View over Phi Phi

The Phi Phi Islands consist of two islands. The smaller one, Phi Phi Ley, is uninhabited and is where the movie The Beach was filmed. The larger island is called Phi Phi Don, and that’s where we’re staying. The island isn’t very big, and neither is the town. We climbed to the top of the mountains via a small but incredibly steep path to get a view of the entire island. We were sweating buckets, but wow, what a view we got – and what a workout right from the start of the day! The island is quite narrow, just a couple of hundred meters wide. From up here, it was easy to see and understand why Phi Phi was hit so hard by the tsunami. It doesn’t take very high waves for the whole town to be flooded. The route we took up the mountains is also an evacuation route in case there’s another underwater earthquake that causes giant waves. At the top, there’s a photo of the town after the tsunami had ravaged it, once the water had receded – such devastation. At 2:30 PM, we took the boat back to Phuket since we’re flying to Bangkok tomorrow and then on to Burma early Thursday morning. We sailed back on a much nicer boat than the one we arrived on. This one was bigger and had air conditioning. We were treated to free soda and pineapple. What a luxury! Back in the noisy, vibrant Patong with its bustling nightlife, we went out for dinner.