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TRIP TO PHAN NGA BAY AND KO PHI PHI ISLAND<br />DEC 14-18 2004

SE Asia 2004 (part II)

Alex Mumzhiu
2006-03-22 19:08:55

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A fleet of about dozen and a half small boat and several large boats sail around two islands and stop at most interesting places, like Maya Bay, filmed in the movie "The Beach". The places we visited, were amazing, but going through them with the hordes of tourists was not the way I wanted to see them.

So, the next day I decided to swim around the smallest (Western) portion of Koh Phi Phi Don. My route shown in red on map in attachment. After the fleet of boats with tourists passed in the afternoon, I was left alone with the sea and the vertical walls of the island. These walls were mostly not even vertical, but with some negative angle, because the sea dissolved limestone material from which they were made. The most amazing features of seashore landscape here are stalactites hanging from the island's walls above the sea, see attachment. Unlike stalactites inside the caves, which are nice
and sleek, these stalactites are are ugly and weird. They remind the bodies and body parts of sinners hanging from the ceiling of Buddhist hell, according to pictures in Tibet. Impenetrable walls were broken sometimes with small grottoes and submerged and half submerged caves to which I dive. And it was a lot of sea animals there. I killed a large cuttlefish with my underwater sling and planned to boil it in next bay with some wood. But accidentally I slipped my bag and it fell to the ocean floor, along with my knife, lighter, steel mag and water bottle. But I missed mostly the cuttlefish, it was so colorful and I wanted to examine it in details. I did not meet any swimmers and only when I approach the end of my trip I met few kayakers. I swam for nine hours and when I came to my hotel I barely stand. But I was happy, it was exactly the type of interaction with the Andaman sea which I dream about.

Next day I took a boat to Phuket. I learned from the Lonely Planet book "Thailand's Islands and Beaches" that I cannot investigate Phang Nga Bay on my own. Islands are far away from the mainland and from each other for swimming. Also water is not clear here, so snorkeling will be not fun. Nobody rents kayaks at Phang Nga. So I took a boat tour like ten years ago. Nature create here even more weird karst phenomenons, then in Phi Phi. That empty island, is the most
amazing. Sea water dissolved its middle part. Unique flora and fauna had been grown inside, behind the tall island's walls in the space which was completely isolated from the outside world. From Phang Nga I took the bus to Khao Lak on Dec 18.

Postscript

Eight days later tsunami hits these places which I just visited and names like Phuket, Koh Phi Phi and Khao Lak were frequently mentioned in the news. Koh Phi Phi island is made of two hilly parts connected with sandy isthmus, which is barely above the sea level. The most narrow part of it is about 200 meters wide. Tsunami which hits directly from the South should washed away everything from the isthmus to the Northern bay. My hostel was 500 meters from the sea in the Tourist village, but even there water reached the second floor. According to the news all houses on Koh Phi Phi was destroyed. In Phuket I lived just across from the main street, I even remember some store's sign boards which now are shown in the news. This street was shown on TV many times with the mountains of cars, boats and garbage in the middle.

I wanted to stay in Thailand till New Year but my daughter wanted me to came back before Dec 25. My son who is now in his round-the-world trip also supposed to be in Thailand about this time, but he fell in love with Africa and postponed his departure from it. So both of us just accidentally were not there in the time of tsunami.