I'll just shut up and let the picts speak...
Dinner right on the beach! My toes were in the sand...
Taking a nice stroll along the beach
Waking up at the crack of dawn for the 1st annual Phuket Tri-athlon...
We then took a boat over to James Bond Island, where The Man with The Golden Gun was filmed. It was about a one hour ride. The ride was very relaxing. Relaxing at the deck of the boat and feeling the wind blow in your hair (well, in my case, my head) was nice. We stopped a few times to get off and ride the canoes into the caves.
Zen-like moment and enjoying the ride...
Canoeing at the caves
Traffic jam on the 405...
James Bond Island...
On the way back to the main island, there was a chance for everyone to jump off the boat and go for a swim in the ocean. I'm not a very good swimmer but was so tempted to jump off. I thought better of it as Lauris, Alvaro and Quang went in for a quick dive.
The following day, all of us went for a half day of snorkeling. I've never actually gone snorkeling before but hey as they say "When in Rome, do like the Romans". We took a speedboat out to Khai island. The ride itself was very bumpy and I was thinking to myself, if we hit a speed bump or something, we could easily all tip over. We just all hung on and soon enough we were on our way. Once I realized that I was not going to drown with my life jacket on, I felt more at ease and was able to enjoy the view. There were so many fish of all sizes and colors. It was just beautiful. It felt like an aquarium. I had some bread in my hand and each time I tossed a piece, schools of fish would instantly converge. It was incredible!
On the way back to our villa, we got into a conversation with one of the locals. We told her where we were staying ($150/night) and she was in awe. She said that was about how much she made in a month and that it was very difficult for her to travel outside of Thailand. She wasn't upset or anything, it was just the way things were. I felt very fortunate to be able to travel and see other parts of the world and how realized how lucky I truly have it. Normally after a taxi ride, a tip of 40 baht ($1) is more than enough and the locals are more than ecstatic to receive it. It's not that we felt sorry for her and the cab driver, but we felt we would bring some joy into her face so we gave her and the driver a tip of 500 baht ($12.50). It wasn't much to us but just to see the smile and genuine appreciation on her face was priceless.
Back to the beach for massages...
On our last evening, the four of us went to see Fanta-Sea. It is a huge amusement park and dinner and a show was included. Since we had time to kill before the show, we played some of the standard carnival games. Since we were going to lose our money anyways, Alvaro and I decided it was best to chat it up with the locals and give our money to the ones that were cute and willing to chat with us.
Back to Bangkok for Earl and Aporn's wedding and the last leg of our two week journey...
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