Snorkeling, Divine Food, and Teal Waters: Koh Phi Phi Island Adventure

Leaving my Thai home of Nong Khai has brought the start of many new adventures, the first of which has led me to the Southern Thai islands in the Andaman Sea.  I have experienced warm, bright teal waters, soft, white sands, monkeys galore, and world cuisines in some of the most beautiful places I have ever seen.  Read on for the first part of this Thai island adventure, which takes place in Koh Phi Phi, Thailand.

Reading time: 16 minutes

Do you happen to remember Genie and Amanda, my dear fellow foreigner friends that I met in Nong Khai, Thailand?  They moved to Bangkok a couple months ago, so we were separated for some time.  Fortunately, the Thai school semester break occurs in mid-October... and we got to meet up for a joint vacation to the beautiful Thai islands!

 Together again, we departed from Bangkok at a ripe 6 AM, bound for Phuket Airport.

From the smog of Bangkok...

...to the islands of the Andaman Sea!  The flight was only 1.5 hours, and man was it worth it.  Nothing like being air lifted from smog-land (sorry Bangkok) and plopped into paradise for only $30 per person.

Our first move was a cab drive from the airport to the base of a mountain, where we felt compelled to stop due to a temple we spotted at the top.  (Okay, actually, we were not enjoying our cab driver at all, who was trying to convince us into doing every single touristy activity in Phuket with him so that he could make some extra cash in the low season passenger-barren climate, so we told him we were ready to get out even though we were practically in the middle of nowhere.)  We climbed the 1 km windy mountain road on foot.

We reached a naga-adorned staircase that led to the final temple.

The view from the temple, called Wat Koh Sirey, was more rewarding than we could have predicted.

A large reclining buddha awaited us inside the temple.

I prayed to the buddha shrine outside, and then enjoyed the view with my friends.

At 200 feet above sea level (all of which we climbed on foot, thank you very much), this temple certainly did not disappoint.

We walked down the mountain and wandered a couple more kilometers to a nearby beach.

The moment I felt the water and the sand on my toes, I was invigorated with excitement for our impending island experience.

At this point, we realized that our attempt to reach the ferry departure point had failed quite spectacularly, due to the fact that we were on the other side of a large sea inlet from where the Phuket pier was.  Whoops!  This is what happens when we let Roxi choose directions based on her *terrible* direction instincts.  No regrets; we got to see a beautiful beach and feel the sea.  It could have been worse, right?  So, we ordered a cab to the pier, where we boarded a two hour ferry to the Phi Phi Islands!

We got fantastic seats on the top of the boat, so we had beautiful views and a delightful breeze for the whole journey.

The smaller islands off of the main Koh Phi Phi were stunning, especially in contrast to the bright blue water.

In the early afternoon, we arrived at our destination!  Welcome to the main island of Koh Phi Phi.

Being the ladies of spontaneity that we are, we did not yet have a place to stay for the night on the island.  We ducked into an air conditioned cafe and got some cold drinks while we searched the internet for a reasonably priced hotel on the quite pricey touristed island.

We had massive success, in the form of Golden Guest House.  This hotel was a 15 minute walk from the main pier, which put it just far enough outside of the most commonly tread path so that it wasn't super crowded or expensive.

We got a triple room, complete with air conditioning, a nice private bathroom, and a personal balcony, for the equivalent of $22 per night.  That's $7.30 per person.  (Note: we pushed the beds together ourselves, because who doesn't love feeling like every night is a giant-bed sleepover with their best friends?)

From our balcony, we could see the jungle-covered mountains and even the sea.  

Happy to be three stuffed backpacks lighter and set for the next two nights, we ventured to the coast for some food and sunset views.

We ended up at a phenomenal Mediterranean place called Fistuk Restaurant.  Their pita was soft, fluffy, fresh out of the oven, and to die for.  The hummus was also some of the best I've ever had.

 We all like falafel - no, we all love falafel - so we got two falafel plates.  One of them was all for me.  Score.  My non-vegetarian friends also got a chicken shawarma pita.  We all still dream of this pita bread.

