The south trip is the trip that everybody is the most excited for when we get our packet of trip schedules at the beginning of our exchange year. The clear water, pristine beaches, and sun are, after all, what people think of when they think of Thailand. Even for students like me, who live less than 10 minutes from the beach, do not often go with our host families, and this trip was our time to have the classic sun soaked vacation. We got to spend the week going from beaches and islands by bus and boat, snorkeling almost every day, and exploring cities every night. We had the most fun time, and this was one of my favorite trips!
Our trip did not in fact start with our flight to the south, but with a Rotary conference on the 11th of March which was held in a city called Chanthaburi. This district conference had members from almost every rotary club in our district attending, and it was great fun. Us inbound students had a talent show where one group of students did the Muay Thai ritual of respect, and then the other group of us (that live closer in the south of our district) did a dance to a mashup of music from Mexico, Brazil, America, Canada, and Germany. It was fun although not altogether as organized as it could have been. We spent that afternoon and evening of the conference just hanging around and meeting the new exchange students who will be going all over the world from Thailand this coming year.
The next morning we had another presentation where we got certificates for our exchange and took many photos together and then us inbound students got on a bus to begin our trip to the south.
We had to take a bus all the way to Ayutthaya, around 5 hours of travel, for the first leg of our trip. Spending the whole day on the bus we slept, listened to music, and talked and by the time we got to Ayutthaya it was dinner. We had dinner on a boat and cruised the river looking at all the ancient monuments of the city lit up in the dark.
The night boat tour in Ayutthaya.
After dinner we went to our hotel which was very rustic but very nice. In my room we actually had a tree growing out of the floor of the bathroom that made its way through the ceiling, a pretty funny thing to see as soon as you open the bathroom door. The hotel also had several ponds and little streams of water, and the largest of the ponds had some of the largest fish I have ever seen. The pair of fish were over 5 feet long, and had black scales with red edges. They were so massive and idle that at first they seemed like large logs, apart from their tails’ slight movement. The pond was also full of smaller catfish, and none were less than perhaps three feet long.
The next morning we toured Ayutthaya on foot. The ruins were incredible and very dramatic. It was such an expansive and full space even though it is in ruins, I cannot imagine what the structures would have looked like in their complete form.
Ayutthaya’s ruins
One of the most identifiable parts of Ayutthaya is the famous stone Buddha head in the roots of a tree that is slowly slowly claiming it. This is one of the famous images of Thailand and very beautiful. Also, the vast majority of the Buddha images in the ruins lacked heads, because the ruins were looted over the hundreds of years. The heads are the smallest piece of the Buddha statues that retains value when sold on the black market, while simultaneously being much easier to transport than the full stone Buddhas.
The Buddha head being engulfed in the tree.
After touring Ayutthaya we drove an hour to the airport in Bangkok and flew to Phuket. After we arrived in Phuket we went to the Fantasea theme park, essentially a tourist trap, and there we had dinner and saw a show about Thai myth. This show was rather unique because it had all manner of entertainment; elephants, pyrotechnics, a tiger, trapeze artists, a magic show, and dance throughout. Rather confusing, and a tad ridiculous, the show is so famous that we had to hand over our phones to ensure that nobody videotaped the show. A great number of celebrities from all over the world have been to the theme park, and the park made plaques with photos of the celebrities who have attended the show in the past, which was pretty interesting.
One of the shops at Fantasea
The theme park was mostly made up of themed gift shops but there was also a zoo type portion with lemurs, peacocks, snakes, and most sadly some white tigers, that were in a very small enclosure made entirely of white cement with no escape from people pressing their faces against the window.
One of the islands with ivy growing in the shape of Buddha
After the dinner and show we went back to our hotel and the next day we set out to Phi Phi island. I would have to say Phi Phi is one of my favorite places I have been in Thailand so far. The island has beautiful rock formations and the little town is one of the nicest I have seen. We took a 2 hour ferry to the island, had lunch, and then went snorkeling. I have never been snorkeling in the ocean before and unfortunately Lake Superior does not boast a large amount of easily observable aquatic life, so seeing all the coral, plants, sea urchins, and multitudes of fish was dazzling.
Snorkeling at Phi Phi
The only downside was the stinging sensation of plankton in the water. The feeling was like a fly bite and immediately itchy, which was bothersome but I think the beauty of the water made up for it. We went snorkeling for an hour and then we got back on the ferry to go back to Phuket. We then went to see the sunset and while we there there a man was playing a guitar of old american classics, which made the sunset like a movie.
Thai Sunset ❤
That night in Phuket we had free, so we went to get food and then explored Phuket’s walking street before going back to our hotel.
The somewhat more murky depths at Krabi
The next day we drove a few hours to Krabi to go snorkeling again and to island hop. The snorkeling was nice, not as clear as the day before, but it was free of the painful plankton. It also had very interesting sea urchins, that had not only black spines but white ones as well that were flexible and releasing something into the water. We ended up also going to Kai Island. In english Kai means egg, and Kai island was named due to the hundreds of years the island was a hot-spot for nesting sea turtles (although it has become virtually devoid of nesting turtles recently due to foot traffic on the sand as well as dwindling sea turtle populations). We also went to the separated sea, a strip of land revealed only when the tide is right to connect 3 islands. From a distance it almost makes the people walking across the strip of land look like they are walking on water.
The separated sea.
