Day 1 – Koh Phi Phi
It started with a walk along the beach near the hotel, then a great breakfast at the (purported) best bakery here. I then walked up to Long Beach and generated about 100 litres of sweat along the way.
Luckily there was a swim at the end of it. A nice beach too, but the walk back was hotter … What followed was a massage, lunch, and a mango smoothie. If you could live off mango smoothies, I would.
I tried to arrange a snorkeling trip for tomorrow, but as I’m a lone traveller, I would need to hire the whole boat myself and that’s simply too boring and too expensive. So, I’ve arranged for a kayak first thing in the morning. I’ll head around the bay from the same close beach.
All in all, today was definitely a rest day. I think it’s important to have days like this every 4-5 days or every 400kms whichever comes first – and I’ve done that so far on this trip.
Day 2 – Koh PhI Phi
Paddled around for an hour and a half – around to Monkey Bay, out to the next point and then across the large bay from one set of outstanding karst cliffs to an even more outstanding set of karst cliffs with a nice swell on the way.
The water was nice out so far, but within the bay, there were telltale sewerage suds and loads of plastic debris. Some of the small beaches looked like garbage dumps. Still, there were quite a few fish, but I definitely won’t be swimming in this bay again. It’s strange when the hotel pool seems like a more healthy option 😁
The rest of the day was again very lazy. I changed the oil in my Rohloff hub, had another excellent Mango Smoothie, swam and did as little as possible.
I finally booked my ferry ticket and later some accommodation in Phuket.
Koh Phi Phi has been a great break, but it’s time to leave and see more of this wonderful country.
Day 3 – Koh Phi Phi to Phuket
Last breakfast at the bakery – just sensational food and coffee. Then it was time to pack and get moving.The guy at the ferry wharf was an opportunist who wanted some money out of me for taking my bike on the ferry. He was hilarious, making a fake call to his manager, “sorry no more receipts left”, “I’ll come with you to tell the crew you paid” – he didn’t. I really don’t care, I just wish he’d say “give me 100 baht and I’ll let you through” rather than go through the play acting.
I’m now in Phuket, where the Old Town seems really nice, so I’ll do a tour of Ao Phang Na islands tomorrow and stay another night.