It has been quite a long time since I've been to beach. I mean I did go to our family vacation home in Cha-am, Petchaburi but, that wasn't what I really want. I wanted to go to a more secluded island down South of Thailand, somewhere with clear blue sea. Phuket and Samui are too popular and too crowded. Though, the beaches are still alright, I wanted something new. My friend has already been to Lipe Island and really like it. Also, I have heard quite a lot from other friends about its picturesque beach, blue sea and great diving sites. So, I wanted to see for myself. My friend wanted to return to Lipe as well. There is a limited opportunity to go there because it wasn't recommend to go to island during the monsoon season. End of year till May is the time to go. The monsoon usually arrives around mid May. To avoid super strong Sun and the crowd from long holiday in April, we decided to go at the end of April or early May. We did our booking at Thai Tiew Thai event back in March. This was a huge event with hotels, resorts, airlines and spas offering promotion rate. We set our sights at a few hotels in Lipe island and ended up with Mountain Resort (http://www.mountainresortlipe.com/). Some of my friends have already been there and I have read a few reviews. This hotel is supposed to have the best view and the room looks quite alright too. We got quite a good deal, I think. 3 nights 4 days Deluxe Seaview room plus meals, snorkling tour and transportation from and to Had Yai airport at around 9,800 Baht. We actually booked our room right at the event because there was only one or two rooms left during the period we really wanted to go. After this, we only needed to book the plane tickets and wait for our holiday.
To travel to Lipe island, we had to go through numerous legs of transfers and rides.
1st leg: When the day came, we got up at the crack of dawn (or actually even earlier). Since it takes such a long time to get to our destination, we chose the earliest flight (6:30am). I know that this flight would get us to our destination quicker but, getting up at 4am on a holiday is still a torture. A flight from Bangkok to Had Yai is around 1.5 hour and we got there at 8am. Since we flied budget air and they were going to charge us extra for checking in luggage, we decided against it and that mean we could exit the airport very quickly.
2nd leg: There, we were picked up for our second leg of the journey. The hotel staff didn't pick us up but, they employed a service of local van operation to take us to the port. The van ride from Had yai airport to Pakbara port (ท่าเรือปากบารา) in Satun province took around 2 hours.
When we got there, it was already 10:30am. There, we met our guide and sort of our caretaker for the rest of the trip. He was responsible for our transfers, our meals, snorkeling tour, basically our experience while we were there. The port itself has been developed to look more official and formal. My friend said that when she came last time, it was very shabby. So, I thought, 'Great'.
3rd leg: Little that we knew, once it was almost time, our guide took us AROUND that nice looking building to a shabby loading plank.
I just assumed that the building wasn't totally completed. Still, I just felt what's the point for building nice and clean building only to keep it tourists free. We did see some people going through the building though. That was pretty annoying. Maybe our ride wasn't worthy of that new structure. Whatever reason, almost all tourists were waiting for an 11:30am speedboat, same for us. At first, my friend and I thought that our hotel will send a private speedboat but, unfortunately not. At least, we didn't have to worry about buying tickets and loading the our baggage because our guide already took care of it. We only need to...wait. When it was time, we embarked based on who ever came first, I mean came to buy tickets. We all received a color card with number which the crew would call out. Once on board, we could choose to sit wherever we wanted. We tried to find somewhere that would give the best air circulation.
Well, it didn't really help because it was so crowded. By the time we left Pakbara port, it was probably almost noon and it wasn't a straight forward ride. According to its itinerary, the speedboat offered two stops before Lipe island. At about half way, we stopped at Tarutao island which is a national park. The boat only stopped for 15 mins, just enough for everyone to rush out, take pictures and get back to boat. My friend and I decided not to get off. Because it was so hot and cramped in the boat, we just wanted the seats to ourselves even for 15 mins.
