Beach Paradise

I am writing you from Railay. I am in a small internet outpost right across a jungle shrub, and just past the shrub is the ocean. The magnificence of this and the surrounding islands is beyond words. We arrived in Railay yesterday, which is an island just off of Krabi Province. Julissa and I flew into Krabi Province on Tuesday and stayed on the mainland our first night. The digs in Krabi were so-so, but our digs in Railay are so fun. We are staying in a small bamboo bungalow that sits on stilts in a mini jungle-ish set up. The island is pretty developed. It is beautiful and the views are stunning, but everything here is set up for tourists. After speaking to a few other travelers, we learned that Railay is one of the less populated islands, which is good because I am not in favor of the super touristy holiday. Julissa and I were looking forward to staying at Koh Phi Phi, which is were the movie "The Beach" was filmed, but we also heard it has become quite expensive and dirty. We have decided to visit the island for a day, but stay in our fun bungalow. After a couple nights in Railay, we will make our way to Koh Jum and meet up with our friend Kevin from Washington, D.C. And then, sadly enough, I make my way back to Bangkok, pick up my luggage and head back to Chicago.

Before I share how sad I am about returning to the cold and leaving paradise, I want to paint in words, as best as I can, our snorkeling adventure . After lunch, Julissa and I booked a snorkeling tour for a very reasonable price that included water (very important), fruit and dinner on the beach. We left at 2pm and returned by 9pm. We swam with the fishies for about 3.5 hours of the six hour tour. The fishies were everywhere! I even saw nemo! My goodness, as I write I can not think of the words to describe the experience. It was beautiful, relaxing, challenging and amazing all in one. We rode out to different rock formations, caves and islands. The tour guide, Joe, who was a skinny little Irish man, would drop us off and we were free to swim around at our leisure. Joe gave us a path to follow to make sure we did not get lost, but it was very relaxed and not structured at all, like other snorkeling tours.

During our swim in the caves, the waves were quite strong and it was a bit scary trying to swim with the current and not being swept into the rocks. Many of the fish swam right along with us. I hope they were not disturbed by our presence, but they seemed unaffected. I saw neon multi-colored fish whose colors were brighter and more sticking than any color produced by American Apparel. I also a sword fish and I could have sworn I saw a shark, but it may have been my imagination. The fish loved pineapple. They came in droves for little bits of the pineapple. Julissa took a picture of the fishies surrounding me as I fed them. I will be sure to post it later. After swimming around for a while, Joe took us to a beautiful sandy beach in the middle of nowhere to watch the sunset and prepare dinner. We lit torches, indulged in a yummy coconut curry dinner and chilled out for an hour or so. Once dinner was done, we rode out to one more island and swam with phosphorescent fish and plankton. You could litterally see the fish and plankton glowing in the water. Julissa and I put on goggles and from under the surface, it looked like we were swimming in a 3-D movie, or in the stars or in the ocean with glowing fish!!! The experience was very exciting for me. The entire tour was tons of fun, and best of all, at a great price.

Today we will be beach bums for at least half of the day and later we will explore the Diamond Cave that apparently looks like its walls are surrounded by diamonds. I will report back soon. Hugs from paradise...see you soon family and friends...