Lots to catch up on

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Sooo much has gone on since the last entry! From the beautiful beaches of Rai Lei we took a boat over to another island on the west coast, Koh Phi Phi. Seems like the west side is a lot more scenic than the east.
Koh Phi Phi got hit pretty hard by the tsunami and its not hard noticing both the damage to the building and trees...
The island was obviously filled with many tourists as well as hard working locals. We were told that many people were killed on the island, but by the friendly nature of these people, we would never have known. We spent 3 nights on the island and throughout this time, we were able to once again relax much like the rest of our trip.
Our first full day kevin decided to book a trip to go snorkelling. Since i had not been in the water due to my accident, i decided to go for a swim early in the morning to see if my arm could handle the water. Fortunately, I passed the test and my arm felt great so i decided to go along on the trip. The snorkelling ended up being mediocre....BUT we did get a chance to capture our first glimpse at a Black tipped Shark. Neither of us were too scared since there have never been any instances of these types of sharks attacking humans...or so we were told prior to our dive.
On our last full day we decided to get our own guide who drove us on a long boat. Our guide took us to the most beautiful areas where the water was an unforgettable clear aqua. We noticed that even the fish were friendly in thailand...hundreds swam up to us at a time. Our driver than took us to the island where the movie 'The Beach' was filmed. Once again, the water was incredible! The island had no hostels/guesthouses and the actual beach was a little different to how it looked in the movie. We were then driven to a spot near 'the beach' to snorkel, and i spotted my second shark! This time, it was a lot more scary since it was swimming closer to the top and eyed me down from quite far away. Just before getting back in the boat, i spotted an eel which exceeded 3 meters in length. After our long day of snorkelling, we were informed about an amazing lookout spot atop a mountain on the island of Koh Phi Phi. The climb up was probably one of the hardest things i have ever done! But it payed off once we were up there...The view and sunset were both incredible.
It was tough to leave Koh Phi Phi...
On to Phuket...
Many people had told us that it was nothing special, but we decided to go in with an open mind. The beach was beautiful, but the nightlife, like many other places in thailand was terrible. Unless prostitutes are your thing...In Phuket we stayed in Karon...
Came back to Bankok and the travelled up north to chian mai. We will be going on a trek for the next 2 days which include white water rafting, elephant riding & much more....And then on to Laos...
Sorry for the delay between this entry and the last....i will try to write on a more regular basis..
Hope everyone is well!

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Photos

'The Beach'
This pic was taken at the same location that the movie 'the beach' was filmed

Long boat
Was taken off the long boat...we stopped here to snorkel for a bit

The Boys
The boat crew...

Koh Phi Phi
A view from above

The beach2
A pic of our private long boat on 'the beach'

Phuket..
sunset in phuket