Day 17 - A Long Day on the Water

In our eagerness to save money we often ask travel agents and guesthouse owners the following question "What is the cheapest way to get from point A to point B?" Their answer is usually not the most convenient or quickest route. Today was a case in point. Instead of taking the high speed boat that would have taken 2 hours from Koh Mook to Koh Lanta we opted for the convoluted ferry route that left Koh Mook at 11:00 am and arrived at Koh Lanta at 17:30. It did cost half the price :) Some budding Thai entrepreneur decided he would run a tour/ferry company whereby some people pay a ridiculous price to get taken to various islands to do some snorkeling and picture taking and along the way he picks up "ferry" passengers. The only difference between the 2 customers is that we paid a fraction of the price. It was an awesome day.

We started off by being taken out on a long tail to the ferry while the high paying customers were exploring the emerald cave we were at the day before. It then went to an island were they stopped for lunch and although we did not get to partake in the lunch we were still happy to enjoy our pea nut butter sandwiches on the amazing stretch of beach.

Two of our fellow cheapskate passengers were a french and Spanish girl who were travelling companions/lovers. They were really friendly and had spent the last 3 years in London so we chatted to them about there time there. The next stop on the itinerary were 2 snorkeling spots. The first one we managed to share some goggles between the four of us and the marine life was breath taking. You were literally swimming with shoal of tropical fish.

The second one was at the base of a cliff where a colony of bats had made there home. We were a bit freaked out by all the weird screeching and decided to have a lie down instead of snorkel. The last stop was a monkey feeding which involved some of the crew members throwing some stale do nuts at a pack of monkeys in a mangrove forest.

Upon arriving in Koh Lanta we failed at bargaining with the motor cycle taxi and were transported to the accommodation I had researched on the net called Sanctuary. Well their prices had increased dramatically and they were no longer in our budget. We left our bags with them and went to look at a some cheaper options. After an encounter with a very feminine landlord and a weird Thai Muslim family where the male patriarch was constantly hocking up flem from deep down in his lungs and spitting it out close to our feet we went running back to the original option. The bungalow we stayed in was made of bamboo and there were plenty holes in the walls and floors. It also had a "quaint" outdoor bathroom.We went to bed covered in a mosquito net on a rock hard bed. In the early hours of the morning Luisa needed the bathroom but lay in bed with her bladder bursting because she did not want to face our al fresco toilet. Eventually she elbowed me awake and told me to stay awake until she was done. Was she scared of being abducted? The joys of being a husband.

Phil