After the day in the sun we went to dinner, and since it was mostly seafood I went out with friends after dinner to get different food. On this quest for more food I found the most amazing place. It was at an Italian restaurant called La Luna and it was absolutely fantastic. The restaurant is owned by an actual Italian (who I met on the stairs on the way to our table). We had the funniest waiter who was very goofy, and laughed at the silly things we were saying as well as running around like a madman. I had bruschetta with prosciutto and then a mascarpone pastry and it was wonderful in every way.
After dinner my friends and I wandered to the downtown of the city and walked along the beach, where we found a misplaced pineapple of all things. After that we went back to the hotel and spent the night just hanging out in each others rooms.
The next day we traveled to Le Khao Kop cave, which was one of the most unique and terrifying experiences I have ever had in my life. the journey to the caves began in a murky river, and with 5 people in a boat and two guides we began to paddle down the river. The river went through some lightly wooded areas with long vines hanging down to eye level, and then we entered the cave. In order to fit in the entrance of the cave everybody has to lie down flat. Once within the mountain there are a few different passages that lead through the stalactites and stalagmites. In these caverns were beautiful formations, various worshiping areas, and thousands of years of natural history. The actual scary part of the path came after the walking as we made our way out of the cave. While we had to lie down to enter the caves inside we still had at least a foot to spare above us, exiting was a different story. As we squeezed by underneath the ceiling I was told to move my hands from my stomach to my sides because the extra inch above the rest of my body would get caught on the ceiling (and indeed my belt got tugged on a particularly low spot) as we went past. There was even a part that was so close that you had to turn your head to the side to ensure your nose was not scraped, and some people said their ears still touched. The whole while going through those crevices all we could hear were the anxious shrieks of people ahead of us, and it was impossible to not do the same (despite the guide’s repeated phrase that they will not let anything happen to us). Getting out of that cave was such a relief I do not think i have ever felt so happy to see light.
One of the islands we stopped at
After the cave experience we went and had lunch, and then headed to the docks to get a boat out to Koh Lipe, our final destination. We were on the speedboat for almost 2 hours, but we stopped part way to walk around an island. Going up to Koh Lipe was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. The sun was setting and there were Thai style boats anchored in the little bay as the sun began to descend. The beach was open and not crowded and all along the beach were various cute little hotels. After we got off the boat we went swimming as the sun set, and then went to Koh Lipe’s walking street (although it is essentially the only street on the island with businesses). Our hotel was right on the water like all the others but our rooms were in the back, so we unfortunately were unable to see the ocean from our rooms, but the proximity was still lovely.
Koh Lipe with its cute bungalows.
The next day was our last full day of the trip and it was beyond amazing. We spent the whole day just going from location to location, snorkeling and swimming. The first spot we went to was very different from past snorkeling locations because it was quite far from the shore, and packed with other tourists. Although it was packed and deeper than the other places it was full of amazing fish. At this location we also had to wear life jackets because of the depth and number of people, so it was a little less enjoyable, but still nice. This spot also had the plankton though, so we did not spend too long there.
Clown fish!
The second spot we snorkeled at was my favorite by far. The coral was vibrant and there were lots of gorgeous fish that were not so numerous at other places. The area we snorkeled at was separated from other tourist groups, and the guide took those of us who snorkeled to see the anemones where clown fish hide and all sorts of other wonderful things. He also pointed out where bigger fish were milling about and showed us how some of the things that lived in holes of the coral would shoot back into the coral if you got your hands to close. This part of the world was the epitome of paradise. We all lounged around on the boat; and spent a few hours diving off, swimming, and having a grand time.
After that we went to an island to have lunch, and it was again, one of the most postcard places I have ever seen. White sand, a hammock, and rope swings on the beach. After we ate we swam a bit and then as some people began jumping off the boat a few of us put on our snorkeling masks and swam around the boat. I was shocked as I looked under the water to see a school of fish, thousands of them, moving together in big swirling eddies. The fish were difficult to see from the surface but below you could swim through them, putting holes through their otherwise impenetrable group. It was one of those moments that I thought to myself that I may never be able to see what I saw again. I wish I could have gotten a picture from below to show what it was like to dive down through the fish and have them swirl above you in your wake.
After that we moved to another beach which was lackluster compared to the previous two. The water was too shallow for a lot of diving to be done off the boat and the coral was rather bleached. There were some fish there though that I had not seen before, and that was interesting in itself.
After that we headed back to Koh Lipe and had dinner, and it was one of our chaperones birthdays so we had a party on the beach with cake and music after the sun went down. Koh Lipe is a very quiet island, and the walking street was desolate by 10 at night, but we kept the party going on the beach until almost midnight which was really fun. Some people even went swimming but I had had my fill after spending the majority of the day in the water.
One of our stops at the aptly named rock island
The next morning we packed back onto the speedboat and went back to the mainland, then flew back to Bangkok. This was our last trip, so there were a lot of tearful goodbyes. We will likely never be as a big group like that every again and it was very sad, but we will see each other again before long, just not all together.
A few weeks ago my friends and I returned to P-Pom’s (a rotarian’s house in Sattahip). We stayed there for a few days and then I stayed a few days after my friends left because my host family was travelling in Hong Kong (and I am not allowed to leave the country).
Since then I have been studying and taken the ACT and also spending time in Bangkok with my friend Natalia and her host sister. I am loving this school break so far and I am just so happy with everything right now. In a few weeks my friends and I are hoping to visit another friend for her birthday on the island her host family runs a hotel on. I cannot wait for the unknown things to come before I go home!
kieranstorertravels 