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"Pee Pee" is how you say "Phi Phi Isands," which was our destination Wednesday/Thursday. Tuesday was a pretty chill day. Within 10 minutes of waking up, we were swimming in the ocean (not a bad way to start to day!). We then moved to the pool and ate our breakfast at the swim up bar. We ordered a very nice Thai beef salad that had the lovliest hint of lime and spice along with fried rice. After getting around we decided to drive to Patong beach which is the main tourist beach here and where I think that most people stay. Well, Matt had his Thailand driving initiation on this drive because we moved into more populated Phuket and that = hundreds of motorbikes everywhere weaving in/out. He handled it like a champ of course and I did my best to silently grip my seat and clench my teeth, LOL.
We arrived in Patong and well....not our thing. We were there a whole 15 minutes and scored Matt some cheap flip flops. It's crowded, touristy full of shop stalls. The beach is also extremely crowded. Just lots of traffic, noise, and not like our isolated prestine Mai Khao! So we
decided to drive "home" and grab another meal at our seaside place we ate at Monday night. We enjoyed more fried fish and blue crabs. Best part of the meal was the fercious thunderstorm we watched roll in, and then sat semi-protected from the rain under our little hut. Again, we have to comment on the difference in the shellfish here. It has to be the warm ocean vs. our cold...so TENDER and moist. The crabs were smaller in size and more work to crack and eat, but worth it.
Wednesday we were up early to head to the East side of Phuket to catch the ferry to the Phi Phi Islands where we booked a sleep aboard boat tour. We left an hour & 15 minutes early and arrived only in the knick of time. We encountered a stalled semi-truck , a motorbike crash, and an overturned ice truck, all which delayed our drive. The ferry ride is 2 hours to the islands and the most hilarious part of the trip is that they have rows of plastic chairs out on a deck to sit on (not enough chairs for passengers). Both Matt & I had chairs with
legs that kept giving out an collapsing no matter how we tried to sit in them. We ended up just standing the last hour of the trip and enjoying the view.
We arrived on Phi Phi Don to a crowded pier full of people screaming at you for hotels and boat tours. First impressions....hotter than hell and kind of gross. All we saw was garbage and construction. It is a total backpacker place full of college age kids from all over the world...it's full of hostels and bars.....But as soon as we walked to the other side of the island (5 Minutes away) our eyes were screaming "this isn't real!!!" "What you are looking at is only in movies and photoshopped pictures!" It was unreal and has to be one of the most beautiful places on earth. It's the perfect inlet cove with amazing turquoise water. We found a nice spot on the beach to have lunch (massiman curry) and a couple of beers before it was time to meet the boat for our tour.
Thanks to TripAdvisor, I had found a sleep aboard tour that takes you to snorkel, then to Maya Bay where you get to
stay after tourist hours for a on-the-beach dinner and then return to the boat to sleep. Another snorkel in the morning and return to the beach before tourist hours and then back to the pier. Upon arriving at the boat I think we both realized this wasn't what we thought it was going to be. The reviews were all fantastic and the website boasted that there were "showers" on the boat as well as covered areas to sleep if it rained. Well, rain has been almost nightly and I can tell you that we were crammed like sardines on this boat. There was no way everyone was sleeping undercover if it rained. Despite our initial "uh oh" we stuck it out. Snorkeling was actually disappointing despite the amazing water, Florida was much better.
They then took us to Maya Bay at around 4:30pm where we would stay until 6pm and some of the folks who were on the boat would leave and do a plankton swim. The sleep aboard folks eat dinner and hang on the beach until 10-11pm when the boat comes back for you to sleep. OK, this is when we realized that we are not 22
anymore, we're not backpackers as 90% of the crowd was. We weren't going to enjoy sitting on the beach with this kids while they all got drunk and told their multi-country backpacking stories, weren't going to enjoy potentially sleeping upright...or in the rain?? We really do not need a lot of luxury in our travels, but we do need some. Their "shower" was a bidet hose in the 1 bathroom with a door that barely closed....
So yes...we bailed. We decided to go back with the plankton dive tour that is at night, and we have to say that was pretty awesome. Plankton are tiny squid that when disturbed light up. So when you move your hands and legs around like crazy they light up all around..way cool. Matt quickly discovered after we were back aboard that if you keep slapping the chest area of my swimsuit they light up too....awesome to think there were dying baby squid in my bra, LOL.
We got back to shore around 10pm and found a semi-decent hotel that was cheap. We showered and crashed. Today we got up and had the hotel's free breakfast which honestly was surprisingly good.
It's so weird how fried rice and noodles become your breakfast. I haven't had coffee in a week and no signs of breakfast food anywhere in our diet (except fruit). We rented a couple of beach chairs for the day for 300 baht ($8) and spend the day on/off swimming in the most beautiful ocean water ever. After taking the ferry back to Phuket we navigated to a seafood restaurant we read about on a blog and had another wonderful dinner. Tomorrow is our final day and we are off to take a tour of James Bond Island. Then we head to Cambodia!
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Tom
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Breakfast and beaches......
Bacon and eggs, please. Fried rice and noddles instead. Ok, I can live with this. European beach ware, I see....that works. Luxury is not the same, it's all in the needs, but a shower always works. What nationalities were most of the backpackers. Is English acceptable there to get by with.....continue your adventures. Any stomach issues.....any jet lag, or will that hit when you get home.....be safe, love mom and dad!