Honeymoon Part 1 - Water Water Everywhere!

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hon.ey.moon ·ˈhənēˌmoōn·
noun
a vacation spent together by a newly married couple
the first month after marriage

Life as always gets in the way of the best laid plans 😊 But we finally did it - quietly, privately - ish - and 3 and a bit months later - as plans got shafted by life again 😊 - actually got round to the equally-important business of getting away on honeymoon.




The complicated compromise of where to go! begins here - on Bangsak Beach, Takuapa, Phang Nga Province, Thailand. Everyone - ok - foreigners to Thailand - call this surreal beach paradise Khao Lak. But really Khao Lak town is a good 20 minutes away. Spouse and I were staying at the Haadson Resort located right on Bangsak Beach. Highly recommended by friends who love travel - 'it's what Phuket was years ago before everyone moved in built up took over'; Haadson is simple and stylish. It's a refreshing back to basics that's totally comfortable with none of the homogenised identikit resort luxury found everywhere these days. The coconutfrond-roofed villas are built on lovely lovely grounds with the most undescribably breathhhhtaking natural lagoon snaking around it. It really is like waking up to a gently rippling watercolour every morning. Owned and designed by a local architect, no trees were destroyed in the building of Haadson. Shady casuarinas and swaying coconut palms fringe and dot the grounds. (NB - No creatures are ever harmed either judging by the scurrying ants that were everywhere!) Our villa came with an indoor and outdoor shower, a frontdoor footbath with floating flowers and a fab little deck with a sunbed overlooking the hypnotic calm green waters. Past the stark modern swimming pool, there are fruit trees and a vegetable garden leading to the massage salas, bordered by yet more lagoon. Water water everywhere... 😊 And all this sits right on the achingly lovely Bangsak Beach...



The beachstrip here is the longest in the province. It's unreal - powdery sand as far as the eye can see, and not another hotel and barely another soul in sight! Fresh young coconut trees line the sand, wild flowers dot the grassy banks, a clear stream meanders down to the waves, perfect unbroken shells to be collected, white sunbleached driftwood, tiny pine cones strewn everywhere. And right down the far far end - a blot on this perfect landscape - a once-grand abandoned beach house. Now an empty shell, its outer walls crumbling. We realised what was happening of course - this is paradise reborn - after The Tsunami four years ago. The warning signs are everywhere. We were told that Bangsak, Bang Nya and Khao Lak were worse hit than Phuket (an hour and a half away). Everything here was devastated, simply washed away. Our local guide Nip had taken 8 European tourists to the Elephant Camp that tragic morning. The tsunami hit an hour later. The 8 lucky visitors slept in Nip's home in the neighbouring province that night. So saplings are now growing. Grassy turf laid down. Strong gnarled trees that survived have steps nailed into them. With signs that read - Tsunami. Climb Up.




Nearer to Haadson are a row of casual seafood restaurants. All this rebuilt in the past couple of years. It's Sunday when we arrive and families are eating in the bamboo pavilions that line the beach. Dogs and kids, a couple of cars have their doors open - music drifting out from their stereos - some Thai version of a Hawaiian melody 😊 Farther along some families are sitting on the grass preparing their lunch - with mortar and pestle. Everyone is friendly, inviting. This is just how the village lives. There are NO vendors pestering you to buy flutes, braid your hair, massage your feet, ride a pony, rent a jet ski. We sit barefoot on the floor in a pavilion watching the waves, ordering our lunch at the Bangsak Garden Restaurant. By the end of the meal we're horizontal on that bamboo floor 😊 The food is superb. Papaya salad with raw horseshoe crab (it's like ceviche - cooked by the lime), steamed garoupa, chicken in basil, excellent fiery tom yam goong, and fantastic prawn tempura - light, crispy and totally ungreasy! Later that evening after a swim, we indulged in long strong massages in the outdoor salas of Haadson. This will be our daily ritual here. Ending each day before dinner with fabulous massages - alternating between Thai (lots of contorting and hard pressure) and oil (lots of long strokes and hard pressure) :D






