Laura and Nigel continue:
Our trip to 5 islands, including Phi Phi was both really enjoyable and dissapointing! We got to see many appealing islands, with very nice beaches. We went swimming and snorkeling and saw colourful coral and tropical fish of all shapes and sizes and also visitied some small monkeys on “Monkey island”, some babies not much bigger than a hand.
The part that was disappointing was experiencing the negative effect tourism has on these islands; the rubbish floating on the water, fumes from the countless boats, noisy people, signs of damage to the coral reefs etc. This was no surprise considering more than 700 people a day visit these islands. We were also disappointed having being part of this type of tourism ourselves.
Krabi was a good experience overall. This town had a nice feel to it and our interaction with some of the locals was also rewarding.
It was also here where we experienced our first Thai massage. It aims to free blocked energy, like many other systems and we both felt a lot better after. (It was a little painful though!).
The trip from Krabi to Phuket airport was also interesting. Not only trying to communicate to the guy on the bus that we wanted to be dropped off on the highway, 3 kilometers from the airport, but also attempting to walk with our backpacks on our backs and up hill while it was raining. I think one of the locals must of felt sorry for us, as she stopped to give us a lift. This however did not prove easy, especially trying to carry us both on her motorcycle with our backpacks and a sports bag! In the end she had to drop me off first and then go back for Nigel.
By this stage, we were both pretty wet and sweaty due to the exertion, but arrived at the airport with plenty of time to change and catch our flight. There may have been an easier way, however it was the day before a public holiday and we couldn’t get reliable information on public transport, it seemed certain services were not running.
