a tropical island for a few months.

Storm’s lack of beach love was more than compensated for by Nanny, who loves the beach. Because Nanny, as I was fast learning, is a big kid.

I’ll confess that I was nervous about how the dynamic would work, bringing my mother-in-law into our chaotic travelling world, but it was the healthiest thing to have her join us. It brought out the best in her; the kids loved having her around, and that brought out the best in me.

So, with Ann’s help, most days we cajoled Storm down to the sandy shores of Long Beach. Our apartment was right by where a small river flowed into the sea, and the kids could play there for hours. Then, of course, when it was time to leave, Storm never wanted to go.

We settled into a rhythm with Ann around. Playtime in the morning, grab some food from a local Thai place on the way home, chill time in the apartment through the heat of the day (34C) — when one of us would nip off to do some work in the coffee shop downstairs. And then out again in the late afternoon for more playtime.

We’d made a few trips out to connect with the world schooling community we hoped to be a part of, and Ann was in her element — meeting new people, making up affectionate nicknames for them (because she couldn’t remember their real names) and showing off her grandkids.

Ann was getting so settled into island life that she was even wandering off up the street on her own, after dark for shopping trips. ‘You know, I’d never go wandering around alone in the dark in Gloucester’ she said. And I did know that. She wouldn’t walk home from our house, half-a-mile away, partly because she had to go past a creepy graveyard but also purely because she was a woman, alone on the streets, in the dark.

I hadn’t even considered whether I felt safe or not on Koh Lanta until that point, but of course I did. Ann’s comment made me realise that wasn’t always a given. Yes, the place may be overrun with tourists and there were waay too many sun-burned bum cheeks peeking out of thongs for my usual liking, but it was also a safe, snuggly, palm-tree lined cocoon.

Suddenly, Nanny was a few days away from going home, and we’d spent so much time at the local beach that we hadn’t really seen much of the island. I’d read that Koh Lanta’s Old Town was a lovely place to wander around and visit some shops (Nanny loves to shop) so we hatched a plan for a trip over to the eastern shore.

It took us 35 minutes to potter slowly up and over the mountain to the other side of the island in our tuk-tuk, which we had temporarily, in Ann’s honour, named ‘The Nanny Wagon.’

Getting off the main busy road with its central reservation and climbing up and into the jungle was just what my soul needed. We passed small homes on stilts, shack-style eateries, laundry hanging on lines in front gardens, small shops that looked nothing like a 7/11 and with plenty of green space in between.

It was a world away from the where we were staying, and it felt like the first glimpse of the real Koh Lanta.

We parked the tuk-tuk under the shade of a tree near a small playground, next to the impressive Old Town pier. There was a giant sculpture of a blue lobster at the start of the pier which the kids thought was, and I quote, ‘mental’.

From the pier, I could see out across the ocean to the island of Ko Por in the distance. Beyond the lobster, I could see that the main street was lined with restaurants and shops, all built out on stilts, which stretched into sparkling steel-blue waters.

It was 10am and everything was opening up for the day as we wandered to begin our Old Town mooch. There were way more Thai locals than tourists about, some of then sitting under the shade of the trees, others opening up their shops or tinkering with their scooter. A few kids were riding rusty bikes on a nearby patch of grass.

Immediately, I liked Old Town’s sleepy vibe. It felt peaceful. Quieter. It felt more… us.

We’d promised the kids they could do some shopping, and it was so cute to watch as they ran ahead with Nanny, strutting down the street side by side, each of them with a small shoulder bag slung across their chest — a fluffy rainbow unicorn number for Jupes and Storm, a black and green dinosaur bag for Rocky.

These bags contained their purses, and in those was some money which Auntie Chan and Uncle Lee-Lee had sent over. They had a whopping 500 baht (£11.50) to cut loose with. Old Town retailers — hold on to thy hats. The McKids were in town and they had funds to burn!

‘I want a monkey, Mummy!’ Jupiter pointed up at a carousel of stuffed monkeys with long arms which had Velcro on their hands for dangling around your neck. We’d made it approximately ten steps down the street and were at the first shop.

‘Okay Jupes — we can have a look. Are you sure you don’t want to see what else there might b—’

‘No. I want the monkey.’ She said, resolute.

