Koh Phi Phi, Thailand

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This trip started with rushing through dinner and running to get a taxi to get to the pier just to find out that we were an hour early. Like many other situations during this trip, it was not our fault, we were lied to. By arriving early we would end up spending money at the local businesses that our booking agent was friends with. It really didn't take long to discover this reoccurring situation. During our hour, I sat there and even though I wanted to buy some snacks or a beer I held out. We boarded our night boat in an unsafe and unorganized fashion as usual that could've easily ended in someone falling off the narrow boarding plank into the ocean with all their belongings. The first thing I though of upon entry into the cabin was Noah's Ark. The whole thing was empty and on either side of the cabin were narrow mats, side by side all the way up and down. At no point in the last 6 to 9 months had they considered taking some of the substantial earnings and cleaning the mats or the pillows. One side of my pillow resembled something that looked like black mold, thankfully the other side was more of white shade so I was able to put my face on that. The fans no longer oscillated so every third person was mildly comfortable as far as temperature was concerned. The rest of us were left to sweat all over the linens for the next batch of unfortunate travels. To this whole experience off, the waters were rough so the boat was swaying quite a bit which meant we would slide forward and then back. It's amazing that I was able to get any sleep whatsoever, but I managed to pass out for a few hours. I awoke to the lights coming on and the boat driver laying on the air horn at 5 am. There are probably more civilized ways to alert your paying customers of their arrival, but then again it is Thailand.

When we purchased the tickets we were told that a bus would be waiting for us at the pier, which we soon found out was also incorrect. We were herded like cattle into a taxi and by taxi I mean the back of a truck half the size of a Sonoma. They were able to pack 12 of us into a vehicle that should hold 6, uncomfortably. We were taken to a little cafe were they had us wait for 1.5 hours for absolutely no reason except for the fact that they wanted us to buy breakfast from them, which was no doubt all in the family. I used the restroom and when I came out they said, “It's 10 baht for the toilet service.” To this I replied, “There was no service performed in there....if anything I serviced myself, haha!” I took our the biggest bill I had which was a 1000 and handed it to her. I knew that she had no way to break it so needless to say my toilet service was free, as it should be. I know that sounds kinda cheap on my part but when your time is consistently wasted so people can make money for a 3rd party, it tends to get on your nerves. They should just charge more for the tickets and give them the cash.

Finally they packed us back in the taxi and took us to the bus station were yet again we had to sit at a little shop for another 35 minutes before we could leave in the bus. Now 2 hours behind schedule, we were on our way to Krabi. This bus ride was supposed to take 3 hours and of course it took 5. This in part was due to the numerous stops on the side of the road so the driver could take a leak while the rest of us held it. We arrived in Krabi at 12:30, bought our ferry tickets to Koh Phi Phi pronounced (co pee pee) and grabbed lunch. The ferry only took 1.5 hours and we finally we arrived at our destination.

I promise that entire travel experience was worth it for the time we spent and the things we experienced on beautiful Koh Phi Phi. Think of this island as a figure eight, the east and west ends are inaccessible by the 2 motorbikes and one car on the island. If you want to explore those areas it's either on foot or by boat. The north end is one of the most beautiful beaches I've ever seen in my life, standing on the beach and looking out to the left and right are limestone cliffs and strait ahead looks out into the open ocean. Then to the south is more beach and the pier where all the boats arrive.

After finding accommodation we spoke to numerous dive shops to figure out the rates and just to feel them out in general, we didn't want a place that was too commercialized. We ended up choosing a place called Phi Phi Sea Frog dive shop. The people were friendly and most importantly they were honest with us. They told us it would be best to wait a day for the visibility to get better, so we did just that.

The first day we went familiarized ourselves with the island and hung out on the beach. We did a little shopping and just took it easy after our hellish travel experience. Day two we arrived at the dive shop to do some diving.

We only ended up doing a total of 4 dives in Koh Phi Phi, but were fortunate enough to see what some divers have never seen if their lives. I could list all the crazy fish we saw but I'm sure most would have no idea what they are. I could not have identified the majority of them before I started diving in Asia, so I won't bore you with the details. I've posted some pictures of what we saw so you can see how beautiful the coral and sea life is on this side of the world. The thing I would like to discuss is my whale shark encounter. During and directly after this experience I had no idea how lucky I truly was to experience this in the particular conditions I did. First, the dive master I was with had seen 4 whale sharks prior to this one in 1.5 years of diving almost everyday. Second, whale sharks eat plankton so typically they hangout in water that tends to be murky because of the overwhelming amount of plankton, this day however, was clear as could be, I could see the surface in about 65 feet of water. Third, usually whale sharks will get nervous around groups of divers and swim off. I swam with this shark for about 10 minutes and it could've been longer but my dive buddy literally ran out of air and had to buddy breath with the dive master back to the surface. Lastly, at one point I was swimming next to the whale shark and it turned suddenly, made eye contact with me and swam directly at me. Now I know there has never been an incident of a diver being swallowed by a whale shark but when you have a 16ft. shark swimming directly towards you with it's 4ft wide mouth open it tends to be intimidating. I had to let air out and propel myself down in the water to avoid colliding with it. It was honestly one of the most surreal and est experiences of my life. It feels good to know that you've experienced one of your top life goals, I think I was smiling for like 3 days.

