Thailand Parts 1 & 2

Thailand Part 1- Bangkok “Too Hot To Handle”

I have been more than guilty of gloating about the temperature of where I am compared to back home (there was a lot of talk of snow). India saw highs of 30 degrees and the humidity was mild, Hong Kong was cooler, around 26 degrees but there’s no risk of having to de-ice your windscreen with those numbers, Thailand, more specifically Bangkok was a different story altogether. Landing there just after midnight it was 32 hideous degrees. This number sounds good, but this number is anything but good when the humidity is about 150%, I wanted to be back on the plane, or better still, ice cold home.  My clothes instantly became saturated with sweat, dripping from my forehead, into my eyes, my brain was frazzled. Those that know me will be more than aware of my body’s inability to regulate its temperature and here it was under its most vigorous test to date. The simple task of following a sign to the food hall to buy some water took us three attempts to go up the correct escalator; we literally walked in circles for about 20 minutes. Outside things weren’t any better.

In the light of the morning, having spent the evening in an air-conditioned room I felt a lot more confident about the day ahead, then I opened the bedroom door. The hallway in the hostel was not air-conditioned and I got my first real taste of the Bangkok heat, if last night was a wood burner this morning was a full blown forest fire. I slid to the shower, leaving a trail like some human slug creature, praying for ice cold water to cool me, or at least offer some justifiable reason for being this damp.

The temperature outside was a level up, teamed with the heat and ugly humidity was the pollution element, every moment outside was miserable, making me ever more self-conscious. We walked to a nearby pier where we were to catch a river taxi to get closer to the city centre. The breeze from being near water and the speed at which the boat travelled offered a much needed life line but as the boat filled and I was sandwiched between crowds of equally hot and uncomfortable people everything closed in around me. All the joy of being on a traditional river taxi, speeding through the heart of Bangkok, temples, markets and other wondrous sites all around me all I could think about was jumping in the murky water.

I hadn’t really given Bangkok much thought, it wasn’t until I set foot in the city that it dawned on me what kind of place this was supposed to be. My head filled with all the statements people had said to me about it, how crazy, mad and insane it was. I feel I can’t not mention the effect the movie The Hangover has had on the city’s image. So when I enter one of the supposedly most out-there-anything-goes streets in the world, Khao San Road I really cannot help but be disappointed. As I wander the market stalls selling all the essentials to transform you from Westerner to the Hippy clone everyone thinks you need to be once you attach a bag to your back my frustration grew, maybe it’s the humidity talking but this place is fake and boring.

Aside from the soulless markets designed to draw in zombie tourists looking to buy novelty trash that the Thai’s wouldn’t be seen dead wearing or eating the city also boasts an amazing collection of temples. I  know I’ve mentioned my thoughts on temples before, and trust me their appeal is further reduced given the heat. However, my brother, having recently been to Bangkok said if I do only one temple thing then it should be the reclining Buddha, so this was the only thing on our hit list.

I’ll start by saying this, the reclining Buddha is stunning. It is enormous and extreme and truly inspiring. The tranquillity that should surround this breath-taking monument however has been replaced by the shoves and groans of the hordes of hungry human cattle barging their way through to get in the best positon for their selfie with Buddha. The whole experience is worthless and instead of walking away stunned at the magnificent statue I am stunned at the stupidity of the human race, or at least the tourist race.

Khao San Road by night is even more pointless, the markets are still there only now you can buy buckets of brightly coloured alcohol, scorpions on sticks and have your photo taken with some drugged up primate. Bangkok in my head would be effortless chaos, none stop WTF but in reality it was scripted and sad.

 I would stress however, that this street does not reflect Bangkok as a whole and in no way represents the people of Thailand, this is very much a cesspit of brainless tourists looking to get a “decent Facebook profile picture” whilst getting as fucked up as they can. It’s a great money maker for the locals and is amazingly confined to just this road, well policed and very safe. Once I was a big party head so I do understand the appeal of a road like this but if this is the extent to peoples experience of Bangkok, or worse still the reason they go I feel very sad for them.

