29 JULY 2000 Ferry to Phi Phi
A quick 20 minute look around the fair at Krabi was enough to convince us we were not missing much. Rachel came back with a Longines watch and proudly declared 'It's a Fake'.
The boat to Phi Phi was almost empty and since they too had experienced several poor days with rain many were heading back to Krabi. As it turned out our timing was much almost perfect.
On arrival we took a long tailed boat to Ma Proa as near to Long Beach as he would go because of the surf and low tide height (220B).
In fact it was unsatisfactory for swimming in spite of glorious weather. We had to complete the difficult journey with full rucksacks over rain soaked ground on foot including descending a steep slope holding onto the mass of overhead ropes for rucksack carriers with free hands (on our first visit years ago a single rope had to suffice). By the time we arrived the sun was shining and the beach was full of sunbathers. There were several European families like ours but the vast majority was adult backpackers.
From Paradise Pearl we hired a M3 medium sized bungalow for ourselves or 450B and large bungalow (M15 500B) with two double beds for Judy and two more M3's for Jim. The next day they changed for two doubles each on the beach for 600B. The bungalows were a good condition with full mosquito protection.
The large restaurant roofed but otherwise open to the air was good without quite the finesse of Kotung but was 50% more expensive. In the early evening they display the fresh fish catches for dinner by special order and could choose the manner of cooking eg green curry. We missed out that our first day but never again.
Swimming wonderful, scenery magnificent, sand almost silver from coral reef just offshore, lots of fine shells to collect. Out came the camera.
The restaurant was almost full for dinner but the service was fairly quick and above all cheerful. A Star Wars video was playing so Alice and Hazel went over to look and on return were quizzed on return, was it Star Wars I or II and the precise style of the headdresses.
30 July Everyone slept well. Air Con was by fan playing directly over heads which suited met but not Joan. I hope Judy has a good night so far the heat, humidity, smelly shower, mosquitoes and even the young children had been too much for her in Krabi. Gary has been great at playing with the children but Judy had ended up carrying Joe home on her shoulders.
I took the advantage of the early light to go out with the camera, the colour of the surf, of coral segments protruding from the sea.There were two other like minded people with SLR's, Jim and Alice were the only others out early strolling at the edge of the sea.
We four went for a swim and Anne-Marie and Hazel who I guess had been watching us from the bungalow soon joined us. Alice was given a big selection of shells by the Sea Gypsies.
We all went swimming after breakfast but thereafter I kept out of the way with a worsening cold and read the Bangkok Post (in English I guess, never having tried to master Thai Alphabet symbols).
Thai Politics 2000
Following the last elections it had taken 5 months to select and re-elect the members of the Senate and the dispute now was to elect a Speaker. Chuan Leepai is still PM as he has been for 9 years since 1992, before him it was military rule. There had been concern about vote buying and other corruption 'can no longer be regarded as a valid form of wealth redistribution'. 'An independent body will now vet Congress but that too is expected to be corrupt so a third level will be needed to scout them. Special harsh measures are needed to combat entrenched corruption'. The Electoral Commission is to be given powers to revoke the election rights of candidates found guilty of campaign fraud, even to the point of dissolving an entire political party As I write in 2015 there is still electoral chaos with the military back in charge of that country and the revered old king nearing the end of his reign.
Another article concerned a 45 year old illiterate woman Sa-ing Tawaisin on hunger strike to draw attention to the poor the main losers in the increased organisation of production, particularly forest management and the use of outside firms. She had started protesting in 1990 against the scheme to take farm land from villagers in her village Dong Mae Ped to plant eucaluptus trees for paper making.
There are 40 hunger strikers protesting about lay offs in front of Government House
Korean Politics 2000
Kim-Jong II has suddenly become a cult figure following his formal meeting with the South Korea leader Bae-lo-Shak, now a Kim look alike. Kim has adopted bouffant hair style, a Mao jacket, oversized sun glasses and 5 inch lift to shoes. He was previously seen as the despot at the helm of a rogue nation with a large nuclear arsenal. 90% of the southern people polled thought Kim deserved a Nobel prize. The Korean war ended without a Peace Treaty and they thought he needed help with a population of 22 million and a failing economy.
