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Published: August 29th 2010
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Koh Phi Phi
The island from the view point The bus stopped in the middle of nowhere at some awful, antisocial time of the morning and those of us going to Phuket had to get onto a mini-bus, which was a lot more comfortable than the big bus. I sat with my arm out of the window, which was well stupid as it was burnt to a crisp when we eventually arrived. On our last legs, we started the final part of our journey, a two hour boat trip to Phi Phi (also often spelt Pee Pee) island. We had travelled by every conceivable form of transport in the last three days - train, car, plane, taxi, tuk tuk, bus, mini bus and boat - and finally we could relax.
Koh Phi Phi is actually two islands - Phi Phi Don and Phi Phi Le. The main one, where everyone stays is Phi Phi Don, which consists of a narrow strip of land, lined on each side by long golden beaches, linking two uninhabited rocky islands. It was complete paradise, which is obviously why it was used in the movie, The Beach. It’s the sort of romantic paradise that you should visit as a couple, not with four other
Arriving on Koh Phi Phi
Mike and Andy arriving on the main beach blokes. Never mind, it was still a fantastic place to go for a week.
The accommodation was basic to say the least, which is actually fine by me as the island was not crowded with people and has not been destroyed by huge great hotels, as is the case on Phuket. For a pound each we had two huts nested in between the palm trees, each containing a bed and a smelly squat toilet. Given that the change of climate and diet was likely to effect all our digestive systems, we all agreed that we would only use the toilets by the beach. We had been promised showers (a priority in this heat), but these turned out to be a well and a bucket with holes in.
The days on Koh Phi Phi were complete relaxation. There was the odd highlight, like the day we took a boat trip to Phi Phi Le and to do some snorkelling. And on another day, it was fun watching some local Thais annihilate the "we are such shit hot football players" British. I just watched as my involvement would only have made matters worse.
In the evening we would go
Island Hut
Our luxury accommodation amongst the palm trees for a meal in the village and then a bar to watch a movie or, if we were in the mood, the beach bar to get ratted. Thai-whiskey will probably make us go blind but it gets results!
We even eventually managed to get used to the heat at night and the sound of coconuts falling on the roof.
Unfortunately, Alan, who had actually eaten some of the Russian food, was now quite ill and Mike had burnt his feet, which puffed-up really rather badly. We all also overdid it in the sun, which was considerably hotter than it was on Brighton beach, where of course we never went when we were supposed to be in lectures. Despite the odd bit of burning we left Koh Phi Phi with tans to be proud of, albeit safe in the knowledge that skin cancer is probably now a dead-cert. At least we wouldn’t look so pasty-white and out of place when we got back to Bangkok.
Quite often in the evening, we'd see boats leaving, taking couples off for a romantic night by themselves on any one of the beaches that could only be reached by boat. Come the
Boat Trip
On the boat trip around Phi Phi Don and Phi Phi Le morning, I expect that they'll be desperately hoping that the boat owner remembers go back and pick them up in the morning.
We've heard that the island is a lot more developed now (decimated by what I've heard) with that strip of land now taken over by huge hotels, along with some of the other beaches as well. No more romantic get-aways, sadly. We also heard that it was a beach on Phi Phi Le that was used for the movie and was made so popular that they've had to close it to the public before it was permanently ruined. I can't remember if we got to visit that on our boat trip.
We stayed here for ten days, but I won't bore you with ten separate blog entries as we didn't do a lot and they all consisted of pretty much the same routine.
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