Chasing Horizons #13: More Islands, More Beaches and More Movie Sets – Thailand

More Islands, More Beaches and More Movie Sets

The signs looked ominous. On the evening of July 4th I went into the travel agent to book my ticket on the next early ferry to Koh Phi-Phi. She explained that although my friends (Steve and Gareth) did catch the ferry that morning the seas were very rough and there is a probability that the ferry service will not run the next day.

On checking back in the morning, sure enough the ferries out of Ao Nang had been cancelled. Just as I was thinking to myself, “Oh no, I don’t want to waste another day in this dump”, when the agent suggested I take a 20 baht taxi into Krabi Town where the bigger boat leaves from the pier there for Koh Phi-Phi. This plan worked pretty well and by the departure time of 10:30am the boat was full and ready to go.

As soon as we cleared the relative calm waters of the Krabi River estuary the seas turned very rough indeed. The hull of the big ferry being raised 10-15 feet out of the water before slamming hard down into the sea. There were a few green and scared faces below decks where I had managed to find some seats. I couldn’t have been too worried as I fell asleep soon into the crossing only to be awoken as we pulled into Ton Sai Bay on Koh Phi-Phi.

Koh Phi-Phi is actually a group of islands about 30kms out from Krabi Town in the Andaman Sea. Of the group there are two main islands. Phi-Phi Don, which is a sort of dumbbell shaped island, the “handle” being a narrow strip, called Ao Ton Sai, a couple of hundred meters apart between two stretches of beaches. This is where the main concentration of hotel, restaurant and bars are situated.

Phi Phi Lea covers an area of just six square kilometers and is characterized by rugged, steep and lightly vegetated cliffs rising from the seabed, hidden bays concealing small pristine beaches and calm clear water whose colour is a kaleidoscope of greens and blues. Its Viking Caves gets their name from the ancient murals depicting Viking-like sailing vessels. The caves are home to sea swallows. Apparently an excrement is used by the birds to make their nests, and these nests are farmed for the much sort after Chinese delicacy, Bird’s Nest Soup. There are no cars and very minimal motorbikes on the islands which makes relaxing there absolute bliss.

I checked my email directly on arrival in Ao Ton Sai on Phi-Phi Don and sure enough Gareth had considerately left word on where S&G were staying on the island. It was a quiet place about a 10 minute walk from the main strip. I found it no problem and even got a nice and basic bungalow for 150 baht a night.

The main reason for coming to Phi-Phi was for the diving and snorkeling. I inquired straight away, particularly interested in the wreck dive or cave dive or a snorkeling trip to the many bays and inlets in the west side of Phi-Phi Lea, especially Maya Bay where the movie “The Beach” was filmed.

Now the weather had noticeably improved even though we were only 30 km from the mainland. The sun for one shone a good deal more but the islands were still prone to heavy monsoon downpours. This meant that no diving operators were running trips to my desired sites, the seas being to rough and visibility in the water not good at all. The same can be said for the snorkeling operators. It looked like the diving and snorkeling just wasn’t going to happen. The diving prices are quite inflated too so I wasn’t going to fork out those prices just to dive on some average site.

So for a few days all we did on Koh Phi-Phi was relax, read, swim, watch Wimbledon tennis in the evenings and crawl between the many bars and clubs until it was time to turn in. Not such a bad life. On Sunday, July 7, S&G decided they were to move on and left the island back to Krabi and an early morning bus to the Malaysian border. That afternoon I hired a long tail taxi boat to take me for a bit of a ride around the islands. They are impressive and beautiful with limestone cliffs covered with tropical foliage rising sheer out of the crystal clear sea water.

I was only going to stay an extra day in the island before also following the S&G route to the Malaysian border. Always mindful of the fact that the expiry date of our Thailand visas were fast approaching. Hopefully in two days I would be reunited with S&G on the Perhentian Islands in Malaysia.

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