Thai Beaches

Choosing the right islands to hit up in Southern Thailand can be a difficult decision when time is limited. Ko Tao specializes in SCUBA. Ko Phangan in wild faux-hippy beach scene and full moon parties. Ko Samui, stunning but prone to November mini-monsoons. Phuket, touristy and expensive. So Ko Phi Phi (gleefully pronounced "pee pee"), seemingly a combination of the above, became my choice.

To get there though, you go through Krabi. I arrived early, chilled for far too long at a funny coffee shop, and then at the hotel with the strangest staff in Asia and awaited my friends Vicki and Justine, Canadians I met in Chiang Mai. We had a memorable night on the town for Vicki's birthday. The evening ended motorbike taxiing to the club we were told to go to. Frankly, It looked dumb. But Kansas Saloon was right next door! With a few in my system I let most of the bar (95% locals on this night) know I was from Kansas and so requested Blowin in the Wind. The band huddled up and the one guy who knew the tune sang it with his marvelous Thai accent. Too bad I meant Dust in the Wind. They also sang Vicki Happy Birthday!

The next day we longtail boated to Railay Beach and got a hilarious little 500 baht ($15) bungalow. I peed in my third ocean on this trip, swam some, and emerged to snap a gorgeous sunset.

Told them to exaggerate their walks for the pic. Quick learners.

We then ferried to Ko Phi Phi and hiked a path through town to our bungalow in the hills. That first night we trudged to the island viewpoint. It was a bit sobering to picture the 2004 Tsunami enveloping the entirety of what lay below. We then had what we hoped would be a memorable seafood dinner. But the food missed the mark and it proved hard to concentrate with Chinese Big Ern directly in my view the whole meal.

It had been a few weeks since I'd had a strange tour, so we were due. From a plethora of options we forsook the cheap wooden boat tours and the expensive Captain Bob booze cruise and chose a middle of the pack one. It took us to Bamboo Island, Monkey Beach, past the Viking Cave, and to Maya Beach (the beach from The Beach, unfortunately rainy at the time). Along the way our group could snorkel, jump/dive off the ship's plank, or use the kayaks. We indeed had to use the kayaks, as the ship was too big to park it on the beach. This led to hilarious scenes of foreign kayak novices going every which way. And like the Titanic, there were not quite enough for everyone and no Molly Brown to speak up for me. I volunteered anyway to swim (and sometimes be towed) to shore usually.

I should also mention our ship's crew consisted of five young, gnarly Thai dudes with limited English. I believe the ship's cabin and Cheech and Chong's living room shared more similarities than differences. Made for a fun, random day, ending in a postcard-perfect sunset!

The options for a drunk person in Ko Phi Phi are truly endless. You could go from a hypnotizing beach fire show to Muay Thai boxing to clubbing your ass off to a poorly thought out bamboo tattoo to late night street food. Maybe end it by puking, making out, or puking and making out on the "gross beach" (luckily there's a "nice beach" too). And somewhere along the line you hopefully got your picture with the gibbon in children's overalls (I sadly did not). All of this is largely fueled by buckets of liquor.

We were almost disappointingly tame. Had some Changs and shared some Mojito buckets for sure. My favorite was the Reggae Bar Muay Thai. Semi-pros who MURDER each other for our entertainment alternate with true amateur bouts, i.e. tourists fighting tourists from the crowd for free buckets. I told Justine under no circumstances let me volunteer (because it looked fun as fuck). A broken rib or two ruins a trip pretty quick though. Thankfully, on an island awash in young European scumbags and d-bags, several of them drunkenly wailed on each other to our cheers and boos, even lady bouts! Tourist volunteer Muay Thai, best idea ever.

With a sick Vicki at home, Justine and I kayaked back to Monkey Beach for some swimming and, well, monkey feeding. These maniacs can go from serene accepter of corn (most of the time) to bloodthirsty demon devil in the blink of an eye. Was seconds from punting one, but he charged me and just grabbed at my shins, as opposed to biting and making me patient zero in Outbreak 2.

Justine and I put our stuff on the rocks far down the beach and went out for a swim. Coming ashore even further down, I glimpsed what I feared, monkeys in our packs. By the time we got to them, one had unscrewed and drank my Gatorade and another was rummaging in Justine's pack. Tried to get it, but the large male bared his teeth, stole portions of our souls with his murderous eyes, and charged, sending a usually tough Justine screaming into the sea.

That's when our guardian angel materialized. A 6'5 man in a magenta tank top. He spoke English perfectly, yet when he faced off with the minions of Hades, he seriously uttered some kind of Babylonian/primate gibberish (yet there seemed to be distinct words in there). Even he flinched a bit as the large male counter answered his charge, but Magenta won out and returned our stuff to us. His last and pretty much only words to us before disappearing: "You've got to BE the animal." Considered rowing back and getting a tattoo of that sage advice then and there.

The next day I had to see Vicki and Justine off. Sadness. They were amazing travel mates, fun, funny, and chill. I miss them already :)

I had hopefully the saddest (in food terms) Thanksgiving dinner of my life and then woke up early to Skype my family at the Thanksgiving table. Campaigning hard for "Thanksgiving 2" upon my return. I spent my final full day in Thailand lounging on the nice beach before a vigorous 24 hours of ferry, bus, and plane travel ending in Singapore. Had a love/hate relationship with Thai beaches, but as should be in life, let's focus on the love. Shah-la-la-la. Til next time.