Island Hopping in Thailand
The island of Phuket is the party destination of Thailand. Jami and I were only there for one night and experienced the highs and lows of the decibel scale (more on that later). Once reaching Phuket we searched up and down the busy main street to find our hostel hidden in the third floor of a night club. It definitely matched the vibe of the area. The streets were lined with bars. We spent that day laying on the beach and cooling of in the water. As the sun went down we found a place to eat dinner and then find a spot to get the obligatory alcohol bucket. The rest of the night was a blur.
As the night ended for us we headed back to our hostel. It was a cheap place to stay if you don’t mind the bass heavy club music below where ear plugs will do no good. It was the loudest night of our trip (and possibly of our life) which was in stark contrast to the morning after when we hopped in our ride to the ferry that will be taking us to the island of Ko Phi Phi.
They certainly run on their own time in Thailand. We we’re waiting under the sun in a crowd of confused tourists trying to figure out why we weren't allowed to board the ferry yet. That lasted for about an hour after the ferry was supposed to depart. I wasn’t sure if we were going to get to Ko Phi Phi but eventually we were on our way.
Ko Phi Phi was definitely more of a resort island. Our hotel room was amazing. It had its own pool and it was right on the beach with beautiful views. We were leaving for Tonsai Beach the next day and with only one night in Ko Phi Phi we had to make it count. At the front desk of our hotel we were able to book an island hopping tour for the following morning allowing us to visit the smaller islands with great beaches. We spent that evening on Ko Phi Phi enjoying the great food and looking through stalls of souvenirs and bamboo tattoo shops.
The next morning we were off to our island hopping tour. But first we had to get there. One of the unique experiences we had in Thailand were the person to person hand offs to get to our final destination. Just follow this woman and she’ll take you to the pier where you’ll stay by a statue and a man will arrive telling you to get on his boat. To those running the show saw a smooth operation but to the rest of us, we were just hopping that at the end of it all we got to the tour we signed up for.
It was an amazing tour. We saw several beaches (including one with so many monkeys) and snorkeled with tons of fish. After our tour it was on the way back to Ko Phi Phi to pick up our stuff from the hotel and get back on a boat headed for Tonsai Beach.
Tonsai was definitely more of the backpackers destination. It was full of rock climbers with budget places to stay. Our hut on the beach experience that we imagined in our heads didn’t quite line up with our experience. It wasn’t terrible but we quickly learned how dependent we were on air conditioning. Tonsai not only did not have any air condition but also had electricity hours. We could only use the small fan that was provided during the night. But we didn’t let that ruin our high spirits because we had several days of tours lined up. Rock climbing on day one, another island hopping tour on day two, and a sunset island tour on day three.
The tours all departed from the neighboring Railay beach which was more equipped having electricity all day and even air conditioned accommodations! The tours were great but at the end of day two bad luck struck. Jami and I were hit with terrible food poisoning. Lucky I got it a few hours after Jami which allowed me just enough time to get us out of the more primitive Tonsai and into an air conditioned room in Railay where we would spend the rest of our time in Thailand recovering with plenty of Gatorade and watching Iranian dramas on TV. We ended up missing our day three sunset island tour but that didn’t put a damper on our trip. We still had an fantastic time and Thailand is still one of our favorite places we’ve been.