We then wandered around the shops and streets of the island.  We met our favorite island inhabitant, a wonderful snorkeling tour saleswoman named Pew.  She is our favorite because she didn't harass us or pressure us into buying anything.  She also provided us with helpful information when we asked her questions, and she was so lovely and kind.  Most people who were selling things on the island were loud and obnoxious and yelling to us, so we appreciated Pew infinitely.  Naturally, we rewarded her good behavior by purchasing snorkeling tour tickets for the next day.  Woo hoo!

Exhausted, we returned to our hotel, got cozy, and settled in for the night.  This was a long day, to say the least!  Good night, world.

Read Genie's account of day 1 here!

Day 2

The next morning, we awoke on Koh Phi Phi, ready for adventure.  We slept in because treat yo' self!  We then headed to the pier for a day of snorkeling!

We boarded our boat, called Ocean World.  The ladder you see on the side is how we all boarded and disembarked our vessel throughout the day.  The water was delightfully temperate, warm but not warmer than the hot air above.  (Water temperature: 85°F; air temperature: 90°F.)  The sky was cloudy and threatened a storm.  (Classic rainy season.)  We were unsure if the storm would manifest, so we headed out to sea anyway.

First stop on the 6 hour afternoon/evening snorkeling tour was a place aptly dubbed "Monkey Beach."

This beach featured - you guessed it - tons of monkeys!  This species in particular is called the crab-eating macaque.  There is a colony of this type of macaques who live on this isolated beach, so it is a very popular tourist destination for any and every tour in these waters.

Although it was very cool to see monkeys up close like this, it was pretty sad to realize that, due to the beach being surrounded by tall cliff faces, the monkeys were stuck there and could not leave if they wanted to.  They were subject to a minimum of dozens of tourists per day coming onto their small beach, taking photos of them, and getting in their personal space.  I felt quite guilty to be taking part in this once I realized the truth of their circumstances.

The monkeys are quite human-like in many ways.  Thailand is full of single-use plastic trash, and unfortunately, many of the trash items end up littered on beaches and in beautiful natural areas.  This monkey was doing his part to help save the island by removing this plastic bag from his precious beach home.

I was very interested (and a bit dumbfounded) watching this occur.

He took the bag and ran with it.  I later saw a tourist retrieve the trash to pack it out.

A final sweet moment before we left monkey beach: we got to watch a mother clean her darling baby.

Genie's phone has a better camera, so her photos turned out much more clear.  Credit for these goes to her!

All of us felt thoroughly saddened for the monkeys at this point, so we were not disappointed to move on to our next destination of the tour.  Back in the boat we went!

This is one of our boat drivers.  I made friends with him because I speak Thai (somewhat... I try).  What fun!

We rode in the boat for about half an hour before we arrived at one of the smaller islands around the main Koh Phi Phi.  Can you believe the water was this clear?

Depending on how deep the water was, the colors shifted from light blue to deep green/teal.  The jungle covered cliffs offset the sea in varying majestic ways.

At this point, we got to go swimming and do a bit of snorkeling!

I managed to get a somewhat gnarly coral cut on my pointer toe (is that what you call the toe next to your big toe?) in my first fifteen minutes in the water.  Score!  I am writing this blog post a solid 9 days later and my toe is still heartily sporting the mark of this event.  My phone was in a plastic waterproof case at this point so the cut is quite hard to see in the photo, but trust, it is there, and it is magnificent.  A fun souvenir!

For our next snorkeling stop, I bit the bullet and brought my waterproof case-covered phone into the water.  Fortunately, the case worked phenomenally, so I got some awesome in-water photos and videos for the entirety of my island trip!  I was such a happy water bug.  I'm grateful that I got to capture some of these moments on camera.

This is the view under the water in the same spot as the selfies above.  There was a school of yellow/blue striped fish swimming around me here.  Photos cannot accurately portray how surreal this moment felt.

After about 10 minutes in the water at our second snorkeling location, thunder started to rock the waters, and a light drizzle began to fall from the sky.  Our boat drivers called to us that we needed to get back in the boat right away... and then, it started to pour.  The boat was rocking like crazy, and if that wasn't exciting enough, our motor was malfunctioning.  It was storming, and were stuck.

