Ko Phi Phi Don, Thailand

By: Brendon

So we left Ao Nang after being there for about a week and took the 1 1/2 hour boat ride to Ko Phi Phi Don which is an island halfway between Krabi town and Phuket. We were lucky enough to be able to book a place to stay while on the boat. Once we arrived at the pier all the other hotels and resorts had people waiting to carry their bags but not our resort. Well our resort finally showed up and then we walked all the way to the other side of the island. The resort was quite nice though and had a really nice pool that overlooked the bay.

Kris was still not feeling that great and this is when her rash/itchy legs were really bad. Well we made a trip to the hospital on the island and this is when we found out that she had Dengue Fever. The weather was also not very good and we experienced a couple of the monsoon storms. Mostly at night though! During the days Kris wasn't really up for doing anything as she was sick but one of the days I got out to do a couple of dives. I did three dives...a wreck dive and two reef dives. The wreck dive was very cool and although there was no reef the fish life was amazing. The second and third dives were both reef dives and both were great. The second dive was at a site called shark point and yes I did see a shark. It was only a small leopard shark but it was cool none the less. I also saw so many other fish... too many to list and I really enjoyed myself. We were unable to visit the site of "The Beach" (movie) which is on Ko Phi Phi Leh (the smaller of the two islands) as the weather turned out to be bad that day. Maybe next time...

The boat from Ao Nang to Phi Phi. Oh ya Phi Phi is actually pronounced Pee Pee.

Just some great scenery along the way.

More scenery. This is the bay to Rai Leh East.

Rai Leh East with some boats moored in the bay.

Arriving on Phi Phi was very busy and those that didn't book were running around trying to find a place to stay. Good thing that Kris and I booked.

View of the bay with the pier on the left and all the boats out in the bay are mostly dive boats.

Longtail boats lined up on the beach.

Kris waiting patiently for our resort people to show up.

Here is our resort guy taking our bags to the resort.

A beautiful sunset from our chalet.

The view from our chalet.

Tsunami memorial garden.

Mmmm more Thai pancakes. And we found out that the
sandwiches they make are also delicious.

People riding their tuk-tuk.

The view of our resort from in the water.

Ao Nang, Krabi, Thailand

By: Kristin

So we took a 9 hour bus ride to Krabi Town from Malaysia. During the whole 9 hours we stopped once to have a 15 minute lunch. Bren and I were the only "farang" (tourist/english speaking) on the bus and so when they announced lunch in Thai we had no clue what they were saying. Luckily this nice girl helped us and translated as she knew a little bit of English. For the rest of the ride she was very eager to speak to us in English. Once we got off the bus we were literally ushered into a little garage area where we were offered tourist information. We both didn't really want to pay any deposit for accomodation before we actually saw the room so said we would wait until we got to Ao Nang (about 20 minutes from Krabi Town, on the coast). So we hopped into the back of a pick-up truck with two benches to sit on. The taxi driver took us to the J. Hotel which turned out to be a beauty! Clean, with hot shower, tv, mini fridge and balcony....all for the low, low price of 400Baht ( 12$ Can./night). The one bad thing was the room was infested with ants....although if we didn't leave any food out or bother them, they didn't both us much....but it was quite disgusting when Bren decided to knock on the base boards and about a million ants came out and crawled up the wall....EW!
We ended up staying in Ao Nang for almost a week because I got Dengue Fever (although I was told it was just the flu by the first doctor)...so really I spent my time in bed...not that fun at all.

But Bren got out and was able to explore. Here is his part of the story...

Well, although a lot of the time I was taking care of Kristin by getting her food and drinks and taking her to the Dr. I was still able to get a little bit of time to go and explore the local area. I hopped on a longtail boat and took the 15 minute ride over to Hat (Hat=Beach) Rai Leh and Hat Phranang. Kristin and I had done this before but at that time Kristin had already started to feel sick so we didn't exactly explore much. Anyway...this time was great for me. Hat Rai Leh is known for its world class climbing and although I didn't climb I did watch quite a few climbers do there thing. I do know that I'd really love to come back here and just climb for a couple of weeks. I did do a bit of hiking around the area and discovered a great view of the beaches. I also met up with some people that were setting up a slackline. For those of you (probably all of you) who don't know what a slackline is it is basically a stretchy flat rope that you string between 2 points and then walk/balance on it. I have one at home so if anyone wants to give it a go I'll set it up next summer! It started as training for climbing but is now coming into it's own as a sport. Anyway between walking the line I was able to swim in the sea and eat delicious fresh pineapple that Thai ladies sold on the beach...It was a good day for me!!

Our little taxi from the bus stop in Krabi twon to Ao Nang (Ao means Bay).

One of the first things we noticed was the new evacuation signs. There are also huge metal towers every 100 metres that have sirens on them to warn you if a Tsunami was to come.

Everyone here rides these little scooters around so you see them
parked like this all over the place.

This is Ko Pudu (Ko or Koh means Island) with a longtail boat in the forground. To go anywhere you just hop on a longtail boat.

This Thai women is making our favorite thing...Banana Pancakes!!! Mmmmm

Kristin holding our banana pancakes...Mmm so good!!!!

Longtail boats lined up in the morning ready to take you somewhere.
This is the beach at Ao Nang.

Longtail boats again.

It is monsoon season here right now and here it comes....

This is my Tahi buddy who I bought some braclets from. Every night in Ao Nang people would set up little shops on the street. Both Kris and I found some great things.

This is taken from the longtail boat and is of the headland at Hat Rai Leh. West Rai Leh is to the left of the huge limestone spire.

Between west Rai Leh and East Rai Leh is a small piece of land and even now you can still see a lot of the damage that the Tsunami did. It's even better to see that the Thai people are always hard at work at you can see the changes from day to day.

Some rock climbers on Hat Ton Sai (a beach right near Hat Rai Ley).

The View from the lookout I found. The lagoon on the left is West Rai Ley
and bottom right is East Rai Ley.

Slackling on the beach at Phranang Cave. I didn't get any pictures of me unfortunately. It is actually quite hard to walk the line.

Looking the other way at the slackline and Phranang Cave.