Today is a quiet day. I will meet T for dinner. I use the hotel internet, work on this journal, read the newspaper, and generally relax. I speak with R, and manager of KP's office in Krabi, about getting a hotel room, and agree with her suggestion (Ao Nong Palace; 1300B per nite). T meets me at the hotel about 6:30, and we go back to the same mall we went to a few nites previously, but this time we find a different restaurant, MK. I had noticed that there are MK restaurants all over town--it seems like the BK version of Denny's. Each table has its own cooker, and you can order regular cooked meals, or you can order items that you must cook yourself. We get a combination. I get noodles and greens and chicken in a broth, and T gets some Japanese/Chinese style items that must be cooked. Together it makes for an interesting and tasty meal. We talk about my trip to Krabi, and also my next trip to Chiang Mai. T has a cousin in Chiang Mai (the sister of my friend in Miami), and she is thinking about joining me for the trip to Chiang Mai. That is fine with me! She will also get some info about hotels and let me know. What a nice person! After dinner we get a taxi, take T home, and me back to the hotel. I watch some TV and then go to bed.
Day 118; Thursday, January 22, 2004
It is Chinese New Year--Year of the Monkey! Happy New Year everyone! I spend the morning getting packed. I will take one suitcase and my computer bag, and leave two bags at the hotel. It takes a while to get everything sorted out, but I finally do. At noon I check-out and get a taxi to the domestic terminal at the airport. The driver is really good, and we get there much faster than I had anticipated. That's OK. I check-in for my flight, walk around the terminal a little bit just to see it, and have a lunch of fish and chips at one of the fast food places. I also read the paper, then buy another paper. Later I enter to gate area where I get a cup of coffee from BK and use the internet service to check my email. Soon we are boarding for my 4:10 PM flight. The aircraft is a regular full size jet, and I am seated about half-way back in a window seat. The flight is almost full. We board on time, but it seems to take a while to actually puch back and get started. We don’t take off until 4:30.
The flight is no problem, and we land in Krabi at 5:45 PM. It takes a long time for the baggage to arrive, and at about 6:30 I am finally entering the main terminal building. I see the office of WTS (KP's company), and walk to it. Yes, they are expecting me. I share a van ride to the hotel area with two other couples, both of whom are from Canada. We have a pleasant 30 minute ride. I am dropped off at my hotel, the Ao Nang Palace.
I check in, drop my stuff off in the room, and then head out to see that Krabi, or actually Ao Nang beach area, looks like. The weather is very pleasant--warm, but a nice breeze. There are lots of people, mostly European. Interesting. My hotel is about a block from the beach strip. There are lots of street vendors selling food, CDs, DVDs, jewelry, etc. There are also lots of shops selling the same items, along with the usual clothing items. It is a very active place. I finally decide on a place for dinner--a buffet for 180B, and afterwards I walk around some more. There are some bars but nothing really strikes my fancy, and perhaps I am a little tired, so I start to walk back. I stop at a couple difference DVD vendors. The price varies considerably. Some say 180B, other 150B, and one said 120B. When I told this to one vendor, he said 110B if I bought 10! Well, at these prices it is cheaper that renting the video at home. We'll see, maybe tomorrow.
I wake about 9:00 and go next door to a breakfast buffet. They even have pancakes-not bad! Cost is 160B! I get my money's worth! I then walk down to the waterfront and take a look around. It looks much different in the daytime. There is a long sandy beach with many longtail boats coming in and out. I decide to walk south this time. There is a sandy path, with the beach on my right and various hotels on my left. The path continues for about a half-mile at least. At the very end is a Buddhist shrine. I then walk out to the beach, and continue walking north about another quarter mile or so until the beach ends at a rocky point. I then walk back north towards the main area. I am getting a bit thirsty, and I also need to buy some drinking water for my room. I walk up (east) the street my hotel is on until I see a McDonalds and next to it a 7-11. I get an iced coffee at the McDonalds and sit and read the Phuket Weekly (the nearest English language paper), and then go next door to get some water and sun screen lotion.
As I am entering the 7-11 a young Thai lady pulls up on a motor scooter. I have seen many people, men and women, young and old, on these scooters. It is clearly a very popular form of transport. I later see that I could even rent one for as little as 200B a day! Anyway, the lady and I both enter the 7-11, but she finishes before me and is getting on her scooter when I come out of the store. We say hello, exchange names (her name is G) and she asks me where I am going. I tell her, to my hotel, and then to the beach. She nods, and so I ask her if she would like to go to the beach with me. She says OK, and offers me a ride on the scooter. So, I sit behind her on the scooter and we quickly ride the block or so to my hotel. I run up to my room, drop of my water, get into my swim trunks and beach sandals, put the sun screen in my pocket, and jump back on the scooter. She then takes her items to a nearby restaurant/bar (apparently she was running an errand for the owner on the owner's scooter). We then cross the street to the beachfront. She tells me it will cost 100B to take the boat to Railay beach. I say OK, no problem, and soon we are on a longtail boat with several other people getting a ride to Railay Beach, about a mile south.
As we are jumping out of the boat and into the sand and water at Railay, G sees a couple friends of hers with a young man walking ahead of us on the crowded beach. We soon catch up to them. The friends are N and O, and the man is M, from Hanover, Germany. The 3 ladies talk among themselves and decide that we should take another boat to Pa Nan Beach, which is "better". I am not in a position to disagree, and M is OK with it, so we are soon on another longtail boat which takes us a couple miles further south. This is a visually more interesting beach, with tall cliffs and rock formations, along with a long sandy beach. Looks great to me!
The water is crytal clear and medium temperature, about 78-80F. Very pleasant. We find a shady spot near a tree. This beach is also quite busy. And, there are vendors on boats and on the beach selling food and beverage. Later we get some lunch. Among us we have roasted chicken, noodles, green mango strips, soda and beer. And the prices are quite reasonable--the food items were about 30B each, and the beer was 30 or 40 depending on which brand. I had a Chang beer, a local Thai brew, cheaper than Singha, also Thai.
The afternoon is very delightful. M has been coming to Thailand for his annual winter vacation for several years. He really likes it. He was staying in Phuket, but rented a motorcycle and rode it over here to Krabi. He will ride back to Phuket in a few days. It seems as if he and O already knew each other from his prior visits. I go for a swim every hour or so, and as I tell M, it ain't bad being on a tropical paradise beach surrounded by three ladies, eating tasty food, and drinking a cold beer! What a nice afternoon!
As the photos show, the scenery here was really awesome. Later the tide went out (it must have dropped about 5 feet!), and you could walk over to the small island just off the beach. Several others had done this, including some rock climbers, which is a very popular fourist activity here in Krabi. This area has lots of karsts, which are abrupt rock formations that jut out of the water. We are within a day's boat ride to what is called James Bond Island--the island made famous in the 007 movie The Man With the Golden Gun.
The afternoon is over and it is time to get back. The ladies all work at the same restaurant/bar and must go to work soon. So we take a boat back to AoNang Beach. I say goodbye to the group and walk back to the hotel to take a shower. Later I come back out and have dinner at the same buffet, and then walk around some more. I find the bar where G and N and O work, and have a beer and say hello. As I walk back to the room I again look at the DVDs. Very tempting.
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