Our last day on the island we decided to book a tour to Maya Bay. This is where the movie the beach was filmed so we wanted to check it out seeing as we were so close. I'm typically not the tour booking type but after talking with some people it seemed that it was the best value. We left at 1:30 from the main pier and headed to monkey beach. Yup, exactly what you would think....a bunch of monkeys hanging out on the beach. I won't elabarate too much because I think the one picture sums up the important parts. Next stop we went to a cave were birds nest soup is harvested. Birds called a Swifflets build nests with their saliva in these enormous caves and handfuls of Thais live in these caves year round and take the nests once the bird is done with it. Then they sell the nests to the Chinese for a very high dollar. I'm not sure the amount but I do know they've allocated some islands strictly for harvesting these nests.

Next stop was a beautiful inlet with more limestone cliffs, here we snorkeled around the reefs and swam for about an hour or so. We saw about the same things as we did while diving, minus the whale shark. After snorkeling we piled back into the boat and headed to the backside of Phi Phi Leh, which is another island and also home to “The Beach.”

We jumped off the boat and swam about 50 yards towards a tiny hole cut out of the rock wall that concealed the island from the ocean. We swam to the hole and the tide did the rest of the work pushing us through to the other end. Once we got to our feet on the other side we were on the island, it kinda felt like Pirates of the Caribbean, minus the pirates.. From here we made our way through a path cut out of the jungle and about 5 minutes later we arrived at the beach! I kinda made fun of the whole thing because I though the movie sucked and I've seen scenes from Hollywood movies before and they are never the same. This however was different, it was better than what I remembered from the movie. The only thing that was different was that they used a computer generated image to make this cover completely secluded, apposed to the way it really looks today with a outlet to the ocean in the middle of the limestone cliffs. The beach is actually named Maya Bay and until I arrived here the most beautiful place I had ever seen before this was Hill Inlet in the Whitsunday Islands, Maya Bay tied Hill Inlet for first place.

We played a game of pick up soccer on the beach with some locals, it was a lot of fun. I never remember how much I miss the game until I play it. However, the sand makes it 10 times as hard! After the game we just lazed around on the beach and swam a little bit before heading out to the boat for our sunset cruise back to Koh Phi Phi. I got a great seat at the front of the boat, the weather was perfect and the breeze was refreshing. They served us dinner right where we sat and we relaxed and watched the sun go down over the horizon. This was paradise! Upon arrival back to the dock the tide had risen so everyone had to wade through waist deep water to get back to shore, it was pretty funny actually.

We headed back to the room to shower and relax for a little bit before heading out to see a newly certified dive master complete his snorkel test. Some people in the industry regard this as the most important portion of the certification process. They put the guy on stage at the bar and draw all attention to him. They explain that he's just completed all the necessary PADI requirements and as soon as he passed his snorkel test he'll be a true dive master. They put a snorkel and mask on him, the mask so he can't breath through his nose and the snorkel for the funnel to dump anything they want into. This guy got it pretty easy by having to chug a vodka redbull bucket, and two shots of Jagermister through his snorkel. Once he finished they gave him a shot of plain vodka and a beer, he had passed!

I was pretty exhausted from the days festivities and we had an early morning because we had to catch the ferry back to Krabi and catch our flight to Kuala Lumpur so I headed back to the room to get some shut eye! Next stop Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

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Photos

Koh Phi Phi, Thailand
Limestone rising out of the crystal clear water.

Koh Phi Phi, Thailand
A little beach hidden by the limestone walls.

Phi Phi Don, Thailand
The entrance to Maya Bay, (The Beach) on Phi Phi Don island.

Phi Phi Don, Thailand
On "The Beach," well I'm in the water by the beach!

Phi Phi Don, Thailand
Looking in on the beach.

Koh Phi Phi, Thailand
My only regret is that I could not get the video camera out in time.

Comments

[Jess]

photos!
You took amazing photos!!! Love the diving shots, just beautiful! Now, let's talk about how freaken skinny you have gotten! Geez. If I know Darlene, you'll be fattened up in no time. Oh, one more thing. The pic of you in the water in Phi Phi looks totally fake and photo shopped, which is really weird, cause I know better. But doesn't it?!?!