TRIP DAY: Thursday, November 10th, 2022
POST DAY: Sunday, November 13th, 2022, 7:00 AM CST
Even though I'm writing this blog a couple days later than when it was supposed to be written and posted, it feels like all of this happened just yesterday. On the 9th day of travel, we were able to visit another beautiful island in Thailand. It truly seemed that I was living in paradise, waking up to beautiful weather, attending a boat ride and having amazing food once more. This day we had an optional free day. However, our wonderful tour guide allowed us to do another boat tour. I was really excited to visit another beautiful island of Thailand. The island that we visited today was Phi Phi Island. This island is known to be the most instagrammable spot, and let me tell you, it did not disappoint. The tour went from 8:00 AM to 3:00 PM and it was more than enough time to see all the beautiful island. For us to get around from island to Island, we had personal speedboat that took us to each part of the island with a guide. The first stop of the islands was the beautiful
beach on the main island. When we first stopped, we were told that we would not be able to stay on the island for too long, nor was it a place that we could physically swim in the water. Swimming and boat activity has been cancelled from this island to preserve the beautiful corals and wildlife in the area. On this amazing island, not only was there beautiful coral, but there were also beautiful small fish and baby sharks. The sand was as white as can be, the blue sky was as blue as water, and the water as blue as the sky. The water was crystal clear, warm to touch, and the sun was beating down, making it a perfect dream spot to be at all
day. Honestly, if the tour did not have other stops I could have easily sat there and laid my hours away staring at the beautiful island and everything it offered. But I do understand why they don't want much human traffic. There were a lot of humans there. In order to get to the island, the boat had to drop you off on a floating dock. You then had to walk up and through the small forest to get to the beach. However, walking to this beach was completely worth every second.
After the main island, since we were not able to swim, the tour guide took us to a part of the same island on the backside where we could still swim in the clear blue water. What was interesting about this part of the island is that all the boats had docked in the cove and let their people out to go swim so it was crowded. It also became dangerous at times as a boat would get really close to a person that was in the water. But the people have been boating for years and
were aware of the surroundings. Though the rest of my group jumped into the water, I was not trying to get my hair wet, nor did I have plans to get my hair wet so I simply. stepped into the water off the boat. The water was once again very warm and very clear. This is also the first time I had been in the water since the trip. Most of the water in Thailand is a very murky color and you're not allowed to swim. A lot of the islands have the best water that is better to swim in. We stayed in this cove for about 40 minutes and headed off to the next destination. The next step of our tour was a cave where Thai people go to collect bird saliva. Apparently birth saliva is like gold here in Thailand. The Cave is armed with officers and rifles.
Every so many years, a new contractor comes to claim ownership over The Cave. I do not know exactly how they retrieve the bird saliva. I was distracted at this point because I was dumbfounded to find out how expensive and high end having this bird saliva really is. Our tour guide offered if anybody wanted to try the bird saliva. Though nobody wanted to try it there was part of me that wanted to do say fuck it and do it. Next time I will.
The next destination was the part that I was excited for however, this was also my least favorite part of the tour. So, part of the island tour, we were able to try snorkeling. I wholeheartedly was very excited to try snorkeling as I have never snorkeled in my life. I was imagining seeing all the beautiful coral reefs and the beautiful fishes in the water and being very excited to swim down and touch the bottom. My hopes were extremely high. The weather had changed rapidly by the time we got to this point of the tour. In the beginning, you can see it in my pictures, there were no clouds in sight and bright skies. Now the skies were dull and it had seemed that it was going to rain anytime. Once we were all suited up to go snorkeling, I jumped in the water and realized very quickly it was not meant for me. First off, we were not in a shallow area so it was hard to see the bottom or get to the bottom of the water floor. Second, there was an extremely strong current that was in the water. The minute I got into the water; the current took me. In less than a 5 minute, about 10 feet away from the boat. Third, when I went to put my head under the water to see, I received a mouthful of salt water. That was the 3rd strike, and I was over it. I headed back to the boat, which was extremely hard to do against the current and get back in the boat to watch everybody else struggle out in the water. I can honestly say it was funny to watch everybody try to swim back to the boat. After being in the water for so long. The number one thing I heard from everyone was that it felt like they were not going anywhere as they were trying to get back to the boat. However,
after all that hard work, we were rewarded with lunch. We docked our boats next to the beach and were able to go up into our private area to receive our buffet style lunch. Lunch included steam rice, fried rice, cashew chicken, sweet and sour fish, spaghetti, fruit, and much more. There was also a bar that we could get cocktails, but I brought my own alcohol because I always stay ready. Once we were done with lunch, we had an hour free time to walk up and down the beach and explore the island that took buffet was on. Then we took a very bumpy hour ride back to where the tour started to get back on the bus to go back to the hotel. The entire ride back it was rainy with high winds and high waves. It felt like the boat was going to tip over several times.
After the boat tour I was extremely exhausted, so I went back to the hotel and took an hour nap before going back out and exploring more of what Phuket had to offer. All in all, finally, having the time to unwind and relax on the island was wonderful and it was a great way to end the trip in Thailand. Besides coming back to Phuket experience the night life, I don't think I could see myself coming back and doing too much more of the island.
Stay tune for my blog on my final day in Thailand.
コメント