31 July Time for today's reminiscences are another indication I was doing my own thing away from the crowd because of my cold. Joan and I are feeling the heat and I developed a soar throat a few days ago and now she has it.
First a note about menus for example the special offers were
1) Large White Snapper for two at 180B each cooked in three flavour Thai sauce, slightly hot (picante) and sweet.
2) Mixed Sea Food for two at 150B each, crab, clams, mussels, shrimps cooked in hot Thai coconut curry sauce.
3) Plates of Six large Prawns for 150B
4) Smaller Snapper for one at 140B
The all-day breakfasts were served as complete plates of croisantes, chocolate and nut cakes, banana and nut cakes.
Confusion occurred at meal time because the waiters who took our orders spoke a little English but not so those who delivered the food, resulting in frequent concern about the match between order and receipt. Not helped because we were by far the largest party and we tended to order in at least three parts.
Dinner was always a struggle, Rachel was really great throughout with her behaviour but the rest were not quite old enough. Alice, Hazel and Joe are difficult and Hazel sometimes insists on French fries and egg, though they like food cooked in batter eg squid, chicken pieces. They could drink Fanta and eat bread, cheese burgers, chocolate cake, banana cake, and ice cream all day.
I am always amazed by the number of backpackers who ate an American fast food diet of burgers and chips and drink milk shakes in the face of all this lovely unique Thai food. But few backpackers drunk beer - it was too expensive, but not for us, so it accounted for half the cost of dinner, typically 1600B for all ten of us.
Long Beach is beautiful clean with a silvery gold texture the sea a light turquoise colour turning to deep blue where it passes over coral - I am sure we were right to come straight here in spite of the hard walking of long ups and steep slippery downs.
Our Paradise Pearl is well run, more than can be said for the third of three GHs on the beach. It is now wall to wall but not obtrusively so and there is a fair speaking of sun worshipers lying on the sand. Long Beach remains a backpackers resort in spite of higher prices 300-450B even in low season like this and at least double that in winter. Green corrugated roofs, white newly decorated walls, tiled verandas and interiors. Very comfortable. Unfortunately next door they are building new wooden framed bungalows in front of those existing, encroaching further onto the beach. This delightful quiet place too will be spoiled by over expansion
At the correct state of the tide there is superb snorkelling over the reef, to high and the coral is too deep to be seen well, too shallow and you have to wade carefully over the reef avoiding damage and the sea urchins. Yellow blue striped fish, turquoise and purple, phosphorescent blues, black and white spotted fish, sea cucumbers, giant clams embedded in the rocks recognised when their mouths close as you approach.
Sea temperature is lovely, neither too hot nor too cold, so you can stay in for hours but eventually your skin gets waterlogged, and the kids do just this. The steeply shelving sea and the tendency for surf means the kids, particularly Joe and Hazel, need to be well watched in spite of their armbands.
We have just got off the boat which took us for a three hour visit to Phi-Phi Leh having spent the time in the sea inlet snorkeling in deep water.
Joe's first attempt with his dad, a big move on from the near tragedy in the hotel pool in Bangkok, and Rachel having overcome her fears for the first time probably for lack of sight of giant urchins in the deep. Judy stayed behind with Hazel who did not fancy a boat trip, but had to play pretend long tailed boat sitting astride a fallen tree whilst Hazel drove.
Flying fish in great shoals flew out of the water alongside the boat attracted by the noise of the engine.
Hazel is always very easy to amuse as she plays by herself, in contrast Joe is always off and in to everything. After dinner as we are dallying and chatting the girls are watching the video but Joe is outsde in the dark, trying out the hammocks by the beach, getting the Thai boys to play soccer, chasing crabs on the sand for there are hundreds and thousands. Jimmy dug one out of its hole to find it huge and fierce as it scampered away sideways.
