Beach Bums

Remember the movie, "The Beach"? It was shot at Maya Bay on Phi Phi Lay (below). Now imagine Nadim, Yasmin, Roya, and I there. Yes it was awesome. It was really beautiful, especially when we first arrived. About 15 minutes later though, all the other tour boats arrived too and the place was crawling with people and no longer quite as nice.

After our swim at the beach our speed boat took us towards the middle of the lagoon and we did some snorkelling. It was the first time that Yasmin and Roya had done it. They loved it. There were lots of fish to see too, so it made for a great first experience.

We saw some caves and other small inlets before stopping in Phi Phi Don for lunch. And in case you were wondering, Phi Phi Island is pronounced pea pea island. Our friend, Mylene was concerned that it would be close to Phoo Phoo island, but I assure you the waters were clear! The above photo was from one of the bays. Phi Phi Don has two bays that are back to back and connected by a thin strip of land. This area was totally destroyed by the tsunami in 2004, but has been completely rebuilt.

After lunch we stopped at Monkey Beach. It's so named because of the number of monkies that call it home. The monkies were pretty fat and not too interested in what all the humans were up to. Still it was fun to watch them munching bananas and corn on the cob.

We had another swim at that beach. All the beaches were great. All had clear water, white powdery sand and beautiful views of rock formations in the background. It was really warm too.

We ended with a stop at Bamboo Island and another swim. There were big waves there which were fun to play in, but the ride home was an adventure! Nadim had chosen the worst seat. The spray from the tossing waves and wind gave him a salty shower all the way back. The girls and I got wet too, but not quite as bad. It was warm so it really didn't bother us too much.

We had planned to do our school work on the boat, but the wind and the tossing and the water meant that we didn't get a lot done. We finished it up this evening. The girls were such troopers about it, despite being so tired.

CM