Chapter Fourteen: Thailand, a liitle bit island hopping

Thailand

After Hong Kong I decided not to go to the Philippines, weather was horrible over there. It turned out to be a very good decision. Phuket was the first island, I didn't had high expectations. I heard mixed stories from other travelers, a couple were quite negative, others very positive. I didn't read anything about Thailand, i will see it when I get there.

I have a little hotel just outside Patong, near a quiet beach, perfect to chill for a couple of days. For 5 euros per day I rent a scooter and day by day I will see what the plan is. A couple of days on the beach reading a book, excellent.

The food in Thailand is the best I have eaten so far, everything is just delicious and healthy, just jammy!! Patong is an insane little town, many bars, many clubs and of course the gogo bars. Beautiful ladies, but you need to look out for the lady boys...disgusting. I know a friend of my would thrive in this place, let's call him B. the Rabbit. He always talks about the ring of fire, in my understanding it's the volcanic ring that stretches from Indonesia to the Philippines and further, but I'm sure he meant something else.  Nevertheless this place is made for him.

One sentence that will resonate for a while is: Hello...massaaage. There are hundreds massage shops, every time when you pass by you'll here it. Massage is oke, but not as good as I experienced in Bali, that was top notch.

After a couple of days of chilling and no traveling, i needed to do something again. Island hopping...Koh Phi Phi was the next destination, on these islands the movie The Beach was shot. It's a lovely island, an party island with many hidden treasures..

I think I mentioned it a couple of times, but the number of people you meet on the road is very special. Some you only see during a boat trip, with some you travel a couple of days, others you meet again on different place. I hardly take pictures of the people I met, it's just not that common, I don't do it, they don't do it, reason...you meet too many people....kind of unwritten rule.

Arrival in Koh Phi Phi, a characteristic of the islands in Thailand or the one that i visited is that they have bays. One part is massive rock, but when you passed that part you'll see a beach or harbor. 
Koh Phi Phi has something...it's well developed, but it has something, something of a kind of fairytale...actually it's more a place where the party never stops. I must admit it's very touristy, popular among party people. 

I went to many little islands, bamboo island with white powder sand, here you must were sunglasses otherwise you're blinded. Mosquito islands, koh phi phi don and leh, and some other little ones. Some with really really white beaches and with sand, never felt such extreme powder sand between my toes, a massage on its own.

I was on a boat while visiting all the islands (dhhu), good group, crazy people. Met a Canadian guy, also Luke. His friend cancelled the trip, he woke with 2 piercings and a tattoo on his face...yep it's such an island.

But I never expected that I would experience one of the most thrilling moments of my life...and for a second time this trip I felt a moment of fear. The boat stopped at a snorkeling point, the water wasn't clear, too much plankton, coral destroyed and my snorkeling equipment half broken. 500 meters away there was a rock formation. I went on my own, there are many moments that you realize that swimming for many people is not that common. Everybody stayed near the boat where only a couple of fish swam. 
Totally relaxed I reached the rock formation, still the water was muddy and than...than out of the blurry blue grey nothing....a shark of 2 meters with his mouth open closed in on me. Just a meter away it turned to the other side. Wtf, wtf, wtf it scared the shit out of me, after a good look I saw what kind of shark it was, just a black tip shark, 2 meters long, I looked around me if there were more..no...good...let's follow it. The movements of sharks are fascinating, it looks that they are constant searching, analyzing their surroundings for food, what a creature. I think I saw it for half a minute, could be shorter or longer, totally obsessed by this creature. I had no flippers and with the blurry water I lost sight of it. What a moment, this is something I will never forget, just unbelievable f*cking brilliant!!!
I was surprised that when I swam back I never had a moment that the shark or other ones could bite me. Weird, naive, careless...if they were dangerous that should have warned me, right? 
It turned out to be naive, I like jumping of boats any swimming to the shore. I did it on bamboo island, again no warning. On bamboo island I see many signs that the Portuguese war-ships are oftentimes spotted around the island, again wtf. If there is one jellyfish where you don't want to have a close encounter with, it's the Portuguese war-ship, some species are deadly, tiny but deadly. Now I don't think this was a deadly specie, but I would rather not stung by it. At least I have some juicy stories to tell when I'm back home.

Like I mentioned, many islands have bays with unbelievable white powder sand beaches, one to mention is Maya Bay. A little bamboo forest/beach hidden by rock formations, here the beach was shot, a nice place, but very very popular among tourists. I think in 20 years time it will be completely destroyed. Like many other places in Thailand, there's no living coral anymore, oke still some spots, but when I compare it with Tioman island, hell versus heaven.

I decide to do a little bit more island hopping, I'm heading to Koh Lanta and 4 other ones. To reach a beach I need to swim 80 meters through a tunnel...I will let you know how this is.