To hear more about Thailand visit: Thailand Part I & Phuket Resort Review
We boarded a small Thai longtail boat around noon the day of our island hopping day trip from Phi Phi.
The first stop was on Monkey Island. This island is inhabited only by big macaque monkeys and plenty of baby monkeys (hence the name). They’re pretty used to humans so they will come right up to you and swim with you or jump on the boats to look for food. We saw one of the big males steal an entire 2-liter bottle of 7-UP off of a boat before he chugged it down right in front of us.
The next stop was at Maya Bay where they filmed Leonardo DiCaprio’s The Beach. From right off the shores, we snorkeled and were surrounded by huge limestone mountains and sea life. There were hundreds of electric purple fish, rainbow fish and coral reefs. The island itself is absolutely stunning and perfectly preserved. There was only a small shack for food on the entire island. If you’re interested in wildlife and plant species, the island has descriptive plaques all over. To get to the other side of the island, you have to go through a cave. Mijo and I love our water shoes and highly recommend getting a pair if you’re going to be trekking in watery caves, like we did. We swam in the bay area but we saw some jelly fish so we did not stay for long. To get back to our boat, we climbed a rope up the side of a cliff and trekked through the jungle to get back to the other side.
We stopped at another island and passed by Viking’s Cave which has a huge shipwrecked viking boat.
Next, we stopped at Phi Leh Lagoon- a memory that will stay with me for a lifetime. We got there right before the sun passed behind the island’s mountain. At first, we were walking on about four inches of water and passing exposed sea anemones and seaweed. It looked as though we were on a drained sea floor. We walked amongst the sea creatures until we came to a cliff filled with emerald waters. Mijo and I dove into the mysterious and sudden, bottomless pit. Since our boat driver dropped us off for reasons we were soon to find out, we were the only ones on the entire island. We took in the gorgeous surroundings and swam around until suddenly there was a huge rush of water pushing us deeper into the lagoon and we were swimming against a strong current. It felt like someone put on “high force” in an Endless Exercise Pool. We looked around and saw that the once four-inch sea floor was now five feet deep. We swam as hard as we could until we got to the edge of the pit and climbed up. The second we got onto the “sea shelf,” we were pushed back into the lagoon. Finally, we saw our boat in the now, six feet deep waters and swam to it. Nature and its gravitational forces on tides amaze me again. Once we got off the island and into the deep blue sea, the sun was setting across the water. But just as we thought lights off meant the end of our journey, we stopped at Monkey Beach yet again. This time, to swim with bio-luminescent plankton. I grabbed my snorkeling gear again and jumped into the black waters (yes, alone, Mijo preferred the dry side rather than unknown waters this time). The second I jumped in, I was stung/ shocked/ nibbled on (?) by thousands of sparkling demons.
Later, that night we went to a dancing/ fire show on the beach. The second we arrived, I was pulled on stage by two Thai performers and made to sit on a chair and pull my hair up. They threw a cigarette in my mouth and before I could spit it out, a spinning fireball conducted by a man dancing to Michael Jackson was coming my way to light it.
It was a great night filled with much dancing, mojitos, and late night conversations with locals. On our way back to the resort, we found a Slow Loris in a diaper on hanging from the side of a food truck… only in Thailand!
The next day, Mijo and I woke up early to take a hike to the Phi Phi lookout point. If you do this trip, make sure you bring LOADS of water because the hike consists of climbing a dirt mountain for quite a few miles. Mijo and I made this mistake. He was hungover from the fireshow the night before. Mind you, I was fine thanks to the many freshly cracked coconuts I drink a day in Thailand. But Mijo was riding the struggle bus. We got to the lower outlook and I started climbing to the second when I noticed Mijo wasn’t next to me. I hear a whispered, yet urgent “pssst HEATHER.” When I turned around, I see Mijo 20 feet down the hill and surrounded by huge monkeys. They had four inch long eye teeth and were baring them and hissing at him. There was about five males and I thought “dang, here is where we get our limbs torn off.” They slowly stalked him, dragging their paws against the jungle floor to create a weird slumped posture. By some miracle, they jumped back into the bushes. Mijo and I basically ran back down the mountain.
Our life flashing before our eyes made this 24 hours in Thailand- that much more memorable. Thankfully no deaths occurred in the process.
