Alright baby! I'm super motivated to catch you up on my adventures, because so may more are coming! Also I'm jacked on caffeine and sitting in an airport, what else am I going to do?
So where did I leave us? Karthick and I boarding a ferry for the legendary koh lipe island in Thailand? Before we board I find a Starbucks, and can't resist my favorite soy green tea latte, just because! We have to go through immigration before we board the ferry . I pass through with ease, but I realize Karthick hasn't made it through yet. I go back to the gate and they won't let him through because of his Indian passport. So we say an awkward goodbye and I head down the ramp to board the ferry. As I'm about to step aboard someone grabs my arm, it's Karthick! He made it! They finally let him go yay! We sit aboard the vomit comet and watch the movie shooter in Thai, as everyone around us pukes into plastic bags. I'm grateful for my lack of smell and iron stomach!
A few hours later it's koh lipe! And I am on island time! Usually we book accommodations ahead of our arrival but we were sure we'd find something so we didn't. After a beautiful long tail boat shuttles us to shore we start trying to find a room. Everything is super expensive or booked. We hike up and down the shore in the hot sun, to no avail. We eventually take up a guys offer to let us stay in his massage shop for five hundred baht a night. Well take it! And it makes for a good story! We hop on another long tail to go snorkeling, the water here is faerytale Thai island water. Clear as vodka and blue as a bottle of gin, not that I'm an alcoholic or anything. I have dreamt of an island this beautiful my whole life and being here is stunning and startling and I feel triumphant! So we cut across this sea to another island and pull up beside a lot of other long tails to snorkel. Remember in my last post when I said ko rong had the best snorkeling is ever done? Scratch that, it's koh lipe! Clown fish creep out of coral everywhere a new fish a new color, just addictive to swim and watch in wonder. Best snotkling ever and I can't wait to dive here!
We return to the soft sands of koh lipe, Karthick arranges his travel back to koh samui the next day. I play uke with the owner of the massage shop and chill at the bar next door. We get a foot back and neck massage. Best one so far and it puts Karthick and I in this very spacy blissed out mood. Which leads us to going to an Italian restaurant and ordering a pizza, each. I eat an entire pineapple pizza that's fantastic! Afterwards I leave Karthick to walk solo down the sands in the company of the full moon. I hang upside down on some rocks watching the moons reflection bob and ripple in the waves. Then I retire to the open air massage shop mat and hose myself with Insect repellent. I still get devoured by Mosquitos. Karthick leaves the next morning and I am finally traveling solo!
I'm ecstatic! I can do whatever I want! I check into my hostel and sit in the aircon trying to talk my friend elysse into coming to thsiland! I only had one day at the hostel so I set out to scour the island for cheap lodgings. I walked most of the island until I ran out of tourists. I sat alone on the beach gazing out at koh adang across the idyllic andaman sea. I took random trails back to the hostel and came upon a place with nets to rent for three hundred baht a night! I guess I know where I'll be staying! Strolling with my uke I talk to dive shops and sign up for a two dive discovery scuba tour.
Up early to the beach packing my bag an heading to the dive shop. We hop a long tail out to the proper dive boat and start churning the waters heading on to the faraway islands( yeah that's what they are actually called). I meet Pasquale, my heavily French accented dive instructor for the day, he's kooky, hard to understand but full of pep. I suppose the diving is probably easier than it sounds. An hour later I'm suctioning on a wet suit, strapping s tank to my back and jumping in the ocean. It's pretty easy this scuba thing. I didn't see to much spectacular on my first dive, but on the second I saw huge puffer fish, giant morey eels, lion fish, star fish, the entire cast of finding nemo. Okay I'm hooked scuba diving is great. I think I'll have to get my certification,someday when I have more money.
