The Hangover 3, day 2

Koh Phi Phi day 2

Now for the account of day 2 – I was originally going to put days 1 and 2 together, but it was have been WAY too long.

I can’t fully remember what time Karima and I returned to our hotel from the beach party, but it was quite late. Fortunately, we were able to sleep in until about 11 – it was also raining all morning so we didn’t miss much. When I woke up, I had sand in my hair; body paint still on my arms, back, and face; and a burn on my foot from the flaming skipping rope. A night well spent, I would say!

  

The orientation/Australian people were going on an all day booze cruise, but we decided we wanted to do something else. There are tours offered to a nearby smaller island, Koh Phi Phi Leh (uninhabited). These tours feature snorkelling and a stop at Maya bay – a very beautiful beach where the movie “The Beach” was filmed. These cost about 350 Baht including national park fees, so we thought it was a good deal, and would be a good way to pass the afternoon. However, it was still raining a bit and the agency we approached wasn’t sure if the tours would be running and told us to come back later. We had breakfast in an Indian/Thai restaurant and tried and failed to coordinate things with other people around. After breakfast, the rain stopped so we were able to buy our tickets.

At 1:30pm, we left the agency for the pier. The walk consisted of us following a man on a bicycle through the streets. There are no cars in the main village on Koh Phi Phi, and you get around on foot or on a bike. You would be walking along, and suddenly hear a Thai person yelling “Beep! Beep!” at you...slightly chaotic. The closest thing back home it reminded me of was the village at Mont Tremblant. There were restaurants, tour agencies, guesthouses and shops EVERYWHERE. It was somewhat unreal. Also, several open air tattoo parlours where you can get the famous Thai bamboo tattoos. Anyway, our walk also took us through the part of the town where the locals live – it was much shabbier and the pathways were all muddy. It makes you feel really bad about your accommodation, etc., on the island when you see how the locals live. 

We eventually made it to the pier, and were loaded into our long-tail boat. These are one of the iconic images of travelling in southern Thailand. We had the option of going in a speedboat, but it was more expensive, and we wanted to ride in the long-tail boat anyway. Our first stop was a cove where there are lots of monkeys. We threw bananas to them, and one even climbed on our boat. We also saw some swimming to get the bananas that had fallen in the water. Twas pretty cool!

From there, we went to our first snorkelling stop in another cove. There were lots of fish to see, and the cove itself was gorgeous with its steep cliffs and turquoise water. At one point, one fish full out attacked me. I must have swam over its rock or something. It actually bit my thigh before I was able to scramble away. It was moderately terrifying and I had/still have a visible bite-mark. I spent a while hoping it wasn’t the variety of fish that is poisonous. It wasn’t very big or anything, just especially territorial I guess. We stopped again at another spot where there was more coral. There were so many different types of fish there: all different shapes, sizes, and colours! I also saw a bunch of clams, urchins and anemones. At one point, I got really excited because I saw one of the types of fish that was featured in “Finding Nemo”. I’m not 8 years old, I swear...

 Our next stop was Maya Bay – It was spectacular. The bay is surrounded by cliffs, which form cave like structures at the bottom. The beach itself was beautiful white sand, and the water was the famous light turquoise colour. We wandered around the beach, looking for seashells and crabs. After about an hour, we hopped back into our boat and headed back to the main island. At this point, it was actually quite chilly, so I was happy to go back. 

 In the evening, we had dinner at the Thai restaurant again and met up with the group of people from my orientation (who also decided to eat at a fancy restaurant)(I don’t know how they can afford to do so!).  From there, we went to Patty’s Pub, where we were greeted by free shots from the owner. The owner, Patty from Ireland, also sat down with us and discussed what it was like to run a business on Koh Phi Phi – it sounded like no fun. He rattled off some pretty steep figures for rent and whatnot, and also mentioned something about the Koh Phi Phi mafia. He was closing up shop and recommended we go to another bar, “Banana Bar”. On Koh Phi Phi, you can also buy “Do-It-Yourself” buckets of alcohol that include a can of pop, an energy drink, and a mickey of the alcohol of your choice. A few times, we stopped to by those with various friends. 

Banana Bar was alright, but I wasn’t really feeling the bar vibe. I also didn’t want to stay out too late (ha) because of the late night the day before, and NYE coming up.  After a while, Karima and I left to wander, but we got a call from one of Karima’s friends mentioning something about night swimming. We thought that might be fun, so we went to the northern beach again. On the way, we stopped to talk to various people, including people from Sweden, Russia, and Australia. Once we arrived, we decided there were too many people walking around who might potentially steal our stuff. That, and there were several guys peeing in the water. So we decided to just chill on the beach, which was what I was most interested in anyway. Another Australian guy also came by and decided to join us. It was quite nice, but I was super tired. We ended up leaving the beach around 4am. The plan was to catch the 9am ferry the next day to Phuket. Wooooo...