Technorati Tags: Cambodia, Hope, ICC, Killing Fields, Phnom Penh

Blog posts from Africa!

Check in later for blog posts from Africa! We will give you details about our trip with Drifters adventures that took us through four countries in the southern part of the continent. Highlights from Africa includes Cape of good hope, Cape Town, Victoria falls, deserts, safaris and of course the sand desert pictured above. We travelled with a group of crazy Norwegians, Danish and Swiss people, together with our African guide. One day when we woke up, it was an elephant next to our tent in the camp…!

Technorati Tags: africa, around the world trip, namibia, south-africa, zimbabwe

Blog posts from America!

Here we will publish photos and experiences from our trip to USA, Brazil and Argentina! Highlights from our trip includes the Iguacu falls, Buenos Aires, Copa America, Copacabana beach, Yosemite national park, New York, LA, San Francisco etc. We will also show you some stunning shots of Antelope canyon famous from National Geographics. In the meantime, enjoy two of the best things from my trip above!

Technorati Tags: argentina, around the world trip, brazil, grand canyon, usa

Siem Reap – Angkor temples and floating village

We arrived in Siem Reap in northern Cambodia, on Friday 25th of February. Siem Reap is first and foremost known as the location to explore the world heritage site of the Angkor area. We were picked up by the tuktuk driver Kevin at the airport. He was sent from Happy Guesthouse and became our tuktuk driver for the following three days. Happy Guesthouse was a pleasant experience with big rooms, good and very cheap food, delicious Mango Lassi, and the staff was so friendly and down to earth. They helped us with everything while we stayed at their guesthouse.

The next day we got up 5 am to see the sunrise at Angkor Wat. Disappointingly there was no spectacular sunrise; it only gradually lit up the sky. Together with 400 photographers we saw the temple become more and more visible from the lake side view. The temple was much impressive, even if we were a bit disappointed with the construction work that ruined the best photo opportunities with big green plastic covers. The details of the temple gave impressions of how the temple would shine back in its glory days, almost 1000 years ago. The reliefs showed daily life as well as the god-king and mythological creatures. However, time and wars have had its impact on the building and even though beautifully preserved, you can only imagine its stunning hay-days.

Following Angkor Wat, Kevin drove us to Bayon, famous for its giant stone faces. At the 37 towers of the temples, most have four faces carved into their stones. It is still a mystery who the face belongs to, even if some suggests it is a combination of Buddha and Jayavarman IIV, who was the greatest builder in the area and the god-king that had the temple constructed. Bas-reliefs on the temple shows everyday life from the period. The temple is located in the Angkor Thom area that used to inhabit more than one million people.

Another temple that much impressed was Ta Prohm, also called the “jungle temple” that has not been as restored to the degree of the other temples and looks much the same as when it was “discovered” by the French in the 19th century. With jungle overgrowth it creates a unique atmosphere of the wild and exotic past. As this is one of the main temples, and a rather small one, it was overcrowded with people. Also, the natural impact on the temple seemed limited as fences were put up on the most photographic sites.

Just when we thought the goodies were shown, Kevin took us to see many more temples that were less crowded the following day. The halls of Preah Khan is shaped like a sacred sword and used to have more than 1000 monks (see picture above). Just like many of the temples in the are, also this temple also had a university (see below). I think this temple was used for some scenes in Tomb Rider. Also largely un-restored, Banteay Kdei was impressive and looked much like Ta Prohm, only even better and far less crowded. About 37 kilometers from Siem Reap we also visited Banteay Srey who was described as a female temple due to its extensive decorations; the logic goes that only females would have patience to decorate so extensively).

Before bussing off to Phnom Penh we took a short boat trip through a floating village where the houses were standing on seven meter tall pillars, waiting for the water to rise. Also many houses were floating on the sea, even big buildings as schools and temples. As we went early in the morning we saw the daily life of the people in the village, consisting much of fishing, repairing boats and small boat markets. We also witnessed how three boats tried to pass a narrow point in the river at the same time, and it took about fifteen minutes to figure out that if they went one and one, they would be able to move on. This example is illustrative of the traffic (and maybe other parts of life) in Asia so far, it is less collaboration and more ego-driving, making it less efficient.

