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Published: March 29th 2008
We've had a lovely week in Phi Phi, but to start at the beginning.....
After leaving the internet last sunday we were hit by a sudden monsoon,so we ran while trying not to slip in our flip flops back to the guesthouse while watching the rain come down, but as always it was a short burst and we were soon back out on the streets searching for our next meal in this case a famous meal.....There's this small scandanvian cafe in Krabi, lovely estaury town, where Leonardo Di Caprio ate while filming the beach- there's a set Leo Menu and all! It was suprsingly nice, the closest thing we've had to good cheese in the form of Danish something. Although having western food more often now than usual we're finding that we are beginning to miss noodles if we try and go a day without them! I also branched into the noodle soup last week but i cant say its anywhere near as good as Pho Bo. We spent the rest of the evening talking to Frankie, Katie and Jenny, 3 english girls who we spent most of the next week with!
We all met up for breakfast before
getting the Ferry to Koh Phi Phi, the pier was lovely, clean and posh therefore raising our hopes for the boat when we then saw a lovely ferry with tinted windows and then sadly climbed across it to this tiny boat that they were cramming thousands on, with broken windows and no leg room whatsoever- and i dont even have long legs!! We arrived to the immense humidity and had to get a porter to wheel our bags up to the guesthouses- all the places literally on the beach are out of most travellers budget so we settled on a guesthouse 2minutes away which was lovely and clean and pretty much one of the cheapest- as the dorm was only 50THB less.Phi Phi in general is really expensive like a bottle of water at 7eleven is double the price to mainland thailand but the island is so worth it! We headed straight down to the beach, which was full of incredibly tanned topless people. Libby and i retreated to the sea which was so shallow with low tide we were literally lying on the bottom and not drowning! The day was pretty much over quickly by the time we arrived
etc so after dinner of grilled salmon, a viewing of The Beach ahead of our visit there,we sat and charged our electrical goods for a bit- the only plug being in the hall- before heading in for an early night, these travelling days do take it out of you!
Tuesday morning we woke up late, having missed the time we were meant to be meeting Katie and Frankie for brekkie, so we met up with them later to walk over to long beach, which is meant to be one of the prettiest and a lot quieter than the one we're nearer. However along the way we got alarmed by the looming dark clouds, considering the walk there involves clambering over rocks for half an hour, so instead we stopped off at a restaurant called Hippies for a drink. There was a bit of rain but not a big storm to clear the air so we decided to have a dip in the sea instead of climbing in case we couldnt get back!! The sea was lovely and warm in comparison to the outside air, the usual when its raining!! It made the waves nice and big too- although didnt
ease the tsunami fears i had throughout the week. There's so much evidence of it still, through some places still being rebuilt or pictures on the wall of the devestation or memorial plaques. We got back to our guesthouse at about 4 and decided to watch a film in a bar instead of braving the immenent rain again! After watching the simpsons movie -again- cant say i enjoyed it, we decided that this cooler weather was the perfect opportunity to climb up to Viewpoint, which still made us all incredibly sweaty, it's really high up, but the view is stunning, as the 2 symetrical bays sweet across surronded by high mountains. There wasnt much of a sunset due to the clouds but the light was still pretty. You also get to pass the tsunami evacuation checkpoint a sure reminder that you'd never get up there in time!! We climbed back down and went to get ready before all heading to Papaya for dinner, a recommended by other people restaurant, which had lovely food, very basic restaurant, but the portions are MASSIVE!!! So nobody could finish theres despite no lunch!! Libby, Frankie and I then went to a Ladyboy show at
a bar, with thai boxing and all, it was kind of like a cheap version of vegas!! Some of them are a lot more obviously men than others! After a bit of a dance, not with the ladyboys, we headed back to a different bar before calling it a night. Phi Phi definaltey has a lot more young people and nightlife than most places we've been which is nice for a change!!