We only moved to the back of the boat to take a bit of pictures. Poor our guide, he thought that we went off with the rest of the group but, couldn't find us. After sometimes, he realized that we could be in the boat and found us. I think from that time on, he had a fear that we would ditch him. After everyone got back, we headed to the second stop which was Khai island. It was supposed to be very pretty with nice rock formation, white sand and blue sea. Unfortunately, it started to rain and by the time we reach Khai island, the sea got quite rough that we could not approach the beach. Honestly, I was a little bit disappointed because I have seen its pictures and wanted to take some pictures there but then again, I also wanted to quickly get to Lipe island. The captain did a 360 so that we could at least see the island. From there, we had only around 20 mins on that stuffy boat. When we reached Lipe island, the rain already stopped, how nice. The speedboat cannot dock at the island so, they set up a kind of pontoon to offload the passengers and baggage.
4th leg: From there, we were picked up by a long-tailed boat which was hired by each hotel. Our guide directed us to our boat and before long, we were off to our hotel. However, the boat only took us to the beach right in front of us. We knew that our hotel wasn't on that beach so, we were wondering what was going on and how to get to hotel.
5th leg: Once we got closer to the shore then, we saw two golf carts waiting for us. I remember talking to my friend about how many transfer we need to go through! Well, at least, we didn't have to walk especially when our hotel is up the hill. The ride was only around 5 mins through the fishing community.
Finally, we made it to our hotel 'Mountain Resort'!!! After 5 legs of journey, I was aching to see what our hotel has to offer and of course, the much talk about view. When we walked into their restaurant, I just didn't want to listen to what others had to say. I just wanted to see the view from the balcony. I didn't even feel hungry anymore, even though it was already 2pm. The hotel already arranged a table for our lunch. We couldn't ask for a better view.
They arranged a set meal of three dishes which were consisted of fried fish, soup and stir fried chicken. From different review and words from my friend, I had an impression that the food here was pretty bad. Some reviews said that they only had meal there once and no more. Honestly, the food wasn't bad at all.
The fried fish with black pepper was rather tasty though, the stir fried was a little bland. Still, we didn't think that it was that bad. After lunch, we checked in and the staff took us to our room, Deluxe 8. This is an air-conditioned room with balcony which situated at the top of the hill facing the sea. We specifically wanted this room because of the view.
Deluxe 8 is two rooms away from the restaurant. Once we entered, we just had to say "Wow Fantastic!" because we could see the beautiful blue see through the balcony door and windows.
The room isn't very big but because two sides of the room are mainly glass window, it creates the feeling of open space; simple but totally work. Also, I like that the balcony wall is transparent which maximize the gorgeous view.
Honestly, just sitting here, on my balcony looking out to the fantastic blue sea was more than enough for me to forget all the inconvenience of traveling. I just absolutely love it. I just couldn't get enough of taking pictures of this place, my little sanctuary. Anyway, we couldn't just sit here and do nothing. I mean we could but, we also wanted to take a dip in that clear blue sea. So, late afternoon, when it wasn't too hot, we went down to the beach. To get there, we had to go through the restaurant. The stair, the super long stair, is situated right in the middle of the restaurant.
Going down wasn't too bad but, we both dread when we had to go back up. For now, we would just concentrate on the sight and scene in front of us which wasn't so hard to do.
Huh....(almost) white sand and light blueish green sea, just great!! I think my friend and I were swimming till 6pm, just couldn't drag us out off the water. It was very relaxing, with occasionally stepping on rocks but, still we could live with it. When we were heading up, most of people were already gone, probably to get ready for dinner or hit the walking street. Well, we had a reservation at 7pm (our guide asked us ahead of time). I wanted to take pictures of the sunset but, by the time I showered, it already almost fully set. I did get a few nice shots though.