Luckily, other nearby boats anchored onto us and helped our drivers fix the problem with our motor.  After waiting out the storm for about half an hour, one of our drivers successfully started the boat.  The ten passengers on our boat cheered loudly, and we were off to less rocky waters!

Our drivers - the absolute experts in navigating rainy season snorkeling tours - took us to a calm bay in which we could swim/snorkel even with the gentle rain that was still occurring at this point.  This spot was the best snorkeling of the day.  I left my phone in the boat so I could experience this through my eyes alone.  I saw myriad colorful fish - purples, greens, blues, reds, yellows, even gold, in crazy combinations, on fish of all shapes and sizes.  My favorite was a bread loaf-sized purple fish with blue and green fins and gold lips.  (I'm not making this up.)  I swam over an expansive coral reef with my snorkel for almost an hour, soaking up everything and loving every minute.

*Insert Genie photos, because she brought her phone on this leg of the journey*

The storm had ceased, so we headed back to the main island area.  One feature of the tour we chose was post-sunset bioluminescent phytoplankton viewing, which we were so excited for.  Everyone else on the boat except for us abandoned ship - literally! - because they were cold and wet from the storm.  Genie and Amanda and I transferred to a different boat so that we could still do the phytoplankton portion of the trip.  This enabled us to get a private boat basically all to ourselves, along with two others from a different tour boat who also didn't want to end the day early.  We called ourselves "Team Plankton."  We got to swim in the warm water for two extra hours, compared to all the people who turned in early!  It was awesome.

Prepare for an onslaught of snorkeling photos!!

I have not yet mastered the art of a graceful underwater photo, but I tried!

Such a spectacular giant clam, no?

Coral reef and sea anenomes abounded below us.

This was another of my favorite fish of the day: the angel fish!

At this point, a funny event occurred.  I like the way that Genie phrased it best, so I'll insert her direct quote here:

"Roxi injured a sea urchin.  It responded accordingly."

Yep... I lost control of my body for a little bit due to the currents, and although I had been aware that the coral reef was quite close and shallow at some points, I made the mistake of kicking down right over the home of a poor sea urchin.  It felt like a prick in my heel in the moment, followed by my foot becoming heavy with the throbbing of venom over the course of the next few hours... and few days... but oh well!  Another souvenir of the day.  It could have been much worse, I just had to walk on the ball of my foot for the next few days.  Sorry, Mr. Sea Urchin!  I won't do it again!

The sea urchin event didn't stop me from enjoying the nighttime phytoplankton extravaganza.  After the sun went down and it became sufficiently dark, the boat driver instructed us to stir up the water in a circling motion in front of our faces with our snorkeling masks underwater.  The result can best be described as tons of tiny green lights, somewhat resembling a starry night sky, filling the space where the water was being churned.  When we pushed the water toward our faces with quick hand motions, it looked like we were accelerating into hyperspace.  It was so cool, and so worth the extra time we spent out on the water.

So, you may be wondering, how much did this six hour spectacular snorkeling tour cost?

400 baht per person.  That's $13.  This included use of their snorkels and life vests, a fried rice lunch, and a freshly cut pineapple snack.  Not too shabby, eh?

We returned to shore and headed to our hotel to rinse off before getting dinner.

For our post-snorkeling adventure meal, we chose to eat at Phitharom Resort, which had such delightful food and drinks to nourish us.

We got divine spring rolls, pad thai, and massaman curry with rice.

For dessert, we ventured back to the coast for Bingsu, which is basically decadent (and delicious) Korean shaved ice.

It was Amanda's and my first time trying Bingsu, and it was So good.  We got the chocolate lovers flavor.

A special feature of this Bingsu place, called Qoori Qoori, is that they offer board games, free to play if you get their desserts!  We played "Ticket to Ride," which I had never played.  It was so much fun.  We closed down the joint at 11 PM - we just finished the game in time for them to close!

These tired girls then headed back to the hotel and happily went to sleep for the night.

Read Genie's account of day 2 here!

Day 3

The following morning, I woke up and meditated on the beautiful balcony.



Not the worst view to meditate by, huh?