The next morning I ferry away from koh lipe, I sit on the front of the speed boat with the other backpackers who wipe away tears as they say goodbye. It's a choppy ride past deserted islands. We stop for more passengers in turutao national park. There's an entire ferry boat of monks that smile and
wave. Six hours and a minibus later I'm in krabi town gabbing with two sweet Canadians in my dorm room. I tell them my plans to go climbing in railey beach. Oh really? Their cute dreadlocked Austrian
friend loves climbing! So the next morning I head out with the boy and I climb the faerytale
limestone crags of railey beach! It's exhilarating with dramatic ocean view at the top! I love climbing it's difficult but so worth it! My buddy heads back to krabi town and I watch the sunset into the ocean. I'm staying in the hippie rasta part of town called tonsai beach. I can't walk there until the tide goes down. It's well dark by the time I get there and I can't find my guesthouse. No one seems to know where it is either. My gps is leading me into the middle of nowhere. After questioning a half dozen people I find it, tucked way back in the woods up the mountain. Okay they lead me to my room, oops there's someone in it! They give me a different room instead. It's filthy there's huge dead cockroaches in the bathroom. But I'm a trooper I just want to shower the sweat off. The shower doesn't work, oh well, I'll shower with the butt sprayer, I have no pride. Once my hair is soaped the lights go out. Okay that's the last straw! Naked and covered in soap in the dark I wrap myself in a blanket and go outside, none of the staff are around and the other guests ignore the crazy half naked American, sigh, I return to my room. I find my headlamp and finish showering, the water stops working, luckily I'm rinsed. I lie on my bed in the dark and write ukelele songs about how sucky this room is. It's early but I'm in no mood to go out so I wrap the mosquito net around my bed and go to sleep. I have the weirdest dreams ever and escape to the beach early the next morning.
There's not much to do, I swim stare at the gorgeous limestone peaks, play uke, people watch. I discover that there's another beach voted one of the most beautiful beaches in the world. I walk through cavey stalactites to get there, it's an incredible beach, densely populated. There is a cave of carved wooden penises in every conceivable shape size and color! I'm not making it up! Do patently it's some ancient offering to the legend of some sea goddess or some such thing all I know is that it's a fun spectacle in usually bashful thsiland. On the walk home I see a sign that says lagoon with an arrow piointingbup a steep climbing slope covered in ropes and vines and branches, yeah I wanna go! It's a fun climb up and a gorgeous view of the railey peninsula. I meet an incredible traveller there named Op and together with a bunch if young English people we trek down a steep slope into the lagoon. It's breathtaking, the loud sounds of construction on the beach left behind. We are sheltered in
this cave, the water a cloudy brackish blue. I jump in and float out to the middle, I feel tiny and
ancient. The opening to the sky is shaped like an eye and puffy clouds drift by on the sky blue sky. It's a great memory and I wish you could have come with me. I climb and walk home I sing Ecuadorean traditional songs with a gal on the beach. I book my trip to go deep water soloing the next day. That means I sail out to an island and free climb with no equipment over deep water, so when I fall I'm caught by the ocean, awesome! Can't wait! Back at my lovely room they make me move into my bungalow, it's actually a move up, though the mattress is beyond broken down and I sleep in a funny ball. It was a weird day full of Beauty and emotion.
I eat muesli the next day and meet a pleasant Oregonian uke player before I head for the boat. I meet more Americans on my climbing trip today than I did in my entire travels up til then. as always the boat trip is amazing, the view of islands breathtsking! We anchor by the cliffs we climb rope ladders to. I don't do anything too dangerous, but live jumping into the water from a good height! It's fun to watch the good climbers go scary high and jump I the sea! Weeeeee! After a few hours we pull to a private cove and enjoy lunch before going on to our next rock walk location, this one is more challenging but ivves scaling a huge stalactite before jumping off! I feel like a badass though I am admittedly a novice! It was an exceptional day! I hop a boat to so nang beach and climb in a pick up truck buss that winds me through the krabi romantic road back to krabi town as a Swiss man talks to me about life. That winds up my this ocean adventure and it he next day I fly to northern Thailand, Chiang Mai!