PHANG NGA BAY





Spouse hasn't scuba dived since his last outing six years ago ended with blood pouring out of his ears upon resurfacing and I haven't since before Sprog was born. This abstinence may well end though now that Sprog is learning to scuba dive and will need dive buddies :0 In preparation for this imminent occurrence we had packed our masks and snorkels in the hope of taking a ride out to the Similan Islands to start with some leisurely snorkeling at the National Marine Park. The NMP isn't, strictly speaking, open for a few more days, on the 1st of November. But you can still hire a boat to take you out to view the fish frenzy of the Andaman Seas provided you don't actually land on any of the 11 islands. Unfortunately Monday was not to be that day. Sea conditions made visibility very poor so Nip (our lovely tsunami-veteran guide) decided that we should instead visit Phang Nga Bay of the mangrove swamps and beautiful limestone outcrops; and Ko Tapu, the rock that famously co-starred with Roger Moore in The Man With The Golden Gun. We picked up a couple of Singaporean tourists from their hotel - The Something Khao Lak Resort (they all have names like The Palm Beach Khao Lak Resort, The Sunset Khao Lak Resort, The Bayfront Khao Lak Resort) and headed off to Ao Phang Nga National Park an hour away. En route we visited the Temple Of The Gold Cave with its gold reclining Buddha, hanging bats, gorgeous stalactites and resident monkeys. When high tide had receded we headed off to the Bay.




One of the upsides to visiting this region just before high season is that it's cooler and much quieter. Yes you aren't guaranteed great dive/snorkel conditions but all that cloud cover makes the long boat rides and jungle treks so much more pleasant. PLUS - you don't have to deal with stampeding herds of mad bad sad tourists 😊




Off in our brightly-painted long-tailed boat! Phang Nga Bay is just beautiful. The limestone rock formations which of course have earned them all sorts of local nicknames - The Bulldog, The Bullfrog, The Elephant's Nose, The Pig's Snout, The Camel, The Cupcake (ok ok - Spouse and I may have made up a couple of those) - are really quite stunning. Trees and shrubs cling tightly to the sheer limestone walls and crevices. Tangled vines overhanging. Prehistoric cavemen drawings of fish and fishermen well preserved on one wall. Oysters mould to other rock walls just under the waterline. We switch to inflatable canoes which take two passengers and one hired paddler/navigator. Ours was a terrific character named Solih - 'I'm Moslem. From Indonesia. With Thai Passport'😊 He deftly manoeuvered us in and out of dramatic rock openings and barely accessible gorgeous hidden jewel-green caves. Many times we had to lie flat on our backs as we held our breaths and passed through cracks between limestone and seawater only visible at low tide. It was fun. It was thrilling. It was a riot running into a coconut and fizzy drink vendor - in a boat - in the depths of a mangrove swamp.'Hi I'm mangrove supermarket. I'm Moslem.' All these Moslems/Indonesians/Thai passport holders(?) live on the floating Gypsy Village nearby that services the buzzing tourist industry that has sprouted up around Ko Tapu aka James Bond Island. We stopped off at the Gypsy Village for a forgettable seafood lunch. It's an amazing sight though. Rows and rows of seafood restaurants and gaily painted homes. The village also has it's own domed and minareted mosque, schools, shops, fish farms... just floating along on the crest of Nowhere Wave, Phang Nga Bay 😊


The famed James Bond Island is a pretty enough island with gorgeous views of THE rock and other really cool rock formations. But it's totally overrun by pushy vendors with their stalls and stalls and stalls of trinkets, tshirts and ridiculous shell and coral objects. Ok ok I'm a sucker for souvenirs. Yes I confess to collecting snowglobes 😊 None here though - so duly bargained for a coral windchime thing - for Sprog!! - he loves all things from the oceans!



On our way back to The Something Khao Lak Resort (for the Singaporeans) and Haadson (for Spouse and me) Nip wanted to show us the Phang Nga Waterfall. I'm sure it has an official name but this is what Nip called it. Maybe I was just tired by then but I thought the waterfall was a little disappointing. A bunch of young boys were swimming in the pools, scrambling up the shallow rapids, tumbling pretty impressively off the falls. An older group of school boys in uniforms were gambling, smoking, boozing nearby. The place just had a neglected, seedy air about it. We watched and shot some photos. Nobody really felt like joining in or getting wet... ya know!?




