Today was my last day in Railay before travelling back to Ao Nang and onwards to Phuket tomorrow. So I thought I would go to Princess cave and up to the viewpoint and lagoon. Princess cave was really straight forward to get to but a little weird it had great big wooden penises everywhere. I read up about the legend but it was still a little strange. I did have a good chuckle at the woman who put her face right up against one and struck a smile whilst her friend took the photo...think what you will!

This tale, story, account if you like gets it's own review instead of combining with yesterday because this was such an epic day climbing on Railay beach. It started off well, the sign said the viewpoint was up a hill and as I was changing into my trainers (we learnt from Luang Prabang and Siem Reap not to do this in flip flops) it might have been a little off-putting that a tour guide wished me luck after finding out I was going for it. The initial climb was a little steep but of course everything was made harder by the fact that I had all my things on my back as I had to check out this morning. The viewpoint was amazing, just like Koh Phi Phi you could see both bays from the top and all the trees and town in between. Alex had also climbed up there by then as I bumped into him at Princess Cave this morning. We both decided that since we were up here we would then go on to the lagoon.

Oh...my...god. If I knew what I was in store for I think I would have just said no but once I had started climbing it was a mission to get there. The first stage was to navigate down a steep slope which was nothing more than a mud slide. There are guide ropes but we were slipping and sliding all over the place. Alex eventually shouted back that if I loved that then I was going to love this! I could only imagine why and as I approached the end of the mud slide I just saw a cliff edge with about a 30 ft drop all made of jagged rocks. This was not going to be an easy descent and this was also going to be the first of 3, each harder than the last one. After getting through the first 2 drops I came to the final one which entailed going through a hole in the rock on a suspended piece of rope above the over hang. NOT my idea of fun as I was already soaked and covered in mud from head to toe. I took longer to get down than everyone else because I had to weigh up the best route for me on the way down. What some people might be comfortable doing might not suit everyone. This was fine, I dropped my backpack down the hole and then promptly slipped and almost fell down it. Luckily my left arm broke my fall with quick thinking from my left hand grabbing at the rock although there is still a nice black bruise there now and a few deep scratches, I didn't fall to the bottom breaking possibly every bone in my body.

Once at the bottom it was the most amazing thing. The lagoon was so beautiful. We went swimming in it for ages before deciding it was time to go back. Climbing up is much more my style! The journey back was definitely a lot quicker! Today has been an amazing day and we finished it off together in a little bar on Tonsai beach with some very strange Reggae types who managed to get us to drink a shot of clear liquid from a bottle which had a snake eating a scorpion inside...if I didn't have to get back to Ao Nang and play yet another losing round of scrabble then I think I would still be in that bar now along with Alex who I left behind on Tonsai beach *smile*.

This is a picture of the lagoon we climbed down to on Railay Beach.