I really like the color. It was a beautiful mix of blue, pink, orange and purple. Didn't think that nature could produce such a combination of color (in the sky!). At 7pm sharp, we were at hotel's restaurant. Our guide strangely mentioned that he thought we would not show up (on time) because his friend told him that we just got off the water not an hour ago. I guess he kind of hold on to the memory at Tarutao island where we left him searching for us while we were lounging in the speedboat. The dinner kind of looked like lunch, fish, stir fried and soup. It was tasty though especially the Southern yellow curry, very spicy. I didn't take any more picture of the food because our guide unintentionally discouraged us. While we were chatting during dinner, he mentioned to us that these days, Thai people adopted a strange habit of taking pictures of the food before eating...umm...I was about to do just that. Well, he didn't say not to but, because he talked about it, it made us a little self-conscious. I didn't take picture of hotel food again on this trip. After dinner, we told the guide that we wanted to check out the walking street. This is the street that runs between all three beaches and it's where restaurants, snack shops, cafes and shops are. So, kindly, our guide said he would take us there. Actually my friend has already been there last time and we knew that the hotel provides shuttle golf cart from and to hotel. We didn't want to hurt his feeling so, whatever. He was there with us all the way. I mean he was with us from the hotel, until we reach Pattaya beach and until we got back to the hotel. He was nice (we didn't know the extend of his responsibility to us) but, it was a little uncomfortable to have someone following us all the time. We didn't stay long at the walking street that night because it was very quiet. Not many people were walking around and restaurants and shops were almost empty. It just looked kind of sad. So, what we did was walking to the end of walking street and back. I only got an order of roti which wasn't that good.
The guide said that this roti place was one of the popular few. They offers over 20 roti menus. I didn't think that there are that many ways to make roti. I just ordered a simple one, roti with egg. Maybe because I didn't eat it right away, it wasn't as good as I had hoped. I determined to find a better roti on this stretch of street on another night. We were leaving walking street at 9pm, or at least tried to. The last shuttle was at 9pm but, there were so many hotel guests queuing for the ride back. I guess they weren't too impressed with the emptiness either.
The next morning, we were woken by a rain storm at the crack of dawn. I just wanted to scream...OH noooo!! We could only hope that it would stop soon. Still, we knew that the water would not be as clear now. We were to meet up with our guide for snorkeling trip at 8:30am. He gently reminded us last night when we got back from the walking street. By 7:45am, both of us were ready for our breakfast. The buffet breakfast here is very simple and typical of other Thai hotel. It consists of eggs (at least here they offers egg station), sausages, pancake or french toast and a few Thai dishes like boiled rice with seafood. I just had the basics; fried eggs with sausages and toast. It was ok, not good but, not horrible as people said either. The thing that made up for the ordinary food was the view.
8:30am and we were ready. We met our guide at the beach in front of the hotel. Other than having a personal guide, we also had private long-tailed boat and captain. We would be traveling with this boat for the rest of the trip. Our guide told us that, we could only dive in the closer island because the sea was really rough.
For me, it didn't really matter as I didn't have any idea what to expect and I didn't care where as long as I got to see beautiful reeves and fish. I have to say that I can't remember the name of any island we dived. I remember that our first spot was like in the middle of the sea. Lots of tourist boats were already there with a crowd of floating bodies.
We could see big shoal of fish (don't know what kind), a stripy fish as well as quite a few big ones. However, the water was quite unclear with lots of sediments so, our guide suggested us to move on to different spots with nemos (clown fish). Our next spot was much closer to an island which gave us much clearer water and many colorful ocean life. As our guide promised us, we saw lots and lots of nemos. At one point, he actually caught a nemo for us to see up-close. It was later set free, of course. We could also see variety of fish, colorful reeves and different marine lives like urchin, sea star and giant clam. Can't tell the name of the island because I can't remember. Anyway, we had a couple good sighting and our guide took us to Koh Hin Gnam (or beautiful rocks island - simple as that). This island has rocky beach, smooth rocks which gave a unique look. Arriving, we saw quite a few boats there already. From our research, we kind of anticipated it as this island is a popular stop for all tour.
People are here not only for the rocky beach but, there is a kind of tradition of stacking 12 rocks and make a wish. Don't know if it really would help our wish come true but, that's what people have been doing. So, we decided to go with the flow. It wasn't as hard as I first thought and we finished our rock towers in no time. These are ours.