Grand-dad 'look at me, regarde moi' say the girls. Rachel now speaks English with a French person's accent, Hazel and particularly Alice are getting fluent in English. Alice will describe the wonderful fish she has seen, the colours, the shapes, the coral, to her parents and only break into French for the really difficult passages.
All three girls are now equipped with Thai wrap around skirts which look so much better than the tiny shorts Rachel was wearing, she is being good as are all four. Hazel is the most prone to tantrums, Alice can sulk, Rachel gets uptight and Joe screams when he is not allowed to use the chopsticks with which he surely will drop all his pad Thai (noodles) down his T-shirt and onto the floor.
Joe is given fruit by the waiters most days, maybe a bunch of bananas or a bag of Lam Yai (?). He is definitely their star with his blue eyes and silver blond hair.
The morning light and the red sunsets are highlights of the day. Early this morning at 7am we walked to the end of the beach and then across to the beach on the opposite side of this narrow, there is no doubt our coast with high cliffs visible is far the more attractive.
The roar of long tailed boats is ever present interrupted by the odd cry of a bird. Bananas ripen on the tree outside our bungalow, there are small coconut trees, which will present danger from falling fruit if allowed to grow tall, we remember the explosive sound of nuts falling on metal roofs from a previous holiday. Grass is always kept short by strimming, we watched a green and cream hooped snake being held up by a stick so its head could be strimmed off to keep us all safe. Trees of Banana, Papaya, coconut, white Garland flowers, many flowers in white orange and yellow. Bushes, grass and small yuccas around the bungalows.
Less than half the girls are topless, there are some beautiful female bodies on display. Though we are probably the only grandparents around there are many families with children aged say 3- 16 years but the vast majority are backpackers.
'This little piggy goes to market, this little piggy stayed home', with toes under warm sea water keeps Rachel and Alice happy, as do handstand competitions in deeper water.
One or two very heavy monsoon showers come and go but mainly it sunny days, the sea whips up easily so its easy to understand why boatmen, unlike in winter, do not come here.
Not too many mosquitoes in well proofed huts like these, but invariable encountered in the shade and after dusk but no worse than the dry season. Judy seems a little happier now, she never relaxes with Joe to look after, but Anne-Marie has no compunction on going off on her own. All agree on the importance of cold showers last thing at night to rid the heat of the day and ensure sound sleep.
Tomorrow I am going with Gary to Krabi to help ensure he gets a good start on his journey back Trang, Bangkok and the UK and work. I intend to get our own rail tickets back from Hat Yai to Bangkok, and Thai money from the bank, cash Jim's Post Office cheques because the rates were poor on Phi-Phi. Even Paradise Pearl charge an extra 3% for card transactions. I will also check my email room Mary and Bryn as promised and from Songkla (Sao) and Pattani (Nok).
When discussing the last few days of our holiday we all agreed the kids would never find anywhere as interesting as here but Anne-Marie was clear 'It's not just their holiday but ours and we want to see more of Thailand for we may not get the chance again'. We planned 5 days 1-2 at Phattalung (Thaleh Noi), 2 days Songkla and maybe 1 at Pattani. It would be nice to contact Samran (our first pick up truck driver) but Trang area as a destination sounded too much like more beaches.
3 August
I woke up at 2 am to hear a tremendous storm and immediately started to worry about Gary's departure in the morning because oo stormy sea and the low tide the long tailed boat to Ton Sai might not leave at 8 am as usual. It was vital to get the morning ferry at 9 am to be able to get to Trang in plenty of time to catch the 17.10 train back to Bangkok. I had visions of having to walk the hard, wet, slippery path along the Phi Phi coast in order to get the ferry. Gary was having similar doubts. We needn't have worried for by 7:30 it was fine again, if overcast, but the sea was as calm as we had seen it. We were in fact the first on the ferry though by departure time it was full of backpackers returning and local Thais headed for the mainland.
The backpackers were a mixture of nationalities but all young between in their twenties and many were reading whereas on the way out many arrivals from Ko Samui had been sleeping like me. To us travel was an incidental part of the holiday, a necessary evil.
