After seeing in the New Year in busy Bangkok we decided to see some of the islands on the west coast of Thailand for some beach time. Though we had originally planned to also see some of the east coast islands we have heard that these are generally full of 'full mooners' and decided to cut them out.
There had been a storm on the south coast during the new year and our overnight bus seemed to catch the tail end of it. Even though we had decided to get the most expensive bus (these are the only ones that have safety checks as they are owned by the government) the torrential rain still managed to work it's way through the window seals after a few hours and we both slept under the drips.
There was however a Thai soap opera on the t.v. Which kept us entertained; we couldn't understand what they were saying but it was so badly acted we enjoyed it anyway!
We reached Phuket at 8am and had planned to spend a few days in Hat Kata on the east coast of the island. This was not to be as we couldn't find where to catch the swagthaw and we were told we needed to both get on the back of a motorbike (with 2 rucksacks each) to go to the stop. We decided to catch the ferry straight to Koh Phi Phi instead and 5 minutes after buying our ferry ticket we saw the swagthaw to Hat Kata speed past!
We eventually got to Koh Phi Phi in the afternoon after nearly 24 hours of travel and were pleased to finally put down our rucksacks. The island is beautiful with lots of limestone crags rising out of the turquoise sea. It's often voted as one of the best beaches in the world and was used for the filming of 'the beach'. We decided to get into the spirit of things and on our first morning we took a yoga class. It made us realise that we are not very flexible and that travelling has made us a bit unfit but we both enjoyed it all the same.
We also spent an afternoon snorkelling with a Eco diving company, amongst the technicolor fish we saw a lot of black tip sharks (eek!) and a turtle which we free dived down towards to say hello. We also saw a nemo fish in his anemone which our instructor showed us how to dive down and wave your hand at and he will dance with you. Unfortunately neither of us could dive down far enough but we managed to get close enough to see him. As there had been a storm a few days before the visibility was a bit cloudy and there were lots of tiny jellyfish which stung our arms and ears though it only hurt for about a minute. There was a noise like electric under the water which our instructor said was the sound of the parrot fish breaking the coral.
Apart from these two activities we spent the rest of our time on the beaches and trekking up the island to see the viewpoint. The central strip of the island is only 2m above sea level between the tall limestone crags and was particularly badly hit in the 2004 tsunami with 1 in 5 people killed. There are a lot of pictures of the aftermath up on the island and some of the devastation is still evident, and looking down at the island really brought home to us how fragile life can be.