Sandy Footprints

It's been another month since I've updated my blogs... but let me tell you what... I have a good excuse this time! I promise.

March started off for me in Nakhon Phanom, which was soon followed by the Krungtep (That's "Bangkok" in [phonetic] Thai) Experience. A few days after I got home from Bangkok, I rode a cramped bus over to Korat, to hop into the Downstage Left seat of the second floor... of a double-decker charter bus that would be our real "home" for the next 9 days.

I sat by my wicked-cool friend, Michelle [from FL], as a few other friends piled around us and the front of the bus [with the giant window in front, of course], like Diana from Taiwan [love her!], Yuki from Japan [she's awesome,too!], Mandy, Ileia, Carol, ...and a few others.

We rode the bus for a several-hours-long distance until we came across our first "oh my gosh look how clear the water is" beach. ...Ha, and we thought THAT water was clear. We all got burnt there, and celebrated Easter. A few of the exchange students [when we had stopped at Lotus] splurged on candy and eggs [never actually saw them, so I'm afraid I can't detail them], and hid it around the resort. Since we were doing this at night and the resort was practically rented out to just our group, we wouldn't have to worry about neighbors. Unfortunately, though, I was one of the worst that were burnt of the group, and decided [after several million movements that hurt] I'd just try and sleep instead of doing more unnecessary moving. I was lucky though... the next morning I woke up and was ready earlier than a lot of people, so I had more energy to get up and look for anything people missed the previous night. Score! I got a bag-full of candy AND found the missing "Baby Bottle Pop." [There were only a few, and I got one!]

...I skipped something. We spent 2 nights at the resort. After the first night, we went on a small boating tour to the surrounding islands. Speed boat. Fun. Saw a walk-through.. or rather, walk-by cave thing, got back in the boat. Snorkled around a bit. Went back to the resort. Okay, back to where I was.

We got on a boat. We went to James Bond Island!!! Woo!!!
Visited a real "floating city." I mean seriously. Their houses were like on a weird boardwalk thing, surrounded by water. It was pretty cool.

Separated ourselves from our big bags... took a couple days' worth of stuff in a bookbag... boarded our next "home." The big, double-decker boat.
We snorkled. We arrived at the Similan Islands and put our bags in bungalows instead of tents [tents were first idea, but the weather looked kind of bad, so they put us in bungalows]. We spent the next night in tents, with what turned out to be worse weather. Ha! Irony. Oh well. No matter where we stayed, it was sandy outdoors AND in. It's just worse this time because the mosquitoes were upped a few notches to where you had a whole ... flock? after you, and you had to pull your ninja moves to unzip, hop in/out-of the tent, and zip it back up in just a couple seconds flat so you didn't get any enemies in your snooze-zone.
Tons of hermit crabs inhabit the Similan Islands. Be careful where you step on the beach, there's one every foot or so, possibly every other inch (depending what part of the island you're on). However, they're really rather cute...

Next day went searching for sea turtles. Found a couple, but the snorklers snorkled them away...
I got a picture before they left, though. Woo!

Climbed a giant rock pile... had to put your rock climbing muscles to the test...

Next day took off from the tent-y Similan Islands and headed for Phuket! We made it just in time to see the Sunset and grab something to eat.

Woke up the next morning to go to the Phuket Aquarium, and check out the Nemo (clown) fish, electric eels, "upside down catfish," and even some people-sized fish!

After catching some delicious fried shrimp with chili sauce, we did a bit of "gift shopping" and headed back to the hotel, prepping ourselves up to go to Phuket FantaSea, which I found out later was also a small theme park... Darn it... I wore heels, too! Ouch. My feet hurt by the time we looked at all of the wallet-gouging-prices on some cool stuff, took a few pictures, checked out someone making glass sculptures, and ate at a huge buffet that could sit.. what was it, 2,000 people? Haha. Yeah, the brochure even said there was about 1,000 types of food from all over the world... They half-truthed that. I think they mean 1,000 types of food all over the theme park, because there sure wasn't 1,000 types of food at the buffet, to every one's disappointment.
Oh well, they had cream puffs. I guess I'll live (I personally downed a few of those).

Also at Phuket FantaSea were some really interesting bathrooms... Now, hold on. Basically all I meant was that they were themed as well, and the sinks were pretty fun. You turn the knob on top his nose and water comes out not one, but BOTH of the bull statue's nostrils!
...anyway...

Last night on the Southern Tour, we had already started heading home. I could have sworn we stayed at this hotel before, but I guess it was just DeJaVu or something. Anyway, Michelle and I rented out an air-conditioned Snooker room [there were 2 rooms w/ AC, one w/o], and played our own way; we had a blast. There was even a dry erase board. Woo!

Before heading home from that point, though, we saw a banner attached to our hotel. "Phuket Bike Week." There were a lot of bikers, both farang [foreigners] and not, staying at our hotel... wanted to take a picture with a small group, but never found a small group again after having that thought. Oh well.

Yes, mom and dad, I wore my contacts when I was snorkeling. Of course I did! I mean, why would I want to view the prettyfulness of the ocean without them (a.k.a., BLIND)? Haha, just teasing. Seriously though, I did wear them...

PICTURES!
http://picasaweb.google.com/gecko.on.the.wall/SouthTour

IMPORTANT!
Please hold all shipments to Moni [me] for the next week or so. I plan on moving back to my old host house within a few days, and I'll let you know when. Until then, please don't send me anything! It will get sent to the wrong address. If you have put something in the mail already, please let me know! The new address will be the same as the first one I had when I came here. If you would like to get it from me, please send me an E-Mail to:
gecko.on.the.wall@gmail.com

Thanks!

MoniNeko