We spent the majority of the following day seeing the city via the river taxi, it cost us 15 baht each (around 30p) for the full days travel and from here we could see the sites whilst enjoying the sea breeze. Hoping on and off the boat we wondered countless markets and tried all manner of food. I had woken up slightly adjusted to the heat and willing to forgive the city for its poor performance last night and with new eyes on I was starting to enjoy it.

Bangkok is cleaner, more organised and more spacious than I had thought it would be, it’s easy to navigate, safe and very cheap. It’s only problem is the saturation of tourists who seem to have sucked the true identity from it.

Thailand Part 2- The Beach

The next leg of my Thailand adventure looks like this; Krabi Town> Koh Phi Phi Don> PhangNga> Ko Yao Noi> Ao Nammao> Railay> Ton-Sai > Krabi Town. I’ve travelled South from Bangkok and have arrived in the land of crystal clear water, white sandy beaches and spellbinding limestone cliffs. The temperature on average is in the high 30’s, the humidity is low and there is a glorious sea breeze each and every day. Getting off the plane from Bangkok to Krabi felt like winning the lottery.

We had two nights booked in Krabi town, with the plan being to explore some of the near by attractions in the province of the same name. Walking from the bus station to our hostel I was instantly loving Krabi town, I’ll admit the climate played a major role in this. But aside from that it gave off a really laid back, surfer vibe that made me feel very much at home. I like the simple life, I love the sea-side. Being surrounded by blue water and rolling mountains caused me to chill instantly. I think I said “I love it here” about 100 times to Hatty…every ten seconds, I become quite unbearable I’m sure. Every hostel, guesthouse and hotel we walked past I couldn’t help but blurt out how “cool” and “awesome” I thought they looked. I was getting very excited about finding ours, heading out and watching the sunset armed with an ice cold beer.

You can’t have it all however and tonight was no exception to this rule. Our guesthouse looked ok from the outside, the common area was basic but welcoming. The room however was vile, not in its décor, although there really isn’t a time or place for fake Burberry bed sheets but in its scent. Imagine for a second (that would be too long) a truck of cabbages and a truck of fish, tip their contents into a dark, slightly damp space, turn the heating up nice and high and then leave until they have pregnated everything in the space with their toxic odour. We let ourselves into this festering nightmare and both threw up in our mouths. I ran to open the window but to my horror discovered that is was already open- this is the rooms smell when it’s been aired! We crawled to the hallway gasping for any hint of fresh air and lay there disgusted and disturbed.

I went downstairs to find the manager who had conveniently vanished, when I did find him and told him about the rooms smell he just walked off, got a can of Ocean Breeze and emptied it into the warzone. This made a smell that no human should have to endure but as it was now too late to book ourselves into another hostel we had no option but to grin and bear it. We spent as long as we could in the hallway and then when it was time to sleep we racked our brains for suggestions on how to beat the smell. The next part is definitely one of those “don’t try this at home moments”.

Tiger Balm, large quantities of high grade Tiger Balm shovelled from the container and crammed into each of our nostrils. If you are not familiar with Tiger Balm, think ultra-concentrated Deep Heat without all the safety regulations. You may then begin to understand the desperation we were feeling when we put this product into our noses.

Unsurprisingly we didn’t stay for the second night and instead sprinted for the very first boat to Koh Phi Phi Don, only stopping to grab a snorkel and mask from a nearby sports shop on the way.

Koh Phi Phi Don’s scenery is true paradise, seriously do me a favour, open up a new browser tab and go to Google images then search “Koh Phi Phi Don”, you will not have to scroll very far to see what I mean. Emerald waters, silk textured white sand and mesmerising limestone cliffs. We threw our bags down in our room which was fresh, clean and spacious and headed straight for the nearest beach. Hatty is a sun worshipper so she laid claim to a spot of sand and I vanished out to sea. Either side of me where two caves and beyond them distant lands that were crying out to be explored. I waded through the shallow water dancing around the occasional rock and piece of coral. I was full of life and for the first time since Hong Kong really had my passion for exploring and travelling reinstated.