Once finished, we could proudly get on the boat and move on to another diving site. We had another dive before breaking for lunch. We headed to Koh Rawi. Apparently, this island is the lunch destination for just about every divers, rows of long tailed boats lined the beach.
Our guide found a nice spot of a wooden bench under a shade for our lunch. We already ordered our lunch box ahead of time for the trip. I was really impressed with most of the tour arrangement here. There is a rule of 'Do not leave trash behind' on this island. Basically, whatever you bring, you'll have to take it back with you. I would say that everyone really did fairly good to follow it. I mean I still saw some trash around but, not as much as I would expect from a beach full of tourists. Most of tours and hotels, including ours, prepares lunch in Tupperware box which can be re-use and of course, they have to take it back with them. This reduces large amount of trash. After lunch, we were left tot explore on the island. This island is like a hub for all diving groups and equip with basic needs i.e. toilet and shower rooms (a primitive one with water in a tank). What I like was its washing area which was like a pipe with holes. The water is kept running but, I wasn't sure where the water really comes from though. It did look kind of refreshing.
The beach here is like all other island in this area with white sandy beach and very clear bluish green water. It was very picturesque and peaceful minus the tourists who were lying around. It was very tempting to take a dip but, with all the boats, think we'd better wait for the next stop.
After a little stroll, we decided to get back to our boat. We figured that if we left this place before the rest of the crowd, we could have a peaceful dive. So, we gathered our stuff at left. We had a few more destinations left that day. At some point, our guide said that he would take us to a private beach, somewhere with no other tourists. That sounds really great. And he did just that!! I don't know the name of this island. The beach isn't big but, it does have a beautiful narrow white sand.
First, our guide led us out for snorkeling then, he left us and went to hang around on the beach. I kind of thought that he probably got sick of taking care of us already. Once we thought that we have seen everything, we headed back to the beach. There, we found our guide crouching on the sand building some kind of sand castle. When we approached, he just told us that he prepared a watermelon for us on a log not far away. He just wanted to get rid of us while he was finishing his creation. When we saw the watermelon, it reminded us of when we were getting on the boat this morning. When we were getting on the boat, we saw a large knife on a tray but, we didn't see any watermelon then. We were even joking that he maybe a serial killer, planned to chop and bury us somewhere. Now we knew the purpose of that knife. It was quite refreshing to eat watermelon even though it wasn't cool. One thing though, the watermelon was a little salty as we just got off the sea and didn't have fresh water to wash. Anyway, it was really nice, eating watermelon and watching the beautiful sea with no one in sight.
Then, we went to check out what our guide was up to. Basically, he was building a sand fortress for hermit crab or so it looked like. In the middle was a stick for the crabs to climb. This beach has plenty of hermit crab crawling around. We were teasing with a few when we were having watermelon.
There must have been over 20 hermit crabs in the sand fortress. We hardly get to see this many hermit crabs. I think many of touristy beaches are now way to crowded and poorly maintained that we could barely find any sea creatures at the beach. It is excited to see them here. Some of the hermit gang were trying to climb the sand out and others chose the high altitude escape.
We were like a kids, first time in a zoo, just couldn't get enough of these cute crabs. We took so many pictures and , sadly, teased them.
Well, eventually the kids in us had to take a back seat. We still wanted to take a bit more diving. Our guide thought that he could just take us to one more place and we were done for the day. Well, he was wrong. We went to one place but, we weren't too impressed. When we got on the boat, he asked if we should head back to the hotel, he got a surprised because we instantly told him that we still have energy to burn. Our last dive sight was pretty good with lots and lots of colorful reeves, fish and other sea lives. Then, we were done. From there, it didn't take long to get back to the hotel. I think because we went to many islands, I couldn't keep track with the direction. We got back to our hotel around 4 or 4:30pm I think but, we weren't done for the day. We had a plan to go to the walking street before dinner to hang around in some cafe and chill with a glass of iced coffee. So, once we got back to our room, we washed quickly and headed out. The hotel provided shuttle golf cart from 5pm. We were real quick, we even had to wait for the shuttle to come. We just hung around and took a look at other type of cabin and the weird frog garbage can. Didn't know what it stands for though.
