Standing on the Northeastern shore of Lankawi island you can see the silhouette of the closest islands of the Ko Tarutao Marine National Park a mere 3 kilometers away. The problem is that Lankawi is Malaysian and Ko Tarutao is Thai territory. To get between the two we had to get a ferry to Satun on the Thai mainland to pass through immigration (2 hours), a pick-up and a taxi along the coast to another port called Pak Bara (90 minutes), and then a ferry out to the islands (up to 4 hours). Chucking in the waiting time, from a pre-dawn start we arrived in the last light of the day. We had chosen to visit the most distant of the island group, called Ko Lipe, as the guidebook promised an appealing combination of available accommodation
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