Everything went like clockwork in Krabi. I was able to get 200,000B in cash from the bank, Gary had expected me to be limited to my £200 limit in the UK. Thus I was able to purchase our return train tickets from Hat Yai, all in the same carriage but mostly in upper bunks, she told me to come back at 1:30 but waved me in when I was passing the travel agents office an hour earlier. A very efficient delivery of 9 tickets for 5750B, so I asked about hiring an air conditioned minibus and driver for our intended journey to Pattalung. She joked, being done out of business, 'so you're acting as the group tour leader'. A rather a pleasing observation which hadn't previously occurred to me, I was a Thai talking Englishman rather than an English talking Thai. She even offered me a 10% discount at 1800B. So hiring a minibus with driver each time we wanted to move destinations on was the obvious pattern.
Then I chose the right Song Thaew first time, he was already heading for the train station where we found a bus to Trang waiting. Gary said goodbye no doubt relieved it had all gone so smoothly.
As a last resort I checked my aol email in an Internet cafe. Nok had replied twice once to the wrong address the first to bricorbett had been returned but the second correctly on 21 July, the day of our departure to say she was now at the Songkla University, actually in another destination Pattini and only a few minutes from where we had stayed the previous winter, the excellent My Garden hotel in that city. She would be pleased to see us and because of the young children suggested a visit to play in their Kindergarten - back at base everyone thought this was a great idea. We revised plans to 2 nights at Sonkla and a new one at Pattini plus more before boarding the train at Hat Yai.
Before returning to Long Beach I decided to stroll around Ton Sai and was immediately struck by its development since our original visit, a 3or 4 storey PP Hotel with 200 superior substantial wooden chalets over towards the opposite beach. Ton Sai was going rapidly up market, not my scene I preferred the memories of it largely basic and undiscovered, contrasted vividly now with the squalor of the areas where the Thais lived. There were lots more shops and so many places to eat. I bought a Batik T-shirt for Geoff.
At 5pm it looked as though it would be impossible to get a long tailed boat back and so I decided to walk instead, substantial building everywhere but still mainly bungalows many now air conditioned a far cry from the days when we made a point of acclimatising rapidly to the heat of the tropics by avoiding a/c. The Andaman development near Gypsy, where we stayed last winter seemed good, there was a game of pick up football on some spare ground nearby. At the entrance to the Phi-Phi school the path ended forcing you onto the beach up to Ma Prao and the difficult rope aided section.
4 August I had to go to Ton Sai to email Nok in Pattani giving her details of our itinerary. It demonstrates the absence of pre ordained routes one of the beauties of our form of travelling
6 Aug Phattalung
7 Aug am Thaleh Noi
pm travel to Songkla
8 Aug Would like to visits Wannaluks (?) home and Samila beach.
9 Aug am Travel to Pattani
pm Hat Tah (?)
11 Aug am Hope to visit Kindergarten
pm Travel to Hat Yai for train to Bangkok
Judy Anne-Marie and Rachel accompanied me to spend a fine morning shopping, mainly T-shirts for the children with soft animal motifs attached from Anne-Marie, elephants for Hazel and Joe, I bought another two for Geoff. Rachel bought an orange dress and a dainty silver ring with a blue stone.
We had lunch in Mama Pizza where the menu delighted A-M by being in French, above English!, and above phonetic Thai. Judy and Rachel shared a sea food pizza, A-M had a huge plate of mussels in garlic and I settled for squid curry Pla Mak Pad Pet. After finishing we went over to where Mama was eating and were offered Maing Khan a mixture of cashew nuts, chopped onion etc in a sweet and sour sauce put into a leaf (lemon?) and formed into the shape of a cup.
Jim was not so lucky he was snorkeling and dives in to take a closer look just as another snorkeler shot a harpoon which passed near his chest, he bid a hasty retreat to the surface.
Joe has a little girlfriend Saphire whose original group of friends had just left. After dinner we panicked thinking we had lost Joe when Judy was unable to find him on the beach or hammocks. We eventually found playing with Saphire close to the restaurant, Judy had searched far and wide without success. Rachels favourite is still Chicken Island and the lovely sea, she enjoyed our day in town but likes Long Beach much better.
