Bye Bye Phi Phi :(

It was a sad day today.

We left Phi Phi Island.

We could have stayed quite a while longer, but the remainder of our travels beckoned us, and we decided to drag ourselves away from this paradise and move along. We are so happy we trusted our instincts, chose to ignore all of the travel warnings we heard were going around ('Don't go there, widespead disease will kill you all!') and go to Phi Phi anyway. And we can only hope that we'll be able to afford to come back one day. Several people on the island have said that the Thai government wants control of the island. If this happens, they'll probably build all of their fancy resorts, reap all of the profits, and oust 'budget' travellers for good. Not to mention the fact that all of the locals who live here and have lived here for many many years will not be able to afford it and will need to move.

While cruising away from Phi Phi on the ferry back to Krabi, we thought about how much work had been accomplished in just the short amount of time we spent there. It was an hour and a half to the mainland (no unscheduled stops at Bamboo Island though). We got off the ferry and were driven to the town of Krabi to await our overnight bus to Bangkok. Krabi is a bit of a hole, and we spent the 5 hours we had there using the internet and trying not to get drenched in the sudden tropical downpour. We went back to the travel place where we'd booked our bus ticket and caught a small pickup truck to the bus station. The bus station was 100 metres down the street, and we actually had to pass it to get back to the travel agent from the internet cafe. Why they didn't just tell us to walk is beyond us. It was harder to load our bags on and off the pickup than it would have been to just walk down the road.

We boarded our bus, which was supposed to be a delux V.I.P. bus, whatever that means. But it was a smaller, older, crappier bus than we were promised...no surprises there. But the airconditioning did work, even if the electrics didn't. Nige sat and watched the driver's co-pilot change fuses until they ran out, at which time he used a chewing gum wrapper for a makeshift fuse, McGuyver style. It was about 3 hours to the eastern coast. We were dropped off at another travel agent. This one was so packed with tourists and luggage that we couldn't even get in the door. We traded in the stickers on our shirts we had for a little card with our seat numbers on the next bus. Ahhh, here's the V.I.P. bus. We just had time to get a quick dinner before boarding the double-decker 'luxury' bus. It had some leg rests that come out when the seat reclines (like a Lazy-Boy) but they were not very useful as the seats could not recline far enough. We were, however, treated to a magnificent movie. It was a 'C grade' movie, the 'C' standing for CRAP. Kel lasted about 3 minutes until the Kung Fu started, then dove into her book. Tragically, Nige watched all of it.