It kind of looked like it might rain but, it didn't deter us. At the time we got to the walking street, it was still kind of early so, it was still very quiet. After a bit of walking around, we choose Elephant Cafe. We just like the lay back atmosphere there, more like a book cafe.
They had nice selection of hot and cold beverage there. We both ordered a kind iced coffee but, their food menu was also very appealing.
If it was earlier or we didn't have to go back for dinner at hotel, we might ordered some. Grilled cheese~~ It was really tempting. It was really relaxing. Before long, it was time for us to head back because we had dinner set at 7pm and our guide would be waiting. And waiting he was, as soon as we arrived at the restaurant, he quickly approached and inquired of where we went. Maybe he thought of himself as our guardian. The dinner was the similar three dished we had before but cooked in different style. I think 2 days with these food were just right. More than that and it would probably be too much. We had no plan to go out again that night. Lucky that we brought our own drinks from the mainland. So, that night, my friend and I just sat on the balcony drinking, listening to music (from our iPhone), chatting and just enjoying the peaceful environment.
The next morning, we followed the same routine and met our guide at the boat around 9am. It was very gloomy that morning. In fact, it rained just earlier that morning. However, our guide said that the wave wasn't too bad and we could still go out to the outer islands. On the way out, there didn't see any other boat around. We were kind of hoping that others would be less determined and stayed around the inner islands. So that we could snorkel in peace.
Our first destination was an island called Koh Hin Sorn (เกาะหินซ้อน) and it was clear where the name of this island came from. In front of us were two huge rocks on top of the other.
Nobody was around so, we took our time taking pictures. However, by the time we finished, the rest of the tourist boats were coming. Maybe they saw that we came so they just followed our example. Nonetheless, it shattered our hope of snorkeling in private. Nothing we could do but to rush to the next destination and started snorkeling as soon as we could so we would have a little peaceful moment...sadly not for long . We got to three sights in the morning. One of them was really great, don't know the name. We could see many kinds of fish, sea stars, sea anemone along with its resident clown fish. I also get to see one of my favorite fish, puffer fish. Even though, they didn't puff up (which was a good thing), I kind of think that they are cute. They looked like a floating milk carton with tiny almost invisible fins. They also came in many colors. After the morning dive, we could continue to check out different outer islands unfortunately for us, I had a little emergency. Don't worry not anything close to life threatening. I just happened to need a restroom. I thought that there would be another island (just like Rawi island) that we could go for rest, lunch and restroom. However, when we told our guide of our situation, he just gave us a wide eyes and said that there is no such island around this area!! That was scary. He said that my options was to either relieve in the water!!! (CAN"T), go into the forest!!! (CAN"T) or go back to the inner area and to Rawi island. The last choice is the only choice that could and would accept. One draw back though, our guide informed us that if we were to go to Rawi island, we would not have enough time to get out to the outer area again. I kind of felt bad for my friend to have caused this but, I just could not imagine going through the first two options. So, we reluctantly told our guide and captain that we needed to head back. It was about 30-40 mins ride back to Rawi and it was a very longgg 30 mins for me. At around half way, I was very tempting to tell the captain to stop at the nearest island and I would run into the forest...it was that serious. Lucky that we made it just in time. So, we had our lunch, again, on Rawi island. After making sure that the morning episode would not happen again in the afternoon, we headed off. It was good that there are many islands around that our guide could still take us to new and different islands. We could still find some isolated snorkeling area. We ended our tour with a diving site not very far from our hotel. It was around 4pm and we were getting tired. It didn't take long for us to get back to the hotel. We informed our guide that we wouldn't be needing his service this evening as we were planning to have dinner at the walking street. We had in mind a seafood dinner followed by a drink on the beach. We left hotel around 5:15pm. The first thing we did was to do a little survey of what they have to offer.
