Day 8 - Andaman Sea Kayak trip

Today we spent our day in Phang Nga and Andaman Sea. This is probably my favorite trip while visiting out here. Today was my 4th time with this company. We were picked up at the hotel by a minibus at 10 am. It was probably a half hour ride to the pier where our boat was. We basically drove across the island to the other side, so it was not very far. We travelled on the boat for maybe an hour and could see the fascinating limestone rock formations. It is very beautiful and when you get up close you see lots of colors and the formations of the limestone hanging down are magnificent.

Today we could not start with the kayaking because the tide was coming up and if we had entered the "hong" (which is like a room inside a limestone mountain) we would not be able to get out again for 6 hours because the tunnels would be filled with water. So instead we went to a small beach for maybe an hour. It was time for some swimming and a drink. Even I had a Pina Colada!

Back to the boat for a delicious lunch and then we took off for the kayaking. 2 persons + a paddler in each kayak. You do not have to paddle yourself.

First we went into a rather small hong and the tunnel was quite roomy. You could actually sit up in the kayak. In here we found a lot of little monkeys. They were not afraid at all. I guess they see so many tourists coming in these kayaks that they believe it is part of nature!

The next hong we were going to enter was the challenging one. It was literally no headroom so you have to lie flat on your back in the kayak. It is pitch black in the tunnel and there are hundreds, maybe even thousands, of bats hanging above you. And they stink! The paddler has a headlamp and shines his light on the bats. Not really for the squeamish people! In this hong there are trees growing in the water and they look interesting with their big root systems. Here you can also see the strange walking fish.

After maybe another half hour of kayaking we once again borded the boat and started the trip back. We saw another lovely sunset and by the time we made landfall it was dark. We were not back at the hotel until 7.30 pm.

I have tried to add videos here in the blog, but it seems to take forever and ultimaltely it fails to upload. Therefore I have now started my own channel on YouTube where I will post my videos. I will put some there now from this trip and probably add more later when I get back to the US.
The URL is http://www.youtube.com/maggsimm The long ones take a while to download, especially the sunset dance by the infinitypool.