The Slitherants: Koh Phi Phi - Fri 19/03

Koh Phi Phi…After the ‘meh’ factor of Koh Lanta we were both eager
to see somewhere that was a little special. Koh Phi Phi certainly has the reputation but could it back it up?? The first thing to know about Phi Phi is how small it is. The main town (there is only one) is a tiny neck of land between two bays full of claustrophobic laneways all jammed with surprisingly fashionable shops, restaurants and the obligatory party bars with their English/Irish pub theme.

The second striking factor is just how many people there are visiting this tiny island. It’s staggering to see how many (mainly) young people flock to this island and it is the definition of ‘backpacker destination’. The laneways and beaches are absolutely packed to bursting point with people all wanting to experience a little of what ’the beach’ is all about.

As we arrived we met a couple people who were on their way over from Koh Lanta as well and they served as our ‘posse’ for our time on the island. The main beach itself was surprisingly nothing to write home about, the water was a bit murky and there was rocks at low tide.

Our first day was spent lazing on this beach and I guess I may have been a little overexcited at finally having cheap beers as I went on to drink all afternoon in the sun while the girls sipped their vodka’s and next thing you know I had completely passed out, woke up just long enough to throw up on the sand and then pass out again before having to stagger home later and pass out again, all before eight pm!! Not the greatest form but like I say, I may have got a little carried away a bit but I swear drinking in this tropical heat makes you feel way more pissed than you otherwise would but there you go, lesson learned, or was it?? More about that later.

The real reason people come to Phi Phi is to go the ‘the beach’ of course, but that isn’t actually on Phi Phi at all. It’s on the island next to it called Phi Phi Leh (little phi phi). The next day we hired a long tail (the local version of a speed boat) and headed over to check it out to see what all the fuss is about. Phi Phi Leh is every bit as breathtaking as you would expect. The island rises out of the ocean so vertically it gives the impression that it’s floating. The sea has eaten away at the rock underneath and the entire edge of the island is overhanging the surface with stalactites (or is it stalagmites?) hanging precariously from the cliffs. The trees sprouting on these cliffs give the island a mossy look but the whole portrait combines to leave you saying ‘goddamn that’s one nice island!’. But it’s the coves that cut into the islands interior providing sheltered inlets where you can snorkel in the lukewarm water surrounded by towering cliffs that really make this island something special.

The snorkelling is fantastic and the setting is so mind-blowing you can see why hordes of tourists flock here every year. Needless to say we were in there like rats up a drainpipe and had an epic time jumping off the front of our boat and harassing the local marine life.

Baiting the water is fun - where you throw in a little bread and get all the fish to strike the surface while one of you swims in the middle of them all going crazy, magic stuff. Sometimes the fish think you’re a piece of food and try to nibble on you which is actually quite a funny feeling!

After a hard day’s snorkelling and exploring the coves of Phi Phi Leh (yes we went to ‘The Beach’, we had too right??) it was back to the main island for the evening’s festivities. Now Phi Phi had a brand of entertainment that is apparently popular in the backpacker spots around Thailand but was a new experience for me. I am referring to ‘drunken fire sports’. This involves certain hair-singing disciplines like ‘flaming jump rope’, ‘ring of fire’ and ‘fire limbo’. Just imagine all of these usual school yard games, like jumping a long rope or limbo, but with the equipment doused in kerosene and set alight. This may sound pretty ho-hum but add in extremely reckless Thai guys running the proceedings with absolutely no regard for another person’s safety and a bunch of pissed tourists with an ‘I’m only here for a good time so stuff it’ mentality and you have the recipe for a very dangerous good time full of fun and frivolity. For instance if you happen to be jumping the flaming skipping rope rather well then the Thai guys turning the rope will speed it up until it’s so fast that you have to trip out and the rope will inevitably burn you. Our companions all had burns on them from the previous night (where I was safely passed out in bed) and it was funny as throughout that day I had seen a lot of people limping around and wearing bandages. I had wondered what had happened to them and now I had found out-they were all burned! It didn’t matter how fast the Thai guys went with the rope, or how low the limbo rod was there was a never ending supply of pissed tourists willing to try their luck and therefore a non-stop laugh fest for the rest of us. This happens at the bars on the beach every night of the year and the local doctors clinics must have to order in tons of bandages from the mainland every year just to keep up with the demand.

My personal favourite was a Chinese (I think!) bloke who was by far the most pissed of his mates. In an effort to perhaps earn the respect of his peers this bloke proceeded to cock up all of the events and must have collected a healthy bunch of burns to keep him writhing in agony for the next few days. However his moment of genius came when, in his drunken state, he decided to try and take a running dive over the limbo bar, kooked it, and caught the bar with his groin area and landed on the sand with the flaming bar caught underneath his body and no doubt burning what little skin he had remaining over the said groin area. The man was a legend and I nearly fell out of my seat after that one! I hope his mates appreciated his performance and I can only imagine his agony as he woke up the next day with a splitting headache only to be like ‘dude, where’s my skin??’. Fantastic stuff.

After the fire show had run it’s course and enough people were injured the beach kind of turned into a Swedish underage disco where all the ‘cool backpackers’ could dance wildly to commercial radio hits, time for me to go….

The next day we stayed on the island and went to a beach called ‘Long Beach’ which was about a half hour walk around from the main pier. This was a really nice beach and we had a nice afternoon of just chilling, reading our books and going for a million swims before heading back to the main town area to have a few drinks and say good bye to friends we had made before we set off for Phuket in the morning. It’s funny how, in these tropical holiday destinations, where no-one has work the next day, how ‘a few drinks’ can end up being a bit more than that. We had met some really nice people on the island and we (read ‘I‘) proceeded to send off Phi Phi in suitably large style. Anyway we had a great time drinking with the rest of the island on the beach and all before too long it was time to say good bye and head home to pass out in time for the ferry in the morning. Now, through no fault of our own of our own, it turned out the ferry left about three hours after we (read ‘I’ once again) had passed out so it was with no small amount of difficulty that we rose and staggered down to the pier to get our ferry. That was a brutal couple of hours on the ferry I must say and I am still proud of myself because I didn’t spew and we arrived safe and sound in Thailand’s most commercial holiday destination-Phuket. This was a place I didn’t hold much expectations for but I’m pleased to say it was actually pretty cool, but more about that next time. ‘Til then.

The streets of Phi Phi - small alley ways lined with shops and packed with tourists. There were no motorbikes or trucks on the island so all the good were transported to each shop by a trailer pushed by a sweaty worker.

Having dinner with our new friends. I had a pretty tasty Tom Yum soup

The fire poi show. You can see the rows of seats behind the entertainer - we were on the first row where a few times I thought we were going to be hit by a flying fire poi or even worst a fire stick!

Drunken tourist doing the fire limbo. If you got under the limbo stick, you would be rewarded with a free shot of vodka!

The fire skipping rope. This photo has a talented Thai guy skipping - if it was a tourist, he would be burnt by now.

Long beach - the water was better at this beach that the main beach. The water was clear and there was some free shade - on the main beach there weren’t many trees so if you wanted some shade you had to pay for the use of an umbrella and chairs for the day.

On our last night in Phi Phi, we had a lovely dinner at a quirky restaurant called Papaya. The owners cats would have turns at sleeping in the drinks.

The snorkelling crew. Instead of joining a chartered snorkelling trip we decided to hire a long boat and get the Captain to take to a few good spots around the island - it ended up costing us a lot less, $AU11 for 4 hours.