The water eventually became deep enough to swim and so I set off to find out what existed beyond the caves and towering cliff faces. An hour or so later and somewhat breathless I washed up onto another beach aptly names “Monkey Beach” for as you may guess it was inhabited by lots and lots of monkeys. The novelty of seeing monkeys outside of the zoo hadn’t warn off from India and seeing them on the beach was an even newer experience. I wondered the full length of the beach enjoying every monkey I saw, looking out to the distance and enjoying the views even more. I cannot emphasise how exceptionally happy I was. On my way back down the beach I began looking for the cut through to the beach I had swan round from but as I got closer to the giant rock separating the two it dawned on me that I had two options, climb the cliff which was densely covered in both vegetation and monkeys or swim back. As there wasn’t a soul attempting the former I opted for the latter. Stepping back into the sea it had become apparent that the tide was on its way out, the advantage of this is that I could wade more of it thus saving energy on swimming, the disadvantage is that there are a lot of rocks and coral and other sea critters that I would now have to dodge. I cautiously tiptoed over the sea bed checking my every footing. I once had a bad experience with a poisonous sea creature in Egypt and was not looking to repeat this ever again.

Stepping onto a sharp rock I cut my foot, not badly but enough to make me jolt, misjudge my next step, trip over, cut my knee on another rock and finally land on my side on top of a sea urchin who in turn shot some 30 of his lovely numbing spikes into my thigh. I have not been this disappointed in myself for a long time. I said to Hatty I was only going to see what was around the corner, I’d been gone some two hours by this point she was going to be every bit as unimpressed as I am, if I make it back. I swam an inspiring one legged swim over to a local fishing boat and pulled myself on to it. His face when he saw my purple thigh full of black needles was a picture that humoured and scared me in equal measures. Once his eyes had returned into his sockets he calmly said some of my favourite words, “no panic, no poison, no panic”. We pulled as many of the little bastards out as we could and I flopped back into the sea and splashed my way back to Hatty.

As I came round the corner facing our beach I was met by the result of the tide going fully out. I was no dragging my inflamed ligament behind me, cursing every step and myself, my stupidity, my arrogance. When I finally got back on dry land almost four hours later I was a shell of my former self. Sure I was cut to smithereens, had an alien poison rushing through my bloodstream and was gloriously sunburnt in the face but I was in paradise, I’d seen monkeys and I last time I checked I was very much alive, what to explore next!?! Hatty on the other hand was somewhat concerned about the “electric shock” pain that was crippling my every step so insisted we go back to the room.

Having been the guinea pig yesterday we both decided that it wasn’t a sensible idea to try and explore the ocean “by foot” and so instead we hired a canoe. This not only prevented any further injuries but also allowed to explore much further, the best 300 baht (£6) I’d spent all trip. We went back to Monkey island, did some snorkelling, went inside some caves and secluded lagoons, found a number of private and semi-private beaches and generally just chilled out and messed about all day. After dinner we returned back to the beach and watched the sunset, I can’t emphasise how perfect this place is.

This perfection did come as a surprise as nearly everyone I had spoken to and a lot of the online reviews stated that this once beautiful place has become overrun by tourists and has a similar vibe to the one I so positively described in Bangkok. Apparently KPPD is littered with bars, clubs, tattoo shops and tatty markets, it is supposed to be filthy. But lying on this pristine beach, sun setting around me with a soundscape of nothing but the wildlife and waves I was glad I had ignored everyone.

As night fell we went for a stroll around the small island, we were sure we had seen it all over the last few days but somehow we had managed to miss something substantial. As we got closer to the restaurant area the calming natural sounds of the island were drowned out by thumbing bass. A whole “town” revealed itself before our very eyes. This is the Koh Phi Phi everyone had warned me of. It’s another Malaga or Kos, rows of beach bars selling buckets of spirits for absurdly low prices, tattoo parlours (that provide cocktails in the price of the tattoo), fast food restaurants and flocks of dead-eyed tourists stumbling over one another. On paper this is probably a hedonists wet-dream, proper lads holiday territory but for me it was a disaster. This spectacle will no doubt one day expand across the remainder of the island as more walking STDs infect every corner of it. For now though I am grateful that at least some part of Koh Phi Phi Don remains unspoilt and that I have been fortunate enough to experience it. But now it is time to move on once more.

