Railay Railay Nice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Arrive in Railay!!

We arrived in Railay after a 2 hour ferry trip from Ko Lanta and a transfer from the ferry to a long tail boat (whilst in the middle of the ocean) which took us to our destination. Getting off the long tail boat was somewhat difficult as Railay does not have a pier- they just tilt the boat the to one side and you have to jump off with all your luggage whilst still being in the sea. A few bags actually went into the sea - thankfully ours was not one of them. We both knew as soon as we stepped off the boat that Railay was going to be good! As soon as we stepped onto the sand there was such a great atmosphere. Railay is very similar to Phi Phi in the way that two bays meet in the middle but Railay is far less commercialised and crowded. It felt more like Jamaica with all the dreadlocks and Rasta’s playing guitars on the beach. There are still lots of bars but they are really chilled out where you can sit or lay on the cushions they provide you with as you sip on your sex on the beach J The beach that we got off the beach at was Railay West and this beach was stunning with fantastic sunsets. Our first night we just sat on one of the mats on the sand at a local bar and watched a perfect sunset.

As with Phi Phi there are no roads on Railay and no-one to help you with your bags or show you where to go. We found a map on the beach which told us where our hotel was, typically the other side of the bay. In the stifling 36 degree heat we put our bags on and began to traipse over to Railay East. The only downside to Railay is that there are still many developments going on between the West and East side but this didn’t make any difference to our stay. We understood that they were still rebuilding everything after the Tsunami but given another couple of months everything will be back to normal. The walk to our hotel was the hardest walk we had done with our bags so far. We reckon we must have lost several pints of water in sweat just getting there. When we finally reached our residence we looked up to find the steepest set of stairs that we needed to climb in order to get to reception to book in. We thought about counting them but there was just too many - we reckon there must have been more than a hundred. With us already sweating buckets with backpacks the size of houses on our backs we nearly collapsed by the time we finally reached reception. (see pic of Stu) The receptionist laughed when she saw us and poured us a nice cool juice whilst we booked in. We had booked a bungalow with a mountain view (it was the cheapest thing we could get) but what it didn’t say on the internet was that you had to climb half way up the mountain from reception to get to it! When we got there it was certainly different from the places we have stayed so far. The only thing around our little log cabin was woodland and a mountain face - lets just say Kerry wouldn’t be watching any of her scary films about people getting chopped up in woods whilst she was there. The cabin was quite big but had a really steep set of stairs going down to the bathroom - good job we didn’t get too drunk there otherwise we could have both been a mangled mess on the floor downstairs. Its amazing what noises you hear at night when you are in the middle of nowhere, up a mountain hill side and slap bang in the middle of a forest. We quickly learnt not to ask each other too many questions about what we heard at night (such as the scratching on the bed posts, the chirping from above our heads, the rustling from outside the door). We later found out the morning we were leaving at about 4.20am that these noises were a big fat stinking rat!! Needless to say we were glad to be rid.

Our first day was spent chilling on the beach in the morning. In the afternoon we took a trip over to the local town called Ao Nang by long tail boat to stock up on supplies. We had some lunch in a Scandinavian café before we set off back to Railay for the evening which consisted of another sunset, another spot of tea, a couple of bevs and finishing off with a really good Reggae band keeping us chilled to the core!

Our second day we decided to book a one day canoeing tour to an inland sea at a place called Bor Thor. There were two to a canoe so it made it much easier - especially as Kerry only had to pretend to paddle whilst Stu did all the hard work. The inland sea that we canoed through was stunning - it was more like a wide river that took us to some magnificent scenery of mangrove forests and tunnels through limestone mountains where many stalactites and stalagmites sprouted around us. We then followed our guide to Tham Pee Hau Toh which is a cave where many prehistorical cave paintings and layers of fossilised shells are clearly visible. We spent about 20 minutes exploring the cave before getting back in our canoes and carrying on to Tham Khoa Wang and its gorgeous inner lagoon. The first part of our day was over so we went and had lunch - very very tasty. Our afternoon was unfortunately a bit of a let down. We were taken to Tha Pom which is a clear fresh water lagoon where we were due to go swimming. Yet more stunning scenery. The only problem was that we chose to come here on a Sunday and all the pools here were chocca block full with local school kids. We didn’t bother going in as all the kids were bathing in shorts and t-shirts and Kerry had brought her white string bikini which had as much material on it as dish cloth. We headed back to Ao Nang and back to our place to watch yet another sunset. Unfortunately as we sat down to watch it a massive bolt of lightning came out of nowhere (strange as there were no rain clouds) followed by a huge clap of thunder. It scared the living crap out of us especially as we didn’t expect it - WEIRD! Half an hour later the clouds appeared and it started raining - HARD! So we actually missed the sunset for once. We both decided to have an early night and save our funds so we went back to our hut to chill the FD.

The next day we decided to do some exploring of Railay on our own. We read in our guide book that we could take a hike along the trail to Sa Phra Nang (Holy Princess Pool), a hidden lagoon inside the cliff. It did mention that “this hike is not for the weak or vertigo prone, it is not a long hike but a very strenuous one and at times very dangerous” - YOU’RE NOT CHUFFING KIDDING!!!!! We made our way to the start of the “trail” it turned out to be what most people would call a cliff. There were no harnesses or safety equipment - just a manky old rope to hold onto and pull yourself up with. There were also quite a few tree roots and bits of rock that you could also grab onto to make progress. The “free, (unprotected) rock climbing up an down 15ft sheer faces” suddenly became a reality. There were a few Americans climbing up when we arrived so we waiting a couple of minutes to take on water and prepare ourselves for a climb which could potentially be fatal if your foot slips. The climb was actually easier than it looked as there were so many rocks and roots to grab onto. We just didn’t really want to look down. We took it nice and slowly (especially in this heat) and eventually made it to the top. There were several trails to choose from but we didn’t manage to take the right one. We chose the one which brought us out to the breathtaking view point which looked over the whole of Railay (see pic). The scenery was amazing - we could see right through from one end of the bay to the other. We set off in search for the lagoon but got told by some Swedish guy who had nearly done himself a mischief trying to find it himself only to find a slimy old mud pit with no water in and a ridiculously steep climb down to it. We decided to give it a miss and started our descent. The only thing was we had to go down the way we came up. Every hand and foot hold had to be planned carefully as it was sooooo steep. We finally reached the bottom covered in red clay but had such a wicked experience, it was well worth it! We continued on the trail around the bottom of the mountain which brought us out at a gorgeous beach which we had not been to before. We washed ourselves clean and walked along the beach as far as we could go. The cliffs extended out from the beach into the sea which meant that we either had to get a boat around to our bay or if your names Stu and Kez - SWIM! We were careful to stick as close to the cliffs as possible because long tail boats came buzzing past every couple of minutes. It took us about half an hour to reach our bay but thankfully we had a couple of rocks to rest on , on our way around. When we finally got to our beach we just collapsed on our towels and chilled out for an hour or so. This was our last day in Railay and had to be up early the next day (5am) for our travels to Langkawi in Malaysia. Railay is our favourite place so far - we would definitely recommend it to anyone for a holiday!

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Photos

It aint half hot Mum!
Stu post climb to our mountain retreat!

Comments

[Bowena]

STOOOBZ
stay out of the sun you barstools!!!! We are gunna look sooooo pasty against you two at the wedding. Woo wedding soon! Yeay! Love ya xoxox