Overall, Siem Reap was terrific and a non-stop adventure. We left exhausted for Cambodia’s capital Phnom Penh to meet friends at ICC, partnering with Normisjon on development projects. Finally we put a picture of our driver Kevin taking a nap after driving us around the temple area, he was also exhausted at times!

Technorati Tags: Angkor Wat, Floating Village, Happy Guesthouse, Siem Reap, Ta Phrom

Kuala Lumpur

We arrived in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia on the 20th of February. We stayed at Transit Point Inn Bed & Breakfast that offered little more than a small window-less room and some slices of bread with peanut butter. The inn was located in Chinatown with bustling day and night life outside. Although we were warned that Chinatown was not the safest location downtown, we had no problems with anyone in the place.

First day we bought a 24-hour hop on and hop off ticket to explore main tourist attractions of the city. We visited many the main sights, including the Istana Negara (National Palace), Little India, Central Market, National Mosque, the National Museum, Merdeka Square (see picture above), St. Mary’s Church, National Art Gallery, KL Tower, Berjaya Times Square and Petronas Twin Towers.

The KL Tower reaches 421 meters above Kuala Lumpur. However the observation platform was only 276 meters above the ground. This makes up 2058 steps, so we bought a ticket for the elevators. We just got at the top in time to catch the sunset on film. The sights of the city even improved after sunset when all the lights were lit around the city. The main photographic scene from the KL Tower is the Petronas Twin Towers that are only a short distance away.

Next day we went to the Berjaya Times Square which is a big shopping mall, including food court, cinema complexes, and an indoor theme park. First we went to the food court and had some terrible lunch. To pick the lunch ourselves was horrible idea and we ate less than half of it. Then we went to the theme park, had some sugar spin and took carousels until Helene got sick. The rollercoaster passed some of the restaurants in the shopping mall and Asian girls were screaming like crazy. We then relaxed in the bumping cars for a couple of hours making rivals too some small Malaysian girls. Later we went to the cinema and watched Sanctum in 3D which was very claustrophobic.

Next day we met Claire (an old study friend of Helge) and Billy, one of her friends, at Starbucks close to a park near the nice Petronas Twin Towers. This is the largest twin towers in the world, and are famous from among other things, the movie Entrapment (1999). We had coffee, talked about new and old times. Later they took us to one of the hawker food streets in the capital that is one of the recommended places to eat. Here we were surrounded by waitresses from different restaurants, each with their own set of menu to choose from. Having problems selecting food from one menu it was hard with eight, and also they were waiting and trying to tell you what to choose. Quite confusing but our friends were helpful and eventually we ended up with a nice variety of tasty food. Especially the satay with peanut sauce was delicious. We had a very good time before they drove us back to our inn late that evening.

We also visited the National Museum where they displayed the history of Malaysia in pictures, dolls, arecheological findings, movies and other things. There was a big exhibition of football since Malaysia had won the South East Asia Football cup this year, congratulations! We learned a lot about the country history tracing back to the stone age, and how religion and ethnic diversity has impacted the country for almost 10 000 years. Below is a picture of the figures that discuss whether to adopt Islamic religion in the Malacca port city in the middle of last millennium.

About scam, a couple of Malaysia people wanted money for small favors, even if they do it on their own initiative. This happened both on the way to the hostel, and also after buying a bus ticket for the hop on and hop off bus. For example, at the bus station, we talked to a man selling bus tickets before walking to a restaurant. When we got back to buy tickets he was not there, and we bought from a second man. While waiting for the bus the first man came back and was angry because he did not get any provision from our tickets, so he asked us to pay him provisional fee. We thought this ridiculous but said politely “no”.

The rest of our time in KL was spent around the area the China Town, relaxing and looking for good restaurants. Overall we had a good time in the city but were glad to fly on to Cambodia at night on the 25th of February with budget airline company Air Asia. Finally we will share a picture with you of the old train station in Kuala Lumpur that is remarkable for its unique architectural design. Thank you for reading our blog post!

Technorati Tags: Backpacker, Berjaya Times Square, KL Tower, Kuala Lumpur, Petronas Twin Towers

Cameron Highland – Rafflesia, tea plantation and smokehouse

Cameron Highland has been one of the highlights of our trip this far. We arrived on 17 Feb and stayed at Father’s Guesthouse for three days. The guesthouse was very nice with a beautiful garden and a nice view of the valley. Rooms were clean and reasonably cheap, fitting our standards. We only missed a window as the view in this area is nice and this is definitely a place you want to wake up to rays of sunlight through your window.

