Railay Beach Day 1-Monkeys and Toads

I had the great pleasure of receiving a visit from 2 of my dear, dear friends. Cheri and Nate were my Sugar House neighbors in Salt Lake and we had been talking about their visit to Thailand for quite some time. I could hardly believe the day had arrived for me to meet them at the airport. In fact, even on my way to the airport I was half convinced that they wouldn't even be there...kind of like when we would go to pick up a refugee family from the airport in the States and we never really knew if they would be there or if they missed a connection or in the situation of the Cubans, maybe they decided to deplane in Florida and start life there. To my amazement, they did arrive and the familiarity of being around old friends felt as delicious as Lyn's chocolate sheet cake.

The first week that Cheri and Nate were in Thailand I left them on their own to explore Bangkok while I went to work. I tried to fill their heads with all the information they would need. How to ride the sky train and the metro, how to ensure the taxi uses the meter, nearby restaurants and grocery stores, where to go, what to see, maps, keys and much more. Off I went to work as they went off to explore. I felt like a mother dropping her children off for their first day of kindergarden. Or was it that I was just so jealous that they got to play that while I went to work that I convinced myself that they would need me?

Luckily, that first week went by rather quickly. I would meet up with them in the evenings and we would have dinner while I listened to their various adventures for the day. The week soon came to an end and I made arrangements to be out of the office for the next 2 weeks while I joined Nate and Cheri on their vacation...now, our vacation.

First on the agenda was the beach. We took a plane to Krabi and from the airport headed to the pier to catch a boat to Railay Beach, a beach best known for it's limestone cliffs making excellent rock climbing. As Nate is an avid climber this was an area he was really looking forward to. Unfortunately, a recent shoulder surgery removed the option of climbing for him. Cheri knew it would be painful for him to be surrounded by climbers, ropes and quick draws but not be able to join in the fun. Nevertheless, we would have a great time.

Knowing from our guidebook that the longtail boat ride from the pier to our beach shouldn't cost more than 100 Baht ($3) we were surprised when we go the pier and the woman tried to charge us 600B. After some back and forth in my weak Thai the woman wouldn't budge on the price and we suspected that the driver had brought us to the wrong pier...one he was hoping for a kickback from. I pulled out my cell phone and called the hotel. I asked the voice on the other end how to reach the hotel and she said to go to the pier and take the boat that cost 60 B. I told her we were at the pier and they were charging us 600 B. After some back and forth we finally understood each other and I handed the phone to the woman behind the desk at the pier. When she hung up she gave instructions to our driver to take us to the pier we had asked to go and which was just 30 seconds up the road. Once inside the car driver said he had taken us to that pier since at the other pier you have to wait until there are 8 people for the boat to take off. I told him we would have appreciated if he had just taken us where we had asked to go. Once at the right pier we waited maybe 15 minutes and enjoyed the sounds of the calls to prayer from nearby minarets. We paid our 60 B ($2) and took the 20 minute boat ride to Railay Beach.

The boat ride was beautiful. We skidded across the bluegreen water, around the cliffs, by the white sandy beaches and finally arrived at Railay Beach. We unloaded the boat by stepping out of the boat into the warm water, grabbed our bags and walked the remaining distance to the dry beach. Not knowing exactly where to go we followed the signs pointing to our hotel and found ourselves walking in circles. Stopping to ask for directions we found that we had found the right place and we checked in. We unloaded our bags, grabbed our cameras and immediately headed out for a walk that lead us to a beach. The sand was so fine and almost silky on my feet. The feel of walking barefooted felt romantic and worlds away from the office.

Walking along, enjoying the heat of the sun and the sand beneath our toes we found a clan of monkeys swinging in the trees and walking along the beach. We joined the other tourists in the feeling of excited and joined in the photo shoot. The animals found snacks left unattended by sunbathers and took the "finders keepers" approach claiming the bags of chips and tall iced coffees. The sunbathers were too intimidated to put up much of a fight and some even freely offered their snacks to the monkeys. Once the monkeys had had their fill, they moved on and we remained enjoying the beach until sunset. Our stomachs indicated it was dinner time so we indulged and as we walked about continuing our exploration of our new surroundings we found a company that booked both diving and snorkeling adventures. We decided the following day would be perfect for that so we booked tickets, diving for me and snorkeling for Cheri and Nate. On the walk back to the hotel we passed a climbing shop and stopped to look at guide books (guess whose idea that was). The owner had a pet monkey and I asked if I could pet it, not knowing if he was friendly to others besides his owner. The shop keeper said yes so I began to pet the monkey (named Harry Potter) who proceeded to climbed on me and stole my barrett from out of my hair. When I tried to take it back the monkey got mad, hissed at me and gave me a little bite. With the help of its owner Harry Potter finally gave up my hair pin.

As we found our way back through the maze of the outside walkways through the resort to our room we had to be sure to walk lightly as we found along the path numerous toads hopping about and we caused a few near death experiences for them.

That ended our first day on Railay Beach. A great start to our grand adventures.