7 1/2 hours

cab > flight > fast cab > ferry > long tail boat > feet sweaty feet

                       Awesome tats, courtesy of Mia and James, got us through our hustlin' that day.

Not too bad, a relatively quick trip! But 2 of those hours were spent traipsing Koh Lipe in the hot mid day (on the equator) sun looking for accommodation...
We woke in Kuala Lumpur at 5am and literally hustled to make a flight (ran to the gate), and then ran to a cab, to make sure we could catch the 9:30am ferry - that all flew by... and all of a sudden we were puttering to the island in a long tail boat (the island is too small to have a main dock).
When we got to our destination, Koh Lipe - an amzing recommendation by our friend natalie - it was 100 degrees, humid, sunny, midday and we didn't have anywhere to stay yet. Natalie said "go to Sunset Beach and find a bunglow right on the beach $20".  Easy enough!  Long story short, 2 hours of hiking the island with all our stuff (I've mentioned the 30 lb bags;) to find "sunset" beach and only to be very confused as the places were more expensive and kinda crappy, really crappy actually. We went from one to one just certain what she was talking about was around the corner.  So confused. So tired, hot, hungry, hangry even. We made it all the way to another side of the island - Sunrise Beach, which actually must have been what she meant because once we got there we found exactly what she was describing. Of course in hindsight, all is good once you've found a place to drop your bags, and then rewards yourselves by drinking Sing Ha and taking a well deserved dip in the cool turquoise water.