Phi Phi Islands...swimming with the fishies in crystal clear water

Border run!

AoNong Beach

Today was--in a word--incredible. Increible. Incroyable. We left at about 8:30 to the take-off point. Our group guide was pretty much hilarious--such a funny guy. More on that later. The ride out to Bamboo Island was CRAZY. The water was really choppy, and we were at the very front of the speedboat. Pretty much that equates to us getting a couple feet of air every time the boat hit a wave, which was constant. It might sound fun, and sometimes it was, but it was actually pretty scary lol. There was one Japanese girl who was real skinny, and she was flying all over the place haha. That ride lasted a long time...BUT we finally made it to Bamboo Island where we had 45 minutes. Pretty island--I didn't see any bamboo, but I did see a lot of pine trees and step on a lot of pine needles. The water was crystal clear--so blue/green. I'd never been in water like that, so it was pretty exciting lol. The water temperature was cooler than AoNong, but it felt sooo perfect. The sand was beautiful, and there was coral and seashells washed up all along the beach. Such an incredible place to be.

Bamboo Island

After that, we headed to Viking Cave on Phi Phi Leh. The ride over there was crazy, as well. Nella and I were the only ones who braved the rainstorm outside. There's a reason noone else did lol. Going at that speed in a rainstorm...ouch. We ended up lying down so our faces weren't getting pelted. But it was kinda fun to go over those bumpy waves lying down, looking up at the sky. The group guide was too funny--he was singing and rapping in English most of the trip, perched on the front seat like a little kid. He was a crack up. Anyway, Viking Cave was cool--we didn't get out of the boat--not allowed to--but the water was just incredible--all day long. Apparently people actually live in the Viking Cave to this day, protecting it since it's such an old historic site.

Viking Cave

Next up: Amazingly beautiful lagoon. I can't get over how gorgeous the water was everywhere.









 Then we headed to Maya Bay--that's where they filmed the movie The Beach with Leonardo DiCaprio. Of course, that island was incredible. It's just so amazing to see the beautiful green jungle, the limestone cliffs, the white sand, and the clear bluegreen water all next to eachother. So striking--even in cloud cover the water looked incredible. I'm sure in sunlight it would just sparkle. At Maya Bay we walked around a bit to check out the area. The water was extremely choppy, but the beach looked great! It was pretty funny--we saw multiple girls doing the most dramatic poses on the beach. I really would've thought I was watching a model shoot if it weren't for their friend standing two feet away with a little point-and-shoot camera. Also, there were so many gross men in speedos all over. For heavens' sake, men, please put on some clothes! I would've been happy to lend someone the basketball shorts I was wearing lol.





















After that we headed to Monkey Bay where we SNORKELED! Heck yes! That was so fun for me--I think I snorkeled when I was 12 in Hawaii, but my memories of that are vague. This was epic for me. You could see right down to the coral in that lovely water. There were so many cool fish everywhere. I was swimming in a school of pretty yellow, purple, iridescent fishies constantly. They were all around me, within inches. Then there were the awesome, large, colorful fish a couple feet below. It was like swimming in a doctor's office aquarium. But a thousand times more cool. I definitely saw a Dori-type fish (Finding Nemo Dori) except they were yellow with black stripes. There were neon-colored fish that glowed. Angel fish, black fish, purple fish, rainbow fish, etc etc etc. I couldn't possibly describe all the cool fish I saw. Then there were anemones, coral (obviously), sea urchins. So amazing.
After snorkeling, we went to Koh Phi Phi Don. Phi Phi Leh is a national park, and there is no accomodation there. Phi Phi Don is the bigger island, and there are tons of people there. Lots of young adults. We had lunch at a restaurant there. The food was okay. Then we went walking around. Tons of stores. We got a delicious nutella pancake for 50 baht. We wanted more, so we tried nutella/mango. Not as good as we had hoped, but course not bad. We kept walking and walking, and basically we ended up on the other side of the island when we were already supposed to be back. So we had to book it and hope we ended up in the right spot lol.



Last stop was more snorkeling at Phi Phi Don. This area was more open. Nella and I jumped right off the boat--the water didn't look deep enough, but it was, since we didn't land on anything lol. We were the only ones to get out of the boat for quite awhile. People are crazy. They just sat there on the boat. What the heck? Anyway, we snorkeled our little hearts out. We dove down to the sea floor, I touched some coral, and I also dove to get a little seashell I saw sitting on one of the reefs. Good times :) More incredible fish. An enormous school of those smallish purple and yellow ones. I touched a couple of them. There was one fish that was soooo cool. It was pretty large--probably almost a foot long. It was sea green on the tail end, and the rest was just a smattering of beautiful colors. Geez, I wish I could've taken pictures of all the incredible fish I saw. It really was just my idea of paradise--beautiful scenery, beautiful creatures. It was sunny, as well, so that always helps. 

After that, we headed back to AoNong--a nice, smoother ride on the way back. What a day! It really was incredible--this place is so beautiful, it's surreal. Thailand, everybody. Get over here! It's sooo the place to be. Highly recommend anyone to come here. You can't go wrong with the beaches here.