And so Jupiter bought a stuffed monkey with purple fluffy fur and bulbous, shiny eyes. Storm, who was out in the street with Nanny, then saw Jupiter’s purchase and wanted a monkey too. She got a rainbow one. Rocky saw Storm and Jupiter’s monkeys and got monkey envy (this is a real thing), so he bought a blue one.

The shopkeeper found this all very entertaining — us going back to him every few minutes with a new child, clutching a new monkey. I think he sold a month’s worth of monkey inventory in ten minutes.

After leaving the monkey shop, we made great progress. We had walked for at least a full minute before Jupiter stopped abruptly. She dropped her arms to the side, looked at the sky, and let out a wail. ‘Mum. I wanted the pink one, with the baby on its back!’ Her mouth was down-turned, ice blue eyes now staring up at me.

She was, of course, referring to a monkey she had not chosen from the carousel. Given how much Jupiter loves baby animals, I was surprised she hadn’t chosen that monkey in the first place.

I wondered for a moment if this was a time to instil the idea that we have to live with the decisions we make. And then I remembered… she was three years old. And besides, we all make mistakes. Sometimes, even, when purchasing monkeys.

So I went back to see the shopkeeper and launched into an A-level drama performance — acting out Jupiter crying so that he would understand the need for the exchange. He thought I was unhinged, but he laughed and allowed me to make the swap all the same.

And at last, my three monkeys and their three monkeys made it down the street. The whole street. Nanny scored herself some lovely bowls, a tea towel and a few items of clothing, all of which she said were even better than the apple juice on the plane.

Rocky used his change from the monkey purchase to buy a miniature tuk-tuk which he played with on a mound of dirt by the edge of the playground for 30 minutes, and everyone left Old Town as happy as could be.

It was only later that day, back in the quiet of the apartment, that Storm accidentally sat on a monkey and there was a deafening noise — half howl, half squawk. ‘What the heck was that?!’ Jamie cried.

‘Hang on, Storm, give me that monkey — I think they make sounds and… oh god.’ Not only did these monkeys screech, but their bulbous eyes glowed red at the same time. They were devil monkeys. I put my head in my hands. The lady downstairs was going to love these.

The day before Ann was due to go home, there was a lot of chat about rain coming to Koh Lanta. We’d had wall-to-wall sunshine and plenty of heat since arriving on the island, so a storm was big news.

Ann, in her newly brave and always playful state, was very much up for the rain. By their predicted arrival time of 6pm, she’d even had a shower to get ready for what she was calling ‘the show.’

So, we waited, but no rain came. The kids tried a rain dance in the living room. Still no rain. We did the bedtime routine and tucked them all up for the night, then went expectantly out onto the balcony to survey the skies. Dark and moody, but still… no rain.

‘Well, I don’t know where this bloomin’ storm is!’ Ann said, disappointed.

At 9:30 p.m. we all agreed the rain must have passed us by, so Ann and Jamie went out to get a late-night snack from the pancake shack. They’d been gone for five minutes when I heard a deep rumble. There was a flash of lightning and then the deafening roar of droplets hammering onto surrounding roofs. My first thought was, ‘Yes!! This is so cool!’ followed quickly by… oh crap — those two are going to get drenched.

Ten minutes later Jamie and Ann tumbled through the door, Ann’s blonde hair plastered to her face, black dress clinging to her body and glasses steamed up. ‘Woo hoo!’ she beamed ‘Look at the state of me!’

We all stood together on the balcony to enjoy what felt like a mini-monsoon. Palm trees swayed, bedraggled street cats ran for cover and every roof became a waterfall. This is one of the things I loved most about Thailand. When it rains — oh my, how it rains! Jamie and Ann went back inside, and I stayed out there for a while, alone, watching the pathway below turn to a river and listening to the rat-a-tat-tat interspersed with deep rumbles from the clouds.

After the disappointment of arriving in a place that wasn’t quite what I’d expected, and all of the wonderings that came with that, the rain felt like a cleanse, a purge. As if the world was saying: let it go Anna.

Let the rain come.

And I realised, this was not a place we would have chosen, but I was glad we were there. And I meant that in a broader sense — there on the island, there with my family and a nanny who loves her three beautiful, healthy grandkids.

I was so glad Nanny got to see her first ever Thai storm and it came just in time. The following day we packed her off on a two-hour taxi ride (on her own!) back to Krabi Airport. Gone was all that extra energy and childcare support and it was back to just the five of us. Now gearing up to take our Koh Lanta stabilisers off…

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