Sunday
I woke up at 7:30 feeling hungover and so went back to sleep. At noon I woke up again feeling much better and so waited for everyone else to get up and moving. By the time we were all alive and functioning it was definitely time to find food, so we walked around the little Ao Nang area desperately trying to find breakfast food. No place had western breakfast food, only Italian, Thai, and Indian food. We searched dozens of restaurants for an hour before we found a little cafe with a Harley Davidson theme that had several breakfast items available a la carte. By that point I was so hungry that I ordered a cheese omelette and a bowl of yogurt, fresh fruit, and muesli. I love cultural cuisine but I’m going to have a real problem if I ever go somewhere that doesn’t serve eggs in the morning.
Everyone really wanted to go see Railay Beach for the day, one of those picturesque places you see in the guide books, and so we made our way down to the beach were there was a little stand advertising boat tickets. A guy standing nearby informed us that there weren’t any tickets available because of the weather, but after some negotiating he agreed to take us if we would pay for all eight spots on his boat. Since there were six of us we didn’t mind buying an extra two tickets since they were pretty cheap to begin with. The guy’s longtail boat was in the harbor, a little ways away, so he had to cram all six of us into his friend’s tuk tuk. If you don’t know what a tuk tuk is, it’s a little cart that attaches to a motorbike with a couple of seats in it. These little carts usually fit about two Thai-sized people comfortably. Not six Americans. But somehow we all crammed in and made our way to the harbor.
The tuk tuk dropped us off in a little bay area where hundreds of longtails were anchored, and every few moments more were arriving and leaving. We were told which number would be arriving to pick us up and so we walked down to the shore and waited.
After a little while storm clouds began to gather in the distance.
We kept waiting.
Our tuk tuk driver ran down to see why we had’t been picked up yet. We tried to explain that our guy still wasn’t here and he just nodded and ran off again.
Then it started pouring.
The only building on the beach was raised up on stilts so we ran over to it and huddled underneath, beginning to wonder if our guy would ever pick us up or if we had been scammed.
The rain began to lighten up and finally we saw the guy we had given money to driving up in a different numbered boat. Apparently his had gotten stuck or something.
No one cared much that it was raining, when you have only a day or two to explore an area it’s hard to let rain hold you back. The boat ride over to Railay Beach was breathtaking despite the roller coaster of a ride. Massive limestone cliffs lined the shores making up a scene reminiscent of an otherworldly paradise.
We finally rounded into Railay Beach which was a beautiful long, narrow stretch of sand, completely surrounded by massive cliffs.
The rain cleared up just as we arrived, allowing us to spend several perfect hours playing on the beach and building the most awesome sand castle ever.
Then much too soon, our longtail driver was back to pick us up at the requested time and we made our way back to Ao Nang. As we made our way off the boat, there was a man walking there along the beach holding a fuzzy little monkey. Monkeys usually freak me out but this one was pretty cute, so we paid the guy a small fee to hold it and take our pictures with it.
We returned to our rooms to shower and change and then walked down the street to find an Italian/Thai/Indian restaurant for dinner. The place we ended up at had really good mai thais which we ordered several of. I opted for Indian food again since the change had been nice, this time choosing palak paneer, a spinach and cheese dish. Still feeling a little partied out from the previous night we went home and fell asleep.
