The Curse of Koh Phi Phi

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Many people have been told in the past to be careful what you wish for and with the helpful assistance of Koh Phi Phi, I too now understand the benefit of this advice.

After a good nights sleep in Krabi, we headed down for a hearty breakfast before being collected and taken over to the ferry terminal in Krabi to go to our next destination of Koh Phi Phi. There have been many times in my life when I have had the need to praise my digestive fortitude and no more so than on the ferry ride over to Koh Phi Phi. Out of the 50 or so passengers on the ferry ride there were only about 7 of us who weren't soon dissappearing to be sick as a result of the not so tranquil seas. Thankfully both Steph and I were among that elite group.

About 2 hours later, and with our breakfasts still miraculously in the right place we arrived at Koh Phi Phi and, after paying the landing tax of 20 Baht per person, we were greeted with many calls of "Hey you, where you stay. Bungalow cheap cheap." Presenting the stiffest upper lip that I could manage I ignored them all and headed off in completely the wong direction to the hostel which we had initally decided to stay in. Nevertheless our luck managed to hold a bit longer and, by the time we had realised our mistake (and Steph declared she wasn't going to walk to the hostel we wanted) we found ourselves outside the Sand Sea view resort. This was a blessing in disguise as, after numerous bad attempts at haggling, we actually found ourselves in some pretty good accommodation that was actually cheap for a night on Koh Phi Phi.

There are many ways to describe Koh Phi Phi, idyllic, beautiful, paradise however I would have to plum for wet... very very wet. We were on the island for a whole 30 minutes before the heavens opened. Fortunately Steph was inside at the time, it took three days for my T-shirt and shoes to dry. This is what ultmately gave us the greatest problem. Koh Phi Phi is an island largely based around doing three things, diving, snorkeling and lazing on a beach. However, none can be done in torrential rains when the seas are too rough to go out. This meant that we spent quite a lot of time stuck in either a cafe, when we managed to make it out, or in the lodge when we couldn't. This at least was relaxing after our generally busy time in Singapore and Malaysia.

Eventually, on the second day of doing nothing, and having been told by the dive company that we weren't going out today we decided enough was enough and, despite the wind and rain, we were going to do something. After speaking to the locals the only other thing to do was go up to the view points, so up we went. Despite the clouds and the mist the views were still really quite impressive and it really would be beautiful if the sun was out.

After much deliberating we decided that we would give it one more chance to go snorkeling before we abandoned it all and left the island. This turned out to be the best decision that we made as the next morning the sky was clearer there was no wind or rain and a few hours later we were out snorkeling. Granted there were still a few hairy moments, boarding the longtail boat from the beach under someone's house and then watching as the captain banged the engine with a hammer to get it started but soon we were out swimming with the fishes.

This was possibly one of my highlights of the trip so far. We snorkled at three different sites, one of which was great as you got to swim with the different fish and eels that live amongst the coral reef we were snorkeling above. We then headed round to the second site where we were looking for some baby sharks and more eels but couldn't spot any of them. We then had a stop at Maya beach, the scene of some film staring Leonardo Sprout head - seriously his head is the shape of a Brussel Sprout - before heading to the final site where we were loking for turtles. We spotted two of them in the end, with one of them coming up for air and spending a few minutes at the surface in the middle of our group before it dived back down. It was amazing to get so close to all of the fish and I really enjoyed the morning.

Having eventually managed to get out and snorkel we decided that we would catch the ferry back to the mainland and try and head up to our next destination of Chang Mai. Unfortunately, and without any notice, they decided to cancel the last ferry due to rough seas, which were not rough at all, leaving us on the island for one mre night.

We manged to check into another hostel close to the ferry terminal and then continued to do very little as we had on Koh Phi Phi for the other days.

The next morning we headed over and got the first ferry of he day off the island and back to Krabi. It was a lot calmer then the first trip and we mde good time to Krabi. We had planned to make the trip to Bangkok by getting a bus to Sant thani, before getting a night train to Bangkok. This proved to be a disaster. After much confusion at the ferry terminal we eventually manged to get ourselves on a minibus to Swat Thani. It was only as we did this that we experienced the full extent of the flood damage in Southern Thailand. As we drve across the country we saw houses submerged by the floods and the dual carriage way was now down to single file as the opposite bridge had collapsed, and there was still a river a knee deep running across our bridge.

We then got dropped off somewhere - who knows where - before being taken to the local bus stop and put on a bus to the train station. Whilst we were assured the trains were running we arrived at the bus station and were told to get off as the bus could not make it to the train station as it was flooded. This left us sitting around at the bus station hearing other horror stories of people's travel. Apparently the bridge we came over was now no longer useable and, at one stage, a whirlpool had formed near it.

After 4 hours of waiting at the station the buses from Bangkok arrived and announced that they would not be going back due to the deep water. What follows was half an hour of confusion as some companies cancelled and some didn't before veryone eventually cancelled the buses leaving us stranded at the bus station in Swat Thani.

A quick look in the guide book later and we realised that there was nothing to do here and that the accommodation in the book was described as "the best of a dismal bunch" It was with this that we booked into 100 Island Resort and Spa, which has no hot water and where we are now stuck as the buses are still not running. It is a rather dreary affair. Stephanie has decided to make the best out of it and use the spa and to grab a massage. I will be catching up on the sport, unfortunately the only channel that is in English. It really is a hard life!

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Photos

"The Beach"
Maya beach - used in the film