After dinner when everyone else had gone to bed leaving Alice excitingly discussing with Jim the colours and names of the fish they had seen snorkeling and stayed on for the night's film 'Werewolf in Paris'.
The ferry boat back had been memorable for a pretty red haired blue eyed girl sitting opposite. I literally couldn't keep my eyes off her and there she was eating dinner in our restaurant when I got back.
5 Aug. Jim, A-M, Rachel and Alice took the long tailed boat into Ton Sai where they climbed up the hill giving them fine view over opposite bays which formed the narrow section of Phi Phi. Four years later on Boxing Day 2004 this was to be the escape route for those lucky enough to escape the tsunami which tour across this of the intensively inhabited central strip including the main town.
When Jim got back he and I went for one last snorkel together swimming right out and over the main ref where dive boats had been sitting all day. There were few large fish but Jim alone saw two 3 foot long reef sharks. Further inshore there was an excellent variety of smaller fish including long thin trumpet fish and large bright mauve starfish plus others in hues of yellow, blue, turquoise and dark red.
A quick 20 minute look around the fair at Krabi was enough to convince us we were not missing much. Rachel came back with a Longines watch and proudly declared 'It's a Fake'.
The boat to Phi Phi was almost empty and since they too had experienced several poor days with rain many were heading back to Krabi. As it turned out our timing was much almost perfect.
On arrival we took a long tailed boat to Ma Proa as near to Long Beach as he would go because of the surf and low tide height (220B).
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| KRABI FERRY and LONG TAILED BOATS in TON SAI |
From Paradise Pearl we hired a M3 medium sized bungalow for ourselves or 450B and large bungalow (M15 500B) with two double beds for Judy and two more M3's for Jim. The next day they changed for two doubles each on the beach for 600B. The bungalows were a good condition with full mosquito protection.
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| RACHEL, ALICE and JOE |
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| HAZEL and JOE, RACHEL and ALICE |
Swimming wonderful, scenery magnificent, sand almost silver from coral reef just offshore, lots of fine shells to collect. Out came the camera.
The restaurant was almost full for dinner but the service was fairly quick and above all cheerful. A Star Wars video was playing so Alice and Hazel went over to look and on return were quizzed on return, was it Star Wars I or II and the precise style of the headdresses.
30 July Everyone slept well. Air Con was by fan playing directly over heads which suited met but not Joan. I hope Judy has a good night so far the heat, humidity, smelly shower, mosquitoes and even the young children had been too much for her in Krabi. Gary has been great at playing with the children but Judy had ended up carrying Joe home on her shoulders.
I took the advantage of the early light to go out with the camera, the colour of the surf, of coral segments protruding from the sea.There were two other like minded people with SLR's, Jim and Alice were the only others out early strolling at the edge of the sea.
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| JIM and ALICE |
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| ALICE |
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| JOAN |
We all went swimming after breakfast but thereafter I kept out of the way with a worsening cold and read the Bangkok Post (in English I guess, never having tried to master Thai Alphabet symbols).
Thai Politics 2000
Following the last elections it had taken 5 months to select and re-elect the members of the Senate and the dispute now was to elect a Speaker. Chuan Leepai is still PM as he has been for 9 years since 1992, before him it was military rule. There had been concern about vote buying and other corruption 'can no longer be regarded as a valid form of wealth redistribution'. 'An independent body will now vet Congress but that too is expected to be corrupt so a third level will be needed to scout them. Special harsh measures are needed to combat entrenched corruption'. The Electoral Commission is to be given powers to revoke the election rights of candidates found guilty of campaign fraud, even to the point of dissolving an entire political party As I write in 2015 there is still electoral chaos with the military back in charge of that country and the revered old king nearing the end of his reign.
Another article concerned a 45 year old illiterate woman Sa-ing Tawaisin on hunger strike to draw attention to the poor the main losers in the increased organisation of production, particularly forest management and the use of outside firms. She had started protesting in 1990 against the scheme to take farm land from villagers in her village Dong Mae Ped to plant eucaluptus trees for paper making.