We travelled by boat to Phuket and then caught a bus to Phang Nga, as the bus drove us away from the sea and higher into the hills it dawned on me that maybe I had got my locations mixed up. A few days ago sitting in Bangkok I demanded we head South for beaches and a cooler climate, I promised Hatty nonstop sand and sea, so you can image how confused and unimpressed we were when that started to vanish from sight. As it turns out the place I had in my head was Phra Nang. I am now very familiar with the geography of Southern Thailand, more so than even my home country but at the time of booking I had assumed these were the same place. This might sound stupid but it’s not uncommon for one place to have a multitude of names here, for example Rai Leh, Railay and Railey are all the same place. So you could excuse my ignorance when I see place names like Phang Nga, Phang Nga Bay and Phra Nang and assume they are all one place.

Despite being anything but a beach holiday Phang Nga (or Phangnga) was a beautiful mistake that offered some of the most relaxing and rewarding experiences of the whole trip. Our guesthouse sat nestled between a mountain range which offered exhilarating views from every direction. The pace here is very slow and very safe. Phang Nga is off the main tourist circuit, probably because most people can read a map but that separation works for me. Our evening meal, of freshly prepared Pad Thai, rounds of drinks and a variety of sides cost a total of 90 baht (£1.80) for the two of us. The town is laid back but not boring, the locals are friendly but not overbearing.

Of the things to do here, aside from get some proper down time the most popular is to get a boat to Khao Phing Kan island in Phang Nga Bay, this island is more famously known as James Bond Island after featuring heavily in the film The Man with the Golden Gun. The four or so hour tour takes you by boat though caves, caverns and around the ever impressive limestone rock faces before stopping off at Khao Phing Kan, here you can join the day trippers from Phuket standing in front of the infamous rock posing with their finger gun. This didn’t put me off as it was a truly awesome place to spend some time, it’s a wonderful example of natural beauty, and save for a small row of market stalls it remains largely untouched. The boat also takes you to a local Muslim fishing village, which is on stilts out in the sea. The tour company we went with is called Sayan tours, and Sayan was one of the local fishermen who lived in this village, part of the tour used to include lunch in his house and if you got the overnight tour you stayed here too. But his recent death has for obvious reasons removed this from the tour and so instead you are dropped off and then allowed to freely wonder around the village. The German and French couples could not wait to go for a jolly good snoop, poking their cameras into people’s front rooms, we however opted to take a seat in the café and enjoy what was around us. Maybe I am over thinking this but this is not a temple or museum this is someone’s home. Had this part included some interaction with a local, some explanation about the way of life or anything that convinced me they wanted a boat load of picture hungry Westerners letting themselves into their front rooms I think I would have been more keen but doing anything more than sitting in the café felt invasive, disrespectful and unnecessary. That said the tour was money well spent, the crazy natural beauty on offer here was beyond anything I had ever witnessed.

The following day we caught a boat to Ko Yao Noi and were once again reunited with the sea. Our home for the next few days was a wooden hut on stilts buried into the hillside looking out over the sea. The soundtrack of birds, lizards and insects filled the air and created the illusion that you were somewhere very remote. Our hut had a balcony and was the ideal place to unwind, not that I was doing anything stressful but there is little else to do. So much of Southern Thailand is so relaxed that if it were to get any slower it would stop all together and this tiny island is about as close to complete standstill as it gets. Lying on the bench seat reading a book I was chilled to the absolute maximum. Mr Claws soon put a stop to that.

Mr Claws is one of the owners cats and as his name suggests Mr Claws had some fucking long claws and sharp, pointy fangs. I am a cat man, I adore cats, am a little perhaps obsessed with cats. It has become a bit of a running joke that I am a cat magnet as wherever I go I always end up with one following me. Our garden back home was infested with them. Mr Claws was however very uninvited, he had me on edge from word go. Maybe it was my unnaturally low heart rate prior to his arrival or maybe it was his naturally long, sharp claws and killer look in his eye. He had this unforgiving whine that made him sound ridiculous but you would be stupid to laugh at him, not unless you wanted to be gutted there and then.

