We made our way into Thailand to visit Tarutao National Park, the filming location of the hit reality television show Survivor: Thailand. We had visions of Tribal Council, Immunity Challenges and 16 Castaways trying to eek out an existence from whatever they could fish out of the ocean or forage for in the jungle. We imagined there would be good insider information about the show, or remains left behind when the production crew left. This wasn’t the case at all. There was no sign that anything had even been there.

Tarutao National Park was once a remote undiscovered group of islands located at the very tip of the south peninsula of Thailand. Her beaches of pearl white sand stood completely empty, save the occasional tented backpacker and makeshift fisherman village. Among the group of 51 islands that make up the park, Ko Tarutao is the largest and also has the longest history of the group; which includes being home to a band of Andaman Sea pirates and a penal colony that housed some of Thailand’s most notorious political prisoners. These days the park is somewhat different.

The prison has long been consumed by the jungle and a park headquarters has been built on Ao Taloh Wow on Tarutao Island. A few private bungalows have started to dot the shores of a Ko Adang and Ko Lipe (a pair of smaller islands to the west), but for the most part, Ko Tarutao remains very much an isolated tropical destination. The major difference now is that over 30 million Americans can now point to Ko Tarutao on the map (and not Iraq or Canada from what the news has recently reported). The most recent season of CBS’s Survivor was filmed there last summer. The good news is that we’ve discovered our beloved t.v.-watching American comrades are far too lazy to make the trek to Thailand, much less make it all the way to Tarutao. And as far as Tarutao exploiting its new found fame? We couldn’t see a single shred of evidence that a film crew had ever been there.

For Susanne and me the trip was rather easy, relative to a few other destinations we tried to reach. After spending a few days on Pulau Langkawi, Malaysia -- which turned out to be just 5km from Ko Tarutao’s southern tip – we moved north into Thailand. The only problem with traveling from Langkawi to Tarutao is the political border that divides Thailand and Malaysia. This minor geographic issue meant that we would have to go to mainland Thailand to pass through immigration before we could go to the national park. The original plan called for us to stay overnight in Satun (arrival pier from Langkawi) or Pak Bara (departure pier for Tarutao). They’re about 30 minutes from each other via songthaw (that’s a pickup truck) and there’s not much in terms of bungalows, guesthouses or hotels in the area. They are pretty much both fishing villages turned transport points for independent travelers.

Our guidebook said the National Park could be booked up solid during the holiday season, which caused us a little stress. The books suggested we call the park headquarters to see if a room or bungalow was available. Problem: The park staff speak Thai. Mike does not speak Thai, nor does Susanne for that matter.

When we arrived in Satun we were greeted by host of touts asking us if we wanted to go to Pak Bara, Hat Yai, Krabi … just about anywhere. They were also willing to change money, sell us boat tickets and do whatever necessary to part us from the little Thai Bhat we had in our possession at the time. The interesting thing was that the day we arrived in Satun happened to be the maiden voyage of the Satun-Tarutao ferry service. We were talked into buying tickets, exchanging money at a terrible rate (with a nice profit of 10% going to the tout) and heading directly to Tarutao.

Please Note: we had not yet booked a bungalow. We didn’t even know if they had any. In addition, there were no returning ferries until the next morning, which left us in a pretty anxious condition for the hour and a half it took to make the hour-long boat ride.

The boat ride was nice. Air-con, but I chose to spend most of the time on the deck as we made our way out to sea.

As to preserve the picture-perfect setting, the boat was kind enough to blow its air-horn a million times upon arrival at Ao Taloh Wow Pier at Ko Tarutao. The boat was about half-full -- probably because nobody knew of this ferry existed before they got to the Satun Pier. Which meant this boat was filled with a bunch of people just like us: no plans, no accommodations or any idea where they were going. Of the approximate 60 people on the boat, only a handful of us got off on Tarutao Island. The rest of the passengers headed to Lipe or Adang, or into the deep blue sea to be captured by pirates, as far as I know.

The pier was located next to an amazing … [searching for words to describe] stone thingy. It was a big rock, a very big rock. Kind of a boulder, kind of a spire, but maybe more like a monolith left by aliens or a CBS film crew. In other words; see pictures in gallery.

Once you make your way down the pier, sans tribal-torches and panoramic helicopter quick-reverse camera shots, you end up at the park Ranger Station. It’s a fairly large complex that seems to have been built recently, as if a big American television crew had needed someplace to run filming operations from. If you saw the show Survivor: Thailand, at the end of Ao Taloh Wow Pier is where Tribal Council was filmed. I didn’t see the finale, but it would be my guess that the set was shipped back to the states after the last Tribal Council -- because there was no sign of it at the pier when we got there.

There were a few grungy German backpackers dining at the outdoor restaurant (translation: a few tables and plastic chairs), while a group of young Thai men, wearing Park Ranger camouflage, did their best to ensure the steps didn’t run away.

The National Parks Board recently started charging tourists 200 baht to enter the park. This is about US$4.65 or US$5.12 each, depending on the exchange rate you’re ripped-off at. Thai’s are charged somewhere in the region of 35 baht. I guess the National Park system thinks we’re all rich westerners, which might be true, all things considered. We paid our fee and continued to ask if they had bungalows available:

“You have bungalow?”
“Yes, yes.”
[blank stare … continues to collect fees]
“You have bungalows we can stay at?”
“Yes, yes.”
[silence]
“Can we get one of them?”
[collects fees]
“You take car.”
“A car?”
“Yes, we have car. Take you to bungalow. You make reservation there.”
“Oh. And where is that?”
[mumbles]

It was like we were asking if he knew how to perform a kidney transplant. He looked at us with such confusion, even though he seemed to speak and understand English pretty well. Is it so odd that someone would travel to the island and then want someplace to stay for the night? I’m not sure what the issue was, but we weren’t alone. The rest of the passengers that landed with us seemed to encounter the same aloofness we did. The Cliff Notes™ version of the story is that we waited around for 30 minutes for a large double-axel work truck with 4 rows of benches in the trailer bed (the car) to come from the other side of the island and take us to the beach where the bungalows were located.

The other side of the island stood in sharp contrast to the pier we landed at. There was a paved road leading through the jungle to the other side of the island where rows of bungalows lined the mountain side of the road while tents were scattered across the beach side. We passed a restaurant, a park center, a place that we swear thought said “Thai Massage,” and a health center before we reached the very end of the beach and the information booth. Sure enough, there were bungalows available. In all, it was a pretty nice place. But naturally, we had to pay 30 baht for the “car” ride to the other side of the island (one way). Once this was collected they showed us the bungalows. 600 baht ($14) a night got you one bungalow with a pair of twin beds, bamboo mattresses that smelled a little funky, generator-driven electricity for 12 hours at night, a western toilet and an ice-cold shower.

Oh, how we forgot what it was like to be fleeced in Thailand. They had collected US$11 from us before we did or saw anything, plus the food we bought at the park-run restaurant while “waiting” for the truck to arrive.

I shouldn’t complain. It was a very nice place and we were glad to be out of Malaysia. It wasn’t quite the jungle setting we had imagined it was going to be, but that was alright. It was nice to have the comforts of a restaurant and running water. And since there wasn’t a million-dollar prize on the line, we would gladly sleep in a bungalow rather than a cave.

As for the secluded beaches and hidden waterfalls? They were there, they just happened to be covered with trash washed up from the ocean.