There are 40 hunger strikers protesting about lay offs in front of Government House
Korean Politics 2000
Kim-Jong II has suddenly become a cult figure following his formal meeting with the South Korea leader Bae-lo-Shak, now a Kim look alike. Kim has adopted bouffant hair style, a Mao jacket, oversized sun glasses and 5 inch lift to shoes. He was previously seen as the despot at the helm of a rogue nation with a large nuclear arsenal. 90% of the southern people polled thought Kim deserved a Nobel prize. The Korean war ended without a Peace Treaty and they thought he needed help with a population of 22 million and a failing economy.
31 July Time for today's reminiscences are another indication I was doing my own thing away from the crowd because of my cold. Joan and I are feeling the heat and I developed a soar throat a few days ago and now she has it.
First a note about menus for example the special offers were
1) Large White Snapper for two at 180B each cooked in three flavour Thai sauce, slightly hot (picante) and sweet.
2) Mixed Sea Food for two at 150B each, crab, clams, mussels, shrimps cooked in hot Thai coconut curry sauce.
3) Plates of Six large Prawns for 150B
4) Smaller Snapper for one at 140B
The all-day breakfasts were served as complete plates of croisantes, chocolate and nut cakes, banana and nut cakes.
Confusion occurred at meal time because the waiters who took our orders spoke a little English but not so those who delivered the food, resulting in frequent concern about the match between order and receipt. Not helped because we were by far the largest party and we tended to order in at least three parts.
Dinner was always a struggle, Rachel was really great throughout with her behaviour but the rest were not quite old enough. Alice, Hazel and Joe are difficult and Hazel sometimes insists on French fries and egg, though they like food cooked in batter eg squid, chicken pieces. They could drink Fanta and eat bread, cheese burgers, chocolate cake, banana cake, and ice cream all day.
I am always amazed by the number of backpackers who ate an American fast food diet of burgers and chips and drink milk shakes in the face of all this lovely unique Thai food. But few backpackers drunk beer - it was too expensive, but not for us, so it accounted for half the cost of dinner, typically 1600B for all ten of us.
Long Beach is beautiful clean with a silvery gold texture the sea a light turquoise colour turning to deep blue where it passes over coral - I am sure we were right to come straight here in spite of the hard walking of long ups and steep slippery downs.
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| HAT YAO or LONG BEACH |
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| JUDY with JOE, RACHEL,ALICE HAZEL |
At the correct state of the tide there is superb snorkelling over the reef, to high and the coral is too deep to be seen well, too shallow and you have to wade carefully over the reef avoiding damage and the sea urchins. Yellow blue striped fish, turquoise and purple, phosphorescent blues, black and white spotted fish, sea cucumbers, giant clams embedded in the rocks recognised when their mouths close as you approach.
Sea temperature is lovely, neither too hot nor too cold, so you can stay in for hours but eventually your skin gets waterlogged, and the kids do just this. The steeply shelving sea and the tendency for surf means the kids, particularly Joe and Hazel, need to be well watched in spite of their armbands.
We have just got off the boat which took us for a three hour visit to Phi-Phi Leh having spent the time in the sea inlet snorkeling in deep water.
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| PHI-PHI LEH |
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| GARY and JOE |
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| JUDY and JOE |
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| PHI-PHI LEH |
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| GARY, ALICE and JIM |
Flying fish in great shoals flew out of the water alongside the boat attracted by the noise of the engine.
Hazel is always very easy to amuse as she plays by herself, in contrast Joe is always off and in to everything. After dinner as we are dallying and chatting the girls are watching the video but Joe is outsde in the dark, trying out the hammocks by the beach, getting the Thai boys to play soccer, chasing crabs on the sand for there are hundreds and thousands. Jimmy dug one out of its hole to find it huge and fierce as it scampered away sideways.
