We had a drink in D's Bookstore to catch up on our diaries and then spent some time by the hotel pool before heading out again.
We had to be at the tour 'office' for 1:30pm, so we decided to grab a quick lunch at Camaro Resto. Our plan backfired because it took them ages to cook our food. It didn't arrive until 1:25pm! We wolfed down as much food as we could in 5 minutes and then asked for the bill and a box to take the remainder of my lunch away with us.
After meeting at Emerald tours, we were all led down to the sea-front and onto long-tail boats. There were 20 people on ours, so nice and cosy.
Driving the boat looked like great fun. I would have loved to have a go. They look so bizarre, a cross between a traditional wooden boat and something out of the film Mad Max, with a great big oily engine stuck on the back powering the propeller, which sits at the end of a 4m pole (hence the name log-tail).
Our first stop was Monkey Beach. Sadly there were no monkeys to be seen. "No monkey, no stop" said the driver and we carried on to the next stop, a brief pause outside the Viking Cave, where locals collect bird nests to sell for soup.
After the cave we were taken to the beautiful Pilah lagoon surrounded by sheer limestone cliffs. The water was crystal clear and the most amazing turquoise colour. We spent a good amount of time here swimming and taking it all in. Bliss.
After the lagoon we headed to the southern side of the island for some snorkelling. There wasn't a reef as such, more like a collection of large rocks, but the water was teeming with colourful fish. We saw damselfish, parrotfish, triggerfish, boxfish, butterflyfish, wrasse and many more. The highlight was seeing Moorish Idols. Worth checking them out on Google Images, they are really striking fish.
Amber was hilarious because she gets a bit freaked out by being surrounded by too many fish and when the boat driver chucked all the fruit peelings overboard we were right in the middle of a feeding frenzy! The look on her face was priceless. I thought I was going to have to rescue her, but thankfully she was fine after a minute or two.
I find it always takes a little while to adjust to snorkelling when you haven't done it for a while. But the water was so clear and the fish so brilliant that I could have stayed there much longer than we did.
After snorkelling we ate some fruit and went on to Maya Bay, apparently one of the main locations for the film The Beach. Personally I couldn't see what all the fuss was about. The beach was absolutely packed with people on tours like ours, and half the bay was taken up with tour boats. Sure, the beach itself would have been lovely if we'd had it to ourselves, but to share it with that many other people just to say you'd been there was a pity.
We had a bit of a swim in the cove before heading back round the other side of Ko Phi Phi Leh to return home. For our onward journey we were given a bucket of whiskey, red bull and coke to share. Nice!
On the way back we stopped half way to watch the sun set from the boat. A few of the others jumped into the dark blue water and I couldn't resist going back in myself. It's hard to beat watching the sunset from the sea. We got some great pictures.
We couldn't believe that we got that tour for 250 baht. It was so cheap! Well worth the money just for the lagoon and the snorkelling. Would have been even better value if the monkeys had been on the beach.
Once back on Ko Phi Phi Don we headed back to the hotel before going out for the all you can eat buffet at Matt's Joint, which we'd been eyeing up yesterday. It was a proper meat fest. We left feeling very full indeed.
Next door to the restaurant there was a small Nepalese run store selling fake watches and designer bags. I was quite surprised by the quality of some of the watches. It was pretty interesting talking to the guy about the different levels of quality. I was really tempted to buy one, but frustratingly the two I wanted both had slight flaws that were deal breakers.
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