He worked his way over to me and I knew he could smell my fear, as he jumped onto my lap I tried to fight the instinct to throw him off the balcony. He put his face into my stomach and opened his mouth real wide exposing his razor sharp fangs, this is it, this is the end I thought. He let out a little yawn and flopped into my lap, I stroked his fur and he purred appreciatively. Cat whisperer has still got it. I lifted my arms in a sigh of relief only for Mr Claws to uncurl and return immediately to his possessed state. I ran my hand over his coat and he sunk back down, calm once again. This was the only way to preserve my life. Every time I removed my hand from him the devil would reappear. I cannot help this is Karma for how, in my early years on this earth I would only sleep if my mum “drew” on my back. Her arm would go dead from the repetitive circling whilst hung over the edge of my cot. I would be sound asleep and she would ever so gently remove her hand from my back like a robber lifting priceless jewels from an alarmed platform. The heat of her hand could still be felt on my back but I would be instantly aware that she had stopped and therefore instantly wide awake. It seemed only fair that this was my fate.

The rest of our time on Ko Yao Noi was considerably less edgy. The island consists of one main road, part concrete part dirt track that runs around the outside for a total of no more than 20km. We hired a Moped for the duration of our stay and this allowed us to see every nook and cranny of the island. Venturing off the main road led for some challenging riding but with a little determination and a lot of luck we always arrived at our destination in one piece. KYN is as chilled on the road as it is up in the hills and on the beaches, it’s a long way from the chaos of India and that is certainly no bad thing. The joy of it being an island is that you can’t get lost, teamed with the empty roads it is a joy to explore for someone with as bad a sense of direction as me. Every stop offers the chance to refuel on delicious fresh seafood and kick back in one of the many hammocks suspended between palm trees along the beach. At some point this journey is going to end and I will be back in the UK, an alarm set and a job to go to but for now I’m lazing on a beach, sun beating down, breeze flowing over me and I’m swaying in a hammock with an ice cold watermelon smoothie in hand and the future is a distant memory.

Koh Yao Noi doesn’t offer the spectacular crystal clear waters of Koh Phi Phi Don but it doesn’t have the pollution of the tourist and for that I could spend many more days, weeks or month here but for fear of becoming so laid back I fall over it is time to move on.

The next stop is Ao Nammao which is back in Krabi province. The closest town is Ao Nang which is a bustling tourist trap due to the convenience of its port linking you to the surrounding islands. But hitching a lift from a passing Songthaew ten minutes away from the pier once again got us out of the crowds and to somewhere that felt just that little bit more authentic. The other advantage of being in Ao Nammao is that it put us ever closer to our desired destination, Railay (Rai Leh/ Railey) beach. We’d left it too late to get accommodation on the beach but our second best option turned out to be a winner, at less than £10 a night we had a private double room with en-suite, fridge and normal toilet (these two things are kind of a big deal) and a shower with semi warm water and the main attraction AIRCON. The boat ride to Rai Leh takes less than 10 minutes and costs 180 baht (£3.60) for a return, we couldn’t find accommodation on Railay, given our short notice for anything less than £120 a night so Ao Nammao was a blessing for the wallet if nothing else.

Once on Rai Leh our stomachs controlled our decisions, we strolled the beach front and led by our noses ended up in Sunrise Tropical, a five star resort who thankfully open up their buffet breakfast to peasants like us. It costs 300 baht (£6) which is a lot for a Thai breakfast but after my fifth plate of gourmet delicacies its value was looking like it would stretch to lunch and maybe further. The grin on my face from satisfying my glutinous desires would take longer still to vanish.