Wednesday brought a disappointing breakfast and then onto do some chores- dropping off laundry with libby telling them scrubbing bad, washing machine good, in the hopes we wouldnt end up with dirty water and scrubbed clothes! Booked our bus tickets to malaysia and headed to the pier as i thought we might get a better rate on a boat than the travel agencies. After all this we headed to the beach, to lie in the sun, swim in the sea, read, all the usual, before it clouded over again at 3/4pm, luckily though by this point i was boiling hot so ready to retire!! Libby and I did a bit more charging before we all met for dinner, Jenny (The Geek) included. We managed to totally manipulate
the situation to end up at the italain where we wanted to go, which was lovely! Katie and Frankie are returning home early having run out of money so they're on a much tighter budget than us, we also think they're beginning to hate each other, they're friends from uni(norwich met, but never lived together or anything- citing travellin as a drunken convo)!We popped into the Irish Bar for a quick game of Connect 4 before heading back at 10ish for a deserved sleep!!
Thursday was one of the best days ive had since being away- we had a group brekkie, said goodbye to the geek and then went off to catch our private longtail boat- the stefunnee! First we started by snorkeling kind of in the middle of the ocean, where i realised my immense fear of fish touching me, im ok with it when im scuba diving aka one of them, but as a person floating at the surface, eventually we got over our hysterical girl screaming and enjoyed watching them, lots of angel fish. But the snorkels we'd hired were so cheap they were broken so instead we just watched from the surface. Next up was
a secluded beach which had literally 4 other people on and the bluest seas, about 6thai kids came running out into the sea at one point and tried to play with me- which involved a lot of splashing!! Maya Bay, the next stop on our tour, was the set of the beach, you have to pay to go literally on the beach so instead we took photos from the boat, had a little float around the bay, before something started stinging, so Libby and Frankie who were still on the boat were too scared to get off. Finally popped off at monkey island- no monkeys as tide was high- i was grateful, and Long Beach for a drink. We went the whole way around both Phi Phi Leh and Phi Phi Don through the day which was just as beautiful as the literal stops. There was one hairraising moment when we were crossing just behind a ferry whose wake literally swelled up higher than anything in the world, so all screaming and hanging on for dear lives as it the bow rose up forever, luckily it came back down gently and we survived! After dinner we met for drinks, up
in their dorm with swedes, cards and buckets, which didnt make getting up the next day nice. I also achieved one of my thai goals in getting a corn on the cob on the way home which was lush.
We had a ferry at 9 so headed down at 840 to secure seats in the most air conditioned ferry of my life, which was a welcome break, despite the consequential cold! Missing Phi Phi already! We spent literally the WHOLE DAY on a minibus the first one i had the sunbeating on me and got no air con, the second libby was squashed between two smelly geeky boys and I was next to the speaker blasting thai pop music!! We eventually arrived at Penang, stopped for some noodles on the street corner which were covered in chilli! Then we went to the guesthouse we'd booked only to sadly find it disgusting and the creepy man who worked there when i walked up in the pitch black was like go in i was like sorry what? He thought i was his 'guest' and was telling me to go straight into the room, needless to say we ran away and choose
somewhere cheaper with free internet!!
Today (sat) we had a nice late start, chaning rooms to non a/c for half the price, had a bite to eat, used the internet to get up photos and blog. We wondered around Georgetown, which is remarkably civilised- people actually walk on the pavement thus looked at us jaywalkers in confusion!! Malaysia seems a lot more western in some ways, like the motorways are completely western, there are loads of cars etc but at the same time all the restaurants are malay, no western cafes etc, which is good culturally but so different. We managed to stumble upon a chocolate shop with 5 rooms of samples etc which was a nice treat and we werent persuaded into buying any!! Tonight we're going out for a nice meal to celebrate 2 months of being away!
Tomorrow we're seeing the sites, before going to the beach for 2days on monday, maybe a trip to the Highlands,then onto KL and Melaka before being in Singapore next tuesday. 2 weeks till we fly to Oz so time in South East Asia is running out.......
Hope all is well in england, with all this snow etc!!
Lots of love xxxxxxxxxx
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PappaK
non-member comment
Great times
Phi Phi looks really good - glad you got to chill, even tho the dorm party looked like one not to wake up from. Good also to see the famous buckets and that mad Kelly pre rather than post the buckets. Great that you're having a chilled time. I'd enjoy the beaches rather than the cold highlands - spoken from the cold highlands of Kerala. lv dadx