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| JOAN and ALICE on HAT YAO |
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| ANNE-MARIE and HAZEL on HAT YAO |
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| HAT YAO or LONG BEACH |
All three girls are now equipped with Thai wrap around skirts which look so much better than the tiny shorts Rachel was wearing, she is being good as are all four. Hazel is the most prone to tantrums, Alice can sulk, Rachel gets uptight and Joe screams when he is not allowed to use the chopsticks with which he surely will drop all his pad Thai (noodles) down his T-shirt and onto the floor.
Joe is given fruit by the waiters most days, maybe a bunch of bananas or a bag of Lam Yai (?). He is definitely their star with his blue eyes and silver blond hair.
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| SUNSET at HAT YAO |
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| JOAN and SUNRISE at AO LO MU DI |
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| JOAN SEES SUNRISE at AO LO MU DI |
Less than half the girls are topless, there are some beautiful female bodies on display. Though we are probably the only grandparents around there are many families with children aged say 3- 16 years but the vast majority are backpackers.
'This little piggy goes to market, this little piggy stayed home', with toes under warm sea water keeps Rachel and Alice happy, as do handstand competitions in deeper water.
One or two very heavy monsoon showers come and go but mainly it sunny days, the sea whips up easily so its easy to understand why boatmen, unlike in winter, do not come here.
Not too many mosquitoes in well proofed huts like these, but invariable encountered in the shade and after dusk but no worse than the dry season. Judy seems a little happier now, she never relaxes with Joe to look after, but Anne-Marie has no compunction on going off on her own. All agree on the importance of cold showers last thing at night to rid the heat of the day and ensure sound sleep.
Tomorrow I am going with Gary to Krabi to help ensure he gets a good start on his journey back Trang, Bangkok and the UK and work. I intend to get our own rail tickets back from Hat Yai to Bangkok, and Thai money from the bank, cash Jim's Post Office cheques because the rates were poor on Phi-Phi. Even Paradise Pearl charge an extra 3% for card transactions. I will also check my email room Mary and Bryn as promised and from Songkla (Sao) and Pattani (Nok).
When discussing the last few days of our holiday we all agreed the kids would never find anywhere as interesting as here but Anne-Marie was clear 'It's not just their holiday but ours and we want to see more of Thailand for we may not get the chance again'. We planned 5 days 1-2 at Phattalung (Thaleh Noi), 2 days Songkla and maybe 1 at Pattani. It would be nice to contact Samran (our first pick up truck driver) but Trang area as a destination sounded too much like more beaches.
3 August
I woke up at 2 am to hear a tremendous storm and immediately started to worry about Gary's departure in the morning because oo stormy sea and the low tide the long tailed boat to Ton Sai might not leave at 8 am as usual. It was vital to get the morning ferry at 9 am to be able to get to Trang in plenty of time to catch the 17.10 train back to Bangkok. I had visions of having to walk the hard, wet, slippery path along the Phi Phi coast in order to get the ferry. Gary was having similar doubts. We needn't have worried for by 7:30 it was fine again, if overcast, but the sea was as calm as we had seen it. We were in fact the first on the ferry though by departure time it was full of backpackers returning and local Thais headed for the mainland.
The backpackers were a mixture of nationalities but all young between in their twenties and many were reading whereas on the way out many arrivals from Ko Samui had been sleeping like me. To us travel was an incidental part of the holiday, a necessary evil.
Everything went like clockwork in Krabi. I was able to get 200,000B in cash from the bank, Gary had expected me to be limited to my £200 limit in the UK. Thus I was able to purchase our return train tickets from Hat Yai, all in the same carriage but mostly in upper bunks, she told me to come back at 1:30 but waved me in when I was passing the travel agents office an hour earlier. A very efficient delivery of 9 tickets for 5750B, so I asked about hiring an air conditioned minibus and driver for our intended journey to Pattalung. She joked, being done out of business, 'so you're acting as the group tour leader'. A rather a pleasing observation which hadn't previously occurred to me, I was a Thai talking Englishman rather than an English talking Thai. She even offered me a 10% discount at 1800B. So hiring a minibus with driver each time we wanted to move destinations on was the obvious pattern.