I waddled to the beach and plopped myself down into the cushioning soft sand. Visually Railay is more similar to Koh Phi Phi Don, truly stunning but it is substantially more rocky and this makes swimming next to impossible unless its high tide so I had to opt for the difficult alternative of sunbathing. I’m not kidding this is difficult, I don’t know how people lay there all day, within minutes I am uncontrollably bored, hot and restless. Hatty is a sun worshipper and has perfected the art of lying so wasn’t interested in my suggestions to hire a kayak or go climbing. Eventually, most likely out of pity she agreed to try walking. Rai Leh is divided in the East and West and although the island is tiny, easily manageable by foot it offers very different experiences on either side. On our way across the island we saw a large group of wild monkeys off out on a day trip, fathers, mothers and their young all in a line worked their way through the branches and across a fence, the majority taking little notice of us but stopping  all humans passing by in their tracks. It was a wondrous site. Once on the other side of the island we were greeted by caves, caverns, sheer rock faces and swimmable waters. Hatty planted herself under a tree while I ventured off to go climbing.

There is a route up one of the cliff faces that you are able to free climb, it requires some strength and endurance but with confidence (or stupidity- it’s a fine line) it is a manageable ascent. The reward at the peak is a splendid view out across the island, which was nice but the climb was more of a highlight. If you venture further around then you arrive at a lagoon which is you have a really big pair you can climb/fall down to. My excuse for not making this decent is that the lagoon was basically empty and so the reward of getting down there was removed. I was however not ready to make my way back to the beach and so wanted to see what else was up here. I worked my way up steep, slippery rock over uprooted trees and tried to push images of lurking cobras to the back of my mind. I fearlessly (stupidly) went higher up the cliff face and into ever denser vegetation, I shimmied across fallen branches and jumped over gaps in the rock hoping for a clean landing on the other side. In my head I was the ultimate explorer but in reality I was setting myself up to be the next fatality, the typical idiot tourist who ran before he could walk.

Having worked my way to the top and part of the way down another side I reached a dead end and peering over the edge realised that the last half hour or so has led me nowhere and I was going to have to rewind my every skip, hop and jump to get back up. Tiredness set in and the noises in the jungle below heightened my senses, the wind whistling through the branches of the trees below became rattles of giant snakes that were rapidly winding their way up to me. I don’t remember eating a bag of hallucinogenics before climbing but apparently I was losing touch with reality. Whatever it was, my over imagination created fear which in turn sparked the fight or flight reaction. I wasn’t ever going to wait to do battle with an army of oversized and angry serpents so instead fled back up the cliff at breakneck speed and down the side I knew I should have just gone to originally.

Back on the beach my adventure seemed insignificant as I was in full health, Hatty on the other hand had done a little too much worshipping and her skin has passed her hair colour for colour (remember she has bright pink hair).

The following day Hatty went into hiding and I decided to steer clear of the monster snakes. I hired a kayak and did one of my favourite things- exploring, more specifically exploring the caves and caverns and generally being on the water.

Railay far exceeded Koh Phi Phi Don for awesomeness, I paddled from caves to cavern and was transfixed on their beauty, every time I arrived at a new one I was just that little bit more blown away. Whenever I got bored of being on the kayak I flopped off the side and went snorkelling, ever since my sea urchin experience I’ve been somewhat cautious of the sea but here the water is much safer and as I swam about following schools of fish without too much bother. One of my final landing spots was a beach called Tonsai (Ton Sai) which although on the same island as Rai Leh is divided by a large rock and only accessible by boat at high tide. At low tide however you can wade around the rock or if you are feeling adventurous you can clamber over the rock to reach the other side. I have wanted to see Ton Sai but knew that Hatty wouldn’t been so keen on making the journey if it turned out to be naff given her crispy state. I declared that is was very much worth it and jumped back in the kayak and set off back to Railay to find her.

We worked our way over the rock and set up camp in Freedom bar, a wooden shack on the beach front with excellent views both out to sea and of the dare devil free climbers scaling the walls around us. It was infinitely better than Railay and although infinitely less well developed in terms of its amenities it had everything we needed- beaches, beds, food and ice cold beer.

The past two weeks have been some of the most relaxing and inspiring of my life, although there are moments of negativity in my writing my overall feeling towards Thailand is wholly positive. It is a beautiful country full of beautiful people and as much as I want to stay on a beach for the remainder of my days both my visa and my desire to see the remainder of this spectacular country mean I have to move on, and so I begin my journey north.

As always thank you for reading.