Once we had finished our amazing tour of Laos we took an overnight sleeper train back to Bangkok. We had arranged flights to Krabi for the day that we got into Bangkok as we had heard news reports of terrible flooding that was due to hit the city and surrounding area the next day.
Our first day in Krabi we treated ourselves to big breakfasts and a lie in to make up for all the early starts we had in Laos. We went for a wander around the sea front and caught up with emails too. We booked a tour of the Phi Phi Islands for the following day and settled in to our big but cheap hotel room.
We woke up early for our tour and filled up on yummy porridge with banana before a guy picked us up. We were taken to Ao Nang and put into groups before heading down to the beach and getting on the speed boat for the journey to the islands. It started a lovely bright sunny day but we soon hit a shower before it cleared up again. First stop was beautiful Bamboo Island, white sandy beaches and clear blue waters. We had a few minutes of peace there before loads of tour boats turned up! We took some photos and boarded the boat for the next stop. We stopped in the middle of the open sea and went snorkelling, our first time! It was great fun and we got to see lots of fish and experience the lovely warm waters.
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| Bamboo Island |
The next stop was Maya Bay where 'The Beach' starring Leonardo DiCaprio was filmed. It was like stepping into paradise, crystal clear water and even whiter sand than we could imagine possible! Of course such a beautiful and popular place attracts lots of tourists so we were surrounded by people. It was still amazing to be there and look around at the cliff faces and the boats bobbing up and down in the water. Craig went for a dip in the warm water while I savoured the view. After our alloted time we jumped back on the boat and had fresh watermelon and pineapple and sped off to our next location. We had lunch on the very busy Phi Phi Island which had more noisy bikini and boardshort clad backpackers on it than locals which we weren't keen on. We wandered around the Island for a bit but it was so catered to tourists that we didn't like it much. If we had more time there it would have been nice to find a quieter more secluded place to see the scenery from. The heavens opened again so we hid under a tree with ice creams and waited for it to pass.
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| Maya Bay |
Once back in the boat we went to another location for snorkelling, I was feeling a little worse for wear thanks to motion sickness so sat snorkelling out and watched Craig swim around. After snorkelling we headed back to shore and had dinner at a street food stall.
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| Scuba Craig! |
The next day we had booked a 'James Bond Tour', not because we are big fans of the books or films but because James Bond Island where one early film was shot looked intriguing. We started the tour on a long boat which was great fun and a lovely way to see the surrounding landscapes. We got to 'James Bond' Island and walked around the rock and took photo's of the caves and unusual rock that makes the island famous. We toured the mangroves and then had an amazing buffet lunch on a floating village with loads of vegetarian options for me to choose from too. We chatted to a lovely German girl about travelling and walked around the floating village markets. The heavens then opened again and it really rained hard. We waited as the guide decided what to do and we all braved the weather and got back on the boat. The boat powered through the waves and we got back to shore where we drove to a monkey temple in a cave. There were monkeys everywhere stealing food and eating out of bins. We watched them for a while then had a look inside the dramatic caves. We went to a waterfall after but thanks to the rain were unable to swim in it as it had been made too dirty. Despite the rain it was a great day out where we got to see lots of varying and fascinating sights.
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| James Bond Island |
The next day we packed up and headed to Ao Nang for a few days. Whilst in Ao Nang we relaxed on the beach and met some friends from our Laos tour for drinks and dinner on Halloween. We went to pretty Railay Island for the day and ate at a lovely cheap street stall. It would be mine and Craig's five year anniversary in a couple of days so we decided to go to Ko Lanta and spend a bit extra to get accomodation with a a pool. We left Ao Nang for Ko Lanta and had cocktails and a lovely meal for our anniversary and spent some days relaxing poolside. After the expense of that we moved down the island to a wooden hut which was as basic as you can get. It was a bed and net with a desk fan in a bamboo hut and a tiny breeze block annex which housed a loo and cold shower! For a couple of quid each we were happy to stay for a few nights! We lazed on the beach and had fun in the sea, we topped up our tans and had delicious food in the beach cafe's and we caught up on lots of reading. The only downside was a massive thunderstorm that happened one night, it flooded badly outside and kept us up as the roof on our hut was made of metal, we were so worried of flooding that we packed our bags and kept them on our bed but luckily the rain water had subsided by morning.
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| Celebrating five years together in Ko Lanta |
South Thailand was a lovely time to relax and we certainly made the most of the lovely beaches and delicious food on offer. It was nice being in a quiet place with not too many backpackers around where we could live quite cheaply which we needed to do as we didn't want our tight budget going out of control!
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