Many restaurants were starting to have customers coming in but, not so crowded. We walked till we reached Pattaya beach. It was very nice walking along the beach at sunset. The weather was a little cooler now and people were out to take picture, look for place for dinner or simply just hang out.
There are many bars which set their tables and seats (mats) right on the beach. We kind of eyed one or two of them for tonight.
First thing first, we needed dinner. We decided to go with the most popular seafood restaurant on the walking street from our point of view. That's because it's the only restaurant that was full. I think lots of people were there because the restaurant looks quite nice. They tried to replicate the feeling of having a meal on a beach by layer the ground with sand. Not only the atmosphere but, the displayed seafood was very appetizing.
Lucky us, we found a small table to the side of the restaurant and quickly took it. It wasn't ideal because it was rather dark but, better than having to wait for table. We ordered 2 dishes with the waiters but, we had to order seafood at the front of the restaurant. Basically, I had to choose my seafood at the display and tell the staff how I wanted it cook. It shouldn't be difficult to do. However, with crowd of people gathered at the display table and all scrambled to get the the best pick, it was very tiring. This kind of situation bring the bad side of people out. Some people, who was squeezing in to choose the seafood, haven't even gotten table yet. Some people just took forever to choose just a few crabs. It wasn't so much of a physical thing but, more like mental. I was totally annoyed by it. After a few minutes of waiting on queue, I realized that being civil wouldn't get me anywhere. So, I did my best to squeeze myself in and pick my dinner as quick as I could. Lucky me, I only needed to pick for two, one medium size cuttle fish and three blue crabs. The two dishes from the kitchen came quick enough but, not before we finished one roti (dessert as an appetizer).
We had deep fried shrimp and papaya salad with seafood. They were alright. The salad was really spicy but, good still. After that, we had a longgg wait for our seafood. It felt like forever. I think we wait for almost an hour until my patient ran out and I had to give them a push.
Conveniently, our seafood came right away. One thing though, I didn't order grilled crabs. I actually ordered it steam but, in a rush, they didn't pay attention. Well, we didn't have any patient left for a redo. At the time, grill was fine too. Their sauce was pretty tasty actually, a blend of pepper, fish sauce, coriander roots and garlic, I think. After a lengthy dinner, we moved off to Pattaya beach to find a spot for an evening chill. There were a couple place we were looking at before dinner. Once we got to Pattaya beach, we were attracted by the music that came from a bar right next to the walking street entrance. Early in the evening, we didn't pay much attention to this place because, at the time, they were playing Reggae music which didn't suit our taste at all. But this time, it was kind of hip-hop dance. We just didn't give much a thought and quickly walked in. I believe that the place was called Barracuda bar, not a very appealing name though. From the first glance, there wasn't any table on the beach available. We absolutely didn't want to sit inside because, it basically wasn't right plus the speaker was just to close for comfort. Determine to have a nice seat, we asked if they had any more table and rug. Luckily, they had and they actually nice enough to put us in front of everybody. I'm sure that there would be some people who weren't that thrill. Well, we didn't pick the spot, the staff did. It was nice, very relaxing and fun at the same time. We were just drinking, chatting, watching people walked by and enjoy the music...until the CD re-ran and we started to get Raggae again. By that time, it was around 10pm again and it was time for us to head back. I know that it wasn't very late at all but, we had to get up early tomorrow and we had to call hotel staff to come and pick us up. Didn't want the guy to have to wait for us too late. We also had to pack that night.
The downside of Lipe is the transfer, it just took so long and involved a lot of waiting. Our flight the next day was in the afternoon but, we still had started the trip back early. We left the hotel almost the usual time for snorkeling. We had a few last look before we left this beautiful island.
Then, we took the speed boat to Pakbara port (almost 2 hours). Fortunately, once we got there, a van was already waiting so, we didn't have hang around for long. By the time we got to hat Yai airport, it was around 1pm. We basically had hours to kill before our flight, a long time in a small airport. We just chatted some more, admired our beautiful pictures and read till it was time to go back home.