That night Spouse and I decided to go into Khao Lak town centre for some dinner. The Haadson Limo is a pick-up truck with open air seating for their passengers at the back 😊 I was freezing! - dark blue tube dress and black wedges here. The driver dropped us off on Khao Lak's main strip - La On Village. This is where everything is to be found in Khao Lak - dive centres, tailors, pharmacists, massage spas and lots of international restaurants. Kinda confirmed that we don't ever need to visit Khao Lak center again 😊 Passed by some snazzy-looking pizza joints and steakhouses. We were recommended Sala Thai. It specialises in authentic Thai... Really?? The predominantly German clientele seemed to indicate otherwise 😊 The whole steamed snapper was pretty good as were the crab cakes. Can't remember what else we had - the rest was pretty mediocre. Or maybe it was all that wine that Spouse was obviously focusing on! Oh ya - we finished with banana frittershh with aishh-creeeam! Thaaat washh verrry gooood 😊 Got back to Haadson just in time - the heavens opened and it bucketed with rain!!

















THE FROG




In the morning the view from our deck was just soooo lovely - fresh, dewy, almost ethereal after all that rain the night before. It was the perfect morning for a pre-breakfast run. Went outside to pull on my trainers (Thai style - we left all footwear outside). Saw Felt Sensed that something was in my trainer! Shrieking, I flung it at Spouse and fled back inside!! Spouse duly whacked my very expensive Mizuno several times on the ground, prodded inside it with an umbrella, then heroically jumped back gravely stating - don't come out, you don't want to see this. It was apparently a HUGE UGLY FROG! NO - THE HUGEST UGLIEST FROG EVER!! The one thing I HATE more than anything in this world are frogs!! I hate them like Indy hates snakes. Like polar bears hate Sarah Palin. Yes - that much! Maybe more!! Traumatised I made Spouse flap my Mizuno around to air it out, spray the insides with something frog banishing.. - well I only had deodorant actually...



Anyway... 😊 😊 :D



Ho-hum... after all that - the run was lovely 😊 45 minutes along the beachfront. Fresh sea air filling our lungs. Strong waves pounding the sand. Wobbly legs plodding bravely :0 Breakfast was lovely too. Pancakes and perfect softboiled eggs. Only mentioning this because ordering NOT HARDboiled eggs took some doing and then some! A lot was lost in translation so was totally ecstatic when they came perfectly done - firm on the outside, soft but not too runny on the inside 😊 Yay!



We heard that there was a gorgeous waterfall nearby - 6km away - so decided to set off in search of. Spouse rented some bicycles - 6km is nothing on a bike - and off we set... The thing was - I hadn't been on a bicycle that actually moved in over a couple of decades! Spouse zoomed off - very Lance Armstrong. Shoulders forward, elbows bent, butt off the seat. I struggled with the gears, got oil all over my white top somehow, totally skinned my inner knees and had to REALLY focus on steering straight #**%!$(MISSING)@#! BUT - I persevered in total Super Trooper fashion 😊 and after awhile actually started to really enjoy this moving bicycle experience 😊




Sai Rung Waterfall is the largest of the 4 waterfalls in the area. Incidentally, they lie when they say it's 6km away. It's 6km along the main road - then - another 3km inland through the village. The ride is just gorgeous though. The friendly villagers, the simple homes and all those rows and rows of rubber trees. Fresh air is a heady experience for a city girl - who needs drugs?! - this was a total natural high 😊



We finally arrived at Sai Rung. Maybe all that fresh air IS hallucinogenic - or maybe it really did sparkle and flow! It was a jewel in the dark damp jungle. Truly. Just sitting there looking at it was a privilege. We shot a million pics. None of them came close to capturing the reality of what we saw. We stripped down to our bathers and plunged in. It was FREEZING! BUT totally invigorating! Oh the pure childlike joy of splashing around in fresh clear water!











KOP KUN KAH KHAO LAK





Saved the best for last (yess that eating thing we do) and went back to the Bangsak Garden Restaurant for The Last Supper before heading back home early hours of the next morning. Another fabulous feast of shellfish. The lapping waves just that added extra. I've just LOVED Khao Lak-Bangsak Beach-Phang Nga Province-Wherever. Hope it continues to heal from four years ago without altering its incredible beauty 😊 We stuffed ALL our remaining baht into the tsunami collection box at Haadson and promised to be back soon 😊 😊



It's been a total blast with My BFF, Spouse :D Kop kun kah Spouse!!



So now it's 3 days back in KL before heading off on Honeymoon Part 2 - More thrills and spills. More carbs and cholesterol. And lots more water water everywhere - YAAYYY!



HangLiPoh
xoxox

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