Then I chose the right Song Thaew first time, he was already heading for the train station where we found a bus to Trang waiting. Gary said goodbye no doubt relieved it had all gone so smoothly.
As a last resort I checked my aol email in an Internet cafe. Nok had replied twice once to the wrong address the first to bricorbett had been returned but the second correctly on 21 July, the day of our departure to say she was now at the Songkla University, actually in another destination Pattini and only a few minutes from where we had stayed the previous winter, the excellent My Garden hotel in that city. She would be pleased to see us and because of the young children suggested a visit to play in their Kindergarten - back at base everyone thought this was a great idea. We revised plans to 2 nights at Sonkla and a new one at Pattini plus more before boarding the train at Hat Yai.
Before returning to Long Beach I decided to stroll around Ton Sai and was immediately struck by its development since our original visit, a 3or 4 storey PP Hotel with 200 superior substantial wooden chalets over towards the opposite beach. Ton Sai was going rapidly up market, not my scene I preferred the memories of it largely basic and undiscovered, contrasted vividly now with the squalor of the areas where the Thais lived. There were lots more shops and so many places to eat. I bought a Batik T-shirt for Geoff.
At 5pm it looked as though it would be impossible to get a long tailed boat back and so I decided to walk instead, substantial building everywhere but still mainly bungalows many now air conditioned a far cry from the days when we made a point of acclimatising rapidly to the heat of the tropics by avoiding a/c. The Andaman development near Gypsy, where we stayed last winter seemed good, there was a game of pick up football on some spare ground nearby. At the entrance to the Phi-Phi school the path ended forcing you onto the beach up to Ma Prao and the difficult rope aided section.
4 August I had to go to Ton Sai to email Nok in Pattani giving her details of our itinerary. It demonstrates the absence of pre ordained routes one of the beauties of our form of travelling
6 Aug Phattalung
7 Aug am Thaleh Noi
pm travel to Songkla
8 Aug Would like to visits Wannaluks (?) home and Samila beach.
9 Aug am Travel to Pattani
pm Hat Tah (?)
11 Aug am Hope to visit Kindergarten
pm Travel to Hat Yai for train to Bangkok
Judy Anne-Marie and Rachel accompanied me to spend a fine morning shopping, mainly T-shirts for the children with soft animal motifs attached from Anne-Marie, elephants for Hazel and Joe, I bought another two for Geoff. Rachel bought an orange dress and a dainty silver ring with a blue stone.
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| TON SAI, Ko Phi-Phi Don |
Jim was not so lucky he was snorkeling and dives in to take a closer look just as another snorkeler shot a harpoon which passed near his chest, he bid a hasty retreat to the surface.
Joe has a little girlfriend Saphire whose original group of friends had just left. After dinner we panicked thinking we had lost Joe when Judy was unable to find him on the beach or hammocks. We eventually found playing with Saphire close to the restaurant, Judy had searched far and wide without success. Rachels favourite is still Chicken Island and the lovely sea, she enjoyed our day in town but likes Long Beach much better.
After dinner when everyone else had gone to bed leaving Alice excitingly discussing with Jim the colours and names of the fish they had seen snorkeling and stayed on for the night's film 'Werewolf in Paris'.
The ferry boat back had been memorable for a pretty red haired blue eyed girl sitting opposite. I literally couldn't keep my eyes off her and there she was eating dinner in our restaurant when I got back.
5 Aug. Jim, A-M, Rachel and Alice took the long tailed boat into Ton Sai where they climbed up the hill giving them fine view over opposite bays which formed the narrow section of Phi Phi. Four years later on Boxing Day 2004 this was to be the escape route for those lucky enough to escape the tsunami which tour across this of the intensively inhabited central strip including the main town.
When Jim got back he and I went for one last snorkel together swimming right out and over the main ref where dive boats had been sitting all day. There were few large fish but Jim alone saw two 3 foot long reef sharks. Further inshore there was an excellent variety of smaller fish including long thin trumpet fish and large bright mauve starfish plus others in hues of yellow, blue, turquoise and dark red.
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