We checked out of our hotel and went to the pier to catch a ferry from Koh Phi Phi to our ultimate destination: Koh Lanta.  Upon reaching the pier, we learned that the tickets we had purchased two days earlier for a ferry to "anywhere" at "any time" on "any day" were not in fact what they claimed, because it was low season and some boats were not in operation.  The tickets were only valid for a ferry ride from Koh Phi Phi to the mainland city of Krabi, and this ferry only occurred at one time in the afternoon.  So, being ladies of spontaneity, we went with the flow and decided it was off to Krabi!

We had a few hours to kill before our ferry left, so we indulged in some fantastic food.

Sushi at P. P. Wang Ta Fu was a phenomenal choice.  We got a spicy tuna roll topped with salmon, crispy garlic, and tobiko...

...classic tuna and salmon rolls...

...and a shrimp tempura roll topped with albacore and cheese.  (We did not expect the cheese addition, but it was easy to remove.  Hehe.)

We still had an hour to spare, so we decided to enjoy the wifi, phone charge ports, AC, and restrooms provided by the pier-side McDonald's.  We split some French fries and got cold coffee drinks and enjoyed the view from upstairs.

 I don't know of any McDonald's with a more spectacular view!

We boarded our ferry, and right on cue, the sky opened and a downpour ensued.

We got seats inside the ferry, but because Genie and I are both prone to motion sickness (even with Dramamine inside us), we decided to treat ourselves and upgrade to first class.

We each got a big couch, huge window, and lovely air conditioning for a whopping $3 per person.  Gentle flex, none of us threw up on that entire ride.  This was a feat that I am proud of to this day.

It rained for the majority of our two hour ferry journey.  We arrived in Krabi around 5:30.

This sunset view greeted us at the dock.

We took a cab to the hotel we had booked back at the Koh Phi Phi McDonald's.

The Sasi House was a lovely hotel in Krabi Proper.  We got a 3 person room for one night for the equivalent of $30, or $10 per person.  Upon arrival, we were met in the lobby with complimentary pandan water.  The front desk staff were so friendly and helpful.  The room was clean and exactly what we needed, and it came with a teapot and jar of jasmine tea.  Plus, there was a restaurant on site.  Complaints?  None.

For dinner, I got a sunrise cashew fried rice, which is essentially a ball of perfect fried rice stuffed with cashews and wrapped in a thin omelette.  So.  Good.

We went for a long evening walk around Krabi town to see a bit of the city.  This huge crab statue was a highlight.

We found a banana pancake stand at the night market, which we of course had to try for dessert!

We got 2 to share: one honey/banana, one nutella/banana/peanut butter.  Both were heavenly.

Back at the hotel, we brewed a pot of jasmine tea to enjoy as we got ready for bed and played some card games.  A truly delightful way to end the night.

Day 4

I woke up early and meditated in the outside garden with a complimentary coffee in the prettiest cup.

We were only going to be in Krabi for that morning and then we were off to Koh Lanta, so we seized the opportunity to enjoy the city in our few hours there by taking a walk to a mangrove forest park.

We walked along the river and took in the lovely views.

We also got to see some very cool amphibious fish called mudskippers!  They look like something out of an evolution movie: fish with two legs that thrive on quicksand-like mud.



Thanks to Genie for these photos, and to Genie's herpatologist dad for identifying these for us!



We arrived at the mangrove forest, which featured an alphabet park along a path between the beautiful trees.

 

We got to test our very limited knowledge of the Thai alphabet!  These are the letters that begin the words for these things (buffalo = khwai, snake = ngu, monk = pra; ค = kh, ง = ng, ณ = pr).

They also had the numbers, in English and Thai, depicted with the appropriate amount of fruits.

On our way back to the hotel, we got breakfast at a coffee shop called Easy Cafe.  Spinach omelette with homemade hot sauce?  Yes, please!

We went back to our hotel and got our things to check out.  We had booked a van the night before to take us to Koh Lanta straight from where we were staying, which was so convenient.  As we were leaving, I had to snap a photo of this sign: an almost $200 fee for bringing one of these two fruits into your room!  The fee for smoking cigarettes in your room was $60, for comparison.  If you've ever smelled durian or mangosteen, you'll understand why.  Man, are they pungent.

From here, we said goodbye to Krabi and headed off to our final destination: Koh Lanta!  A blog post about this heavenly place is to come.

Stay tuned...

🏝