Coming up to the highlands after island jumping for over a month provided a fresh breath with relaxed surroundings. The temperature was pleasant like a Norwegian late spring and the nature can only be described in one word: amazing, absolutely amazing. Valleys and mountains covered with green tea plantations and a stunning horizon make the scenery in Cameron Highland. Only some ugly farmer shacks along the main road (also called strawberry plantations) put some limit to the beauty of the valleys.

First day in Cameron Highland was spent on a short trip in the forest ending up at a strawberry plantation where we had some delicious strawberry deserts. Along the way we passed Cameron Highland golf field that is a place you definitely want to bring your gulf clubs if you have a set. The strawberry farms are not like Norwegian farms where you have the berries planted in the ground and reap the berries in the summer. These farms have berries planted in pots that look to be fertilized with high technology combining chemicals and electric stimuli. The view thus is of a lot of plastic, but you can still taste nice strawberry products!

Second day we went on a full day tour with Unseen Travel. First we were to look at the world’s biggest flower, the Rafflesia, see a local village and try a blow pipe, then visit tea plantation, another strawberry farm and the butterfly farm. We also visited a waterfall as you can see below. The water here was brown and the locals call it “teh peng” which means tea with milk.

First stop was the local village tribe. This may sound exotic but the people there behaved and dressed more like ordinary people you meet on the street. The government had asked them to come out of the jungle and was now building free brick houses for them to live in. However, many of the tribe people had left the village and went back into the jungle as they had a hard time adapt to a life dependent on money and business traditions. Also, as they traditionally were building bamboo houses, they were skeptical about quality of the brick houses as they were not familiar with the material.

In the village we had a demonstration of their blow pipe tradition that used to be a weapon for hunting animals. Now it is rarely used, except for some older people that preserve the tribe tradition. The blow arrow from the pipe could go quite a distance and was silent, making it ideal for sneaking up on the animals. When hunting the village people also went barefoot and were used to endure much pain when walking. A picture of the blowpipe demonstration will come later!

To see the Rafflesia flower we had to go deep into the jungle. First we had quite a long drive to the jungle. The road into the jungle was bumpy and extremely muddy with steep falls on the road side. After we had driven as far as possible, we continued the tour on foot in the dense jungle. We passed waterfalls, interesting bugs and plants on our way. After an hour of walking we finally encountered the Rafflesia flower. It was only one blooming in the area, which is normal. The flower grows in three years but only blooms for one week. Then it will die and never return to the same place.

On the way back to the car it was possible to take a bath in one of the waterfalls. Helge bravely jumped in first. When we got back someone had stolen the car keys and we spent the next couple of hours walking and waiting for a new car. After couple of hours our guide was able to retrieve his car keys and we left for the spectacular tea plantation.

The view of the tea-valley was amazing and enjoying fresh local breakfast- and afternoon tea at the plantation’s terrace has been an overall a trip highlight so far. We also bought some tea to bring home. Our guide taught us about tea farming and how they harvest the leaves every a month. Today harvesting is done by hand held machines as a labor shortage in the agricultural industry has called for modernization.

In the afternoon we had a stop at the butterfly farm where quite a high number of more or less alive butterflies were supposed to be the main attraction. However, we found it more interesting to have a look in the reptile section where we were presented with a bunch of ugly and scary bugs and reptiles. Helen was the lucky one to touch and hold many of the small monsters, among others the little scorpion cutie. A scorpion sting is supposed to be about ten times the effect of bee, but the small scorpions are more poisonous. At the visit we just had to take the guide’s word for it when he said the reptiles would not harm us. Luckily he was telling the truth.

The Smokehouse is a small hotel in Cameron Highland, famous for its old English colonial style. Both the interior and the garden are thoroughly decorated with old English furniture. In fact, much of the interior furniture are antiques imported from England. Needless to say, Helene went bananas with the camera in the old house; she simply fell in love with the place. We ordered the Smoke House special tea accompanied by homemade scones, cream and strawberry jam. It was delicