Snorkeling and Monkeys

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We woke up this morning and overnight the anemic air conditioner had managed to cool the room to 74 degrees. Yeah!! At least we aren't roasting. Once we managed to evict ourselves from the bed, we set off for food. The nice thing about this place is that everything is pretty close together. We set out and found a restaurant that was still serving breakfast. For a mere 110 baht (less than $4) we each got at least two eggs scrambled, wonderful toasted bread, a huge plate of fresh fruit (watermelon, pineapple, and bananas), orange juice and coffee or tea. Pleasantly stuffed we wandered a bit looking for more sunscreen on the way back to room. Where you save on breakfast, you pay for on sunscreen. The cost for small bottle of SPF 30 was well over $10! We decided that we would see if we could make it back to Phuket before buying more and headed back.

After showering and lathering up with sunscreen we headed out for our boat tour. We booked sunset tour with Legacy Cruises. It leaves at 3pm from the dock and you stop a few places to snorkel and kayak before watching the sunset. There is another tour company here as well and we saw their boat leave too. Their boat was smaller and was packed with people. Ours was larger and probably had the same number of people on it. Everyone had a spot to sit on the top along the edge. There were probably around 30-40 people on the tour.

We went to the tour desk of our hotel at the appointed time and waited for another couple to join us. As we headed along towards the dock we met up with more people along the way. As Jeff put it, it was like a shuttle bus without the bus (there are no cars on the island). Eventually we made it to the dock. There is very limited space, so boats tie up to each other. We got on a ferry and then walked across the ferry to our boat. We grabbed masks, snorkels, and flippers and found a place to sit. After a few minutes we arrived at our first stop, monkey beach. You could either kayak or snorkel to the beach and we decided to kayak. Since Jeff knows how to steer a kayak, we made quick work of the distance and were soon standing on the beach.

As you might guess from the name, there are monkeys on the beach. They have become quite the tourist attraction and are very used to people. There weren't many people on the beach yet and one monkey was sitting on a kayak looking quite cute. I took his picture and turned to walk away. They next thing I knew, the very cute monkey charged at me and was hanging off my legs. Not sure what he was intending to do (they have big teeth) I stomped my feet and shrieked. This scared the monkey away. Our guide, when he finished laughing at me, gave me the helpful tip that the monkeys don't like to go in the water. I think that they don't tell you this on the boat cause they like watching the monkeys scare everyone. We stayed in the water for most of the rest of the time we were there, but it was quite entertaining to watch others being jumped by the monkeys. They are quite mischievous. One women was squatting down to take a picture and a monkey came up behind her and grabbed her bikini bottom. Another monkey tried to steal someones snorkeling gear. Our guide had pineapple to feed to the monkeys. I bravely got a piece and was headed to offer it to a monkey, when one of the big ones jumped out of nowhere and grabbed it from me. Apparently there is no choice as to which monkey you feed! We managed to save our kayak from the monkeys and head back to the boat with only ourselves and no stowaways.

Our next stop was a pretty area where we snorkeled. It was fairly shallow, at times you could almost reach out and touch the coral. There were a number of colorful fish to watch. Here as well, the guide had food for them, and managed to get a big swarm of them around him. You could touch them as they swam by you in search of the food. The water here is very clear and warm. When you are out of the water it appears a very pretty green color. When on the boat, you can look down in the water and see all the fish.

Our next stop was near Maya bay. We swam from the boat to the shore (not a long ways) and walk through the jungle until we popped out at Maya Bay. For you movie buffs, this is where they filmed the movie "The Beach". We haven't seen it yet. Apparently they tore out most of the jungle and brought in more white sand to make the beach deeper. Around when they were done filming, a big tropical storm blew through, and returned to the beach to its intended state. Our guide said that people who have seen the movie are very disappointed when they get here since it looks so much different. I thought that it was beautiful, so maybe its a good thing that we haven't seen the movie yet. The normal course of events, is that the boat comes around and picks everyone up from Maya Bay. The wind had significantly picked up (which is surprising since it is protected inlet) and the waves were to high for this to happen. We eventually trotted back to where we started and headed back to the boat. We had the option to swim or wait for the kayaks to come. The boat didn't look that far away, so we hopped in the water. Between the boat drifting and the waves, it ended up being a ways! I got my exercise for the day!

Once we were all safely on board we headed out to watch the sunset. We stopped between two small islands and had rice, vegetables, coconut soup, and fruit and watched the sunset. Once it was dark, we headed back to shore. Once it got dark and all the boats had their lights on, it was amazing to me how many of them were out there! Once we docked, we climbed through two large fishing boats and one ferry before making it to shore. It was a bit of an adventure in the dark, but there was a staff member near the tricky areas to give a helping hand so that no one fell in.

After showers, we headed out to get dinner. We went to the Hippies bar and restaurant. They have the popular item here of chose your own seafood. You pick the exact fish that you want, and they prepare it for you. Jeff went for this and I stuck with a pizza. After our pizza was so good the night before I wanted another one. Sadly the pizza here wasn't all that great. Jeff got his fish and finished it before my pizza came. Once it came, I can't say it was one of the best pizzas I have ever had. The sauce was very sweet and there was a lot of it on the pizza for how thin the crust was. It even cost more than the pizza the night before. Jeff loved his fish though. If you want to do the fresh pick your own fish, this is a good place to eat. Don't come here for the pizza though!

Next we headed to one of the street vendors selling Thai pancakes. These are fried with various fillings. I got a banana and nutulla one (I love nuttalla) and Jeff got a banana and peanut butter one. They work the dough until it is very thin and then fold up the bananas inside. Next they fry it and then we finished cover it with your chosen topping. It is then cut into small pieces and served. Mine was sinfully delicious! Fresh bananas and nutulla. What more could a person want?

After our long day, we decided that sleep would be good. Unfortunaly we chose the wrong hotel if one actually wants to sleep in your room. The hotel's restaurant, Carpe Diem (which is a ways away from our villa) was having quite the party and the loud music continued until at least 2am. I fell asleep sometime after that and the music was still going strong. The air conditioner was only working somewhat again as well leaving our room a balmy 78 degrees with 60% humidity. I guess we should have given up on sleep and joined in the party! Clearly, this would not be my top choice for a hotel on another trip.