A couple of Islands after leaving Thailand's Highlands

After our crazy visa run to Cambodia we were lucky enough to catch a night bus straight down to the south where we hopped on a boat bound for Koh Tao. We immediately noticed the difference to that of the previous Islands we have been to. There were accommodation and taxi touts everywhere as soon as we stepped off the boat. Not giving in to extortionate taxi prices, we set off on foot heading up towards Sairee beach in search of some budget accommodation. It becomes apparent that this doesn’t exist on the Thai islands and after walking the entire length of the beach we found a bungalow right on the sea front for 600 baht (about $20).  This was our home for the entire stay here and by pure chance it was where a friend we met back in Panama was staying. Was awesome to catch up with Dan who was doing his divemasters course there.

Amazing Sairee Beach paddling

Stunning view from outside our bungalow

The main thing to do on this island is definitely diving and this seems to be a mecca for it but that will have to be another time as funds were starting to dwindle. Our time was spent going to some of the more remote beaches on the island and doing a bit of snorkeling. There are so many fish and so much coral it was amazing. During the days it was just nice to chill and then enjoy the brilliant sunsets right outside our bungalow door.

One of the snorkeling spots on the other side of the island

Awesome local food BBQ

Obviously there are a lot of tourists hear so there are heaps of bars. The best ones are on the beach front and most have fire shows and in true Thai style you can drink pretty much anything out of a plastic bucket. Some of our best nights out were in Koh Tao without a doubt. In contrast the best thing about this island was on days where you didn’t want to go crazy, some bars just put on movies and so you could chill out and separate yourself from the drunks. This place easily caters for all types of people.

One of the new beach bars. The pool bar kicked ass

Fire shows are a nightly event on the beach

One of many stunning sunsets from our place

Petra and our friend Dan loving the buckets (a lot!)

Our time was running out in Thailand so we decided there was time for one more stop before Phuket Airport. A lot of people have told us that Koh Phi Phi was a must see and one of the most beautiful islands so we booked our tickets set off. To save money we booked a slow night boat from Koh Tao to the mainland. This was 9 hours and you get to feel very cozy with the other 100 people all crammed together on little mattresses on the middle deck. Its all good though because the cockroaches mainly kept to themselves :).

Arriving in Phi Phi you can easily see that this is south east Asia’s biggest tourist hotspot.  You get absolutely mobbed with touts walking off the boat. All I can say is book accommodation in advance so you don’t need to deal with these gits. Prices on this island are generally the highest you will see in Thailand and we had a hostel booked on the beach for $700 baht($23-$24).

Hostel view of Phi Phi beach

It becomes clear that this island is for one thing only. 18 year olds getting absolutely off their faces on whatever they can find. The place just doesn’t sleep and neither do you if you come here. There are bars on every corner and every street. The most entertaining definitely being the Reggae bar. Forgetting the fact that there is absolutely no reggae theme inside you are treated to live Muay Thai Kickboxing every night. The fighters however, consist of tourists who after 20 drinks or so decide that it’s a good idea to step into the ring and get rewarded with a free bucket of alcohol. The result is two drunk tools swinging wild haymakers for 3 rounds with a ref pretending to give a crap. Perfect drinking entertainment, just a shame it wouldn’t be legal back home.

Reggae bar entertainment

Petra went on a Thai cooking course to learn how to make 5 different dishes. The results were pretty damn good and you obviously get to eat everything you make. This is quite a good thing to do in Thailand and we were recommended this one by a few people. It was at a restaurant called ‘Pum’ and you should go to eat there even if you don’t want to do the course.

Petras mango and coconut sticky rice

We all know there is one reason this island became such a tourist hotspot. The film ‘the beach’ features both of the Phi Phi islands in a majority of scenes. Koh Phi Phi Don is where we were staying and the smaller island, Koh Phi Phi Li is home to ‘the beach’ or Maya Bay as it is known in the real world. The island is a national reserve and so you have to book a boat tour that takes you round it. It is pretty stunning to say the least and we were looking forward to Maya Bay.  The Bay itself was beautiful and it was so nice that it was just us  and 2000 asian tourists on the beach. Unfortunately this places beauty has been its death sentence and it is very difficult to relax and enjoy the place with so many people there, plus the fact that a lot of the scum are just chucking garbage into the crystal clear water. Small consolation was that we spotted a small isolated beach over to the right and after a five minute swim we had out own quiet piece of paradise. Well until 4 boats saw us over there and decided to unload their cargo of 50 sunburnt camera snappers onto our laps.

Koh Phi Phi Li in all its glory

Maya Bay. The only photo without 1000 Chinese tourists in it!

There should have been more to write about Phi Phi but we accidentally ate a dodgy piece of street pizza and got food poisoning for the next 3 days. After that it was time to get a boat to Phuket and catch our flight to Bali.