At any rate, for the third day of our holiday, we decided to look for a package deal that would take us out to the Phi Phi Islands. There are many stands along the road offering the exact same packages by the exact same company for different prices. I have no idea how they reconcile all the different charges but we found a stand willing to sell us a tour, for about $40, that included about eight stops.
We took a large speed boat out to several islands including Monkey Bay, Phi Phi Don and Maya Bay where Leo DiCaprio had filmed some movie about frolicking naked in the sea. Our very jovial tour guide kept saying over the throb of the engine, "At the back of the boat, we have a mass snorgle, in case you want to snorgling." I wondered for a little while if we were going to enjoy a group hug until I realised he was talking about snorkelling masks.
On the boat, the tour operators, lithe and sinewy in bright red shirts clambered up and down the tarpaulin roof with the agility of monkeys. This particular hero dived into the sea to rescue my snorkel mask after I carelessly knocked it into the water. Those things sink fast and even after Jonathan started panicking because he couldn't see it anymore, Homeboy rooted it out easily.
On the way, we saw Chicken Island - name hopefully self-explanatory.
Our claim to fame on Maya Beach. The sand was soft and white but I'm not a Leo DiCaprio fan and there were way too many tourists to do anything, so we snapped a couple of pictures and went on our way.
Mel and I picked up these awesome bathing dresses at a shop along the Ao Nang stretch. They're literally little halter dresses made of swimsuit material with bikini bottoms. It was awesome. You don't feel too exposed, you just throw on a shirt afterwards, and you're ready to go!
Monkey Bay was just beautiful. I have never, in my life, seen water this blue, stretching far as the eye could see.
We started snorkelling here in a little lagoon. I've never snorkelled before, except in a swimming pool with a straw (growing up, my brothers and I were clowns, okay?), and the moment I dipped my masked head into the water, I squealed loudly into my snorkel. There were fish all around me, large silver ones, amazing vivid purple ones with green patches on the head and yellow stripes at their throat, black and white butterfly fish. I even saw what looked like a lion fish in the deeper part of the shallows fighting a territorial battle with several black suckers.
I'm going to tell you something a little nerdy now. My excitement over the fish, combined with some hard swimming and heavy breathing into my mask was making me hyperventilate a little bit and I started to see tiny gold flecks. It was beautiful, but a little bit alarming. Nerd to the max.
We stopped for lunch on an island where I found a litter of kittens and this little guy to be my buddy. He really enjoyed being carried and fussed over and when I finally put him down, he followed us for several yards.
After lunch, the boat went out into deeper water and we watched the crew feeding brilliant gold coloured fish with bread over the side. Eventually, we docked at a place behind Phi Phi Don where we could snorkel in deeper water. If I was bowled over before, nothing could prepare me for this.
I can't explain how weird and wonderful it was to plunge into the deep blue water and instantly be surrounded by literally thousands of fish. We were right in the middle of three schools - and here is where I wish to God I knew something about fish or I had at least a camera because I've been googling like a madwoman and can barely recognise anything now - long, plain silver fish, rounder silver fish with a yellowy tint and navy stripes and thousands of little minnows.
I found that if I lay on my front and stayed very still, the fish came near the surface and swam all around me, sometimes almost into my face. The minnows swam in a long silver stream and did the beautiful trick of all suddenly steering in a different direction so they flashed like coins. Below me, the sea started at a ten metre drop and fell off to even lower depths that I couldn't see. Amid little alcoves between corals big as cars and sea fans, there were angelfish, other kinds of butterfly fish and even sea urchins, some with pale lilac spines that gently ticked in the current.
All I could hear was the sound of my breathing and the prickle of little bubbles in my ear. As I swam, fish kept appearing out of the current - a flat one with a long nose that looked like a tape measure, a huge mottled brown and white one that stayed well out of my way. My heart was completely full. At that moment, there was nothing to do but look, and see, and learn.
I know places like this are disappearing. The wonder of observing it made it feel even more precious. I know coral reefs are under massive threat and I was probably not doing the area a huge favour by visiting it. But I can't help it. Just once in a little while, I hope I'll get the chance to do something like this again.
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Say your peace, yo.