Krabi, beaches and tropical islands

We flew into Krabi after a ‘public transport adventure’ in Bangkok – choosing to get to the airport via three trains on three different networks in the city. Not sure why they haven’t managed to connect them all up yet, as that would have made things a little smoother but instead we bought a ticket (card) for one train, caught that to the next one, left and re-entered that same station and bought a ticket (token) for the next one, arrived at the main city station, hiked across that, bought another ticket (different token) and made our way up to the airport.

It was a bit of a palaver but we thought it would be more interesting than just jumping in a cab, and we now feel like we can make our way around the city using the public transport pretty well.

The flight was uneventful and reasonably short. Krabi airport is bigger than I expected, and on arrival you are absolutely hounded by every taxi driver in town. I ignored them as best that could (with sometimes Jim having to act as a physical barrier between them and me before they got the drift!), and went off to the Grab pick up point.

Turns out our driver didn’t want to use that though – he preferred to just park in the car park and get us to find him! Eventually we did, but only after he finally sent us a photo of the bay that he was parked in. How he thought we’d find him otherwise I don’t know.

He dropped us at our hotel called ‘Uncle Krabi’, which I think might be the cheapest stay of the trip at around $65/night. The room was spacious with a balcony and the owners are absolutely lovely (a Muslim family – the son, in a wheelchair, runs the front desk, while his dad acts as a taxi driver, which includes providing a free shuttle into town whenever we need it).

On our first full day in Krabi, we hopped in a car to go the pier where we got on a longboat taxi to go to Railay Beach – a reasonably famous beach, and as it turns out very, very crowded.

It was like Bondi Beach on a summers’ day with barely a spot of sand showing, with the added fun of boats pulling up to the beach all the time. It was less crowded in the water, so we did a bit of swimming at a couple of the beaches there, had lunch and a look around, then returned home by the same means.

We then got a lift up to the markets for dinner which was pretty tasty, then wandered home via the riverfront walk.

For the next day, we were booked on a boat tour of the islands, which we were looking forward to, but slightly worried it was going to be crowded again. The tour visits four islands (or four beaches really, with the last one being Railay Beach again). It was a big longboat that holds 50 people and it was full. Unfortunately we were almost last to get on so were in the back row (with Jim sitting with some dude nearby). It was fine though, and luckily nice and calm, although Hamish and I had taken TravelCalm just in case.

Sure enough the islands were beautiful, but very, very busy. We had a swim at the first one, then snorkelling at the second one. They fed us lunch at the third one (which was delicious), and the kids had a swim there, then a swim at the final one.

I shared a story about the ridiculous influencers on Facebook so I won’t repeat it here, only to say that it’s all a bit ridiculous in my opinion.

The family I highlighted in that story were so into their influencing content gathering that they missed the boat back, so we emerged from the back seat for the last leg which was much nicer (and it was great to have them gone too!).

It was a really lovely day out, finished off with another trip to the night markets for dinner where this time we enjoyed a few of the 100 baht ($5) cocktails with our dinner, walking both there and back this time.

We were pretty knackered after that so had a quiet day on the next day, with a sleep in, then a walk into town to do our washing. We then had a quiet afternoon in where I did a bit of work, before Jim and kids when out to find some takeaway locally.

We had considered doing another tour up into the jungle, but decided not to as we were a bit sick of all the crowds. So instead, we took ourselves to Ao Nang beach (1/2 hr in a car) and spent a very relaxing day on the beach there, finished off with a couple of beers at a beachside bar.

We then came back to our side of town before going out to dinner down the street at a restaurant that was very much not for tourists, and therefore had some really interesting (and delicious), authentic Thai meals.

That brings us up to today. We’re now a couple of hours up the road at Khao Sok, just outside the national park. We decided to make life easy for ourselves and book a Grab car to get here, which he did in record time. It seemed a little hairy from the back seat but Jim (in the front) seemed to think the driver was good and could handle the high speeds…

That did mean we arrived early though, so we had a nice lunch before checking in for a quiet afternoon of napping, working (me) and watching movies (the kids).

It’s all about the national park here, which again requires tours. Jim has been investigating the options there, so we’ll report back in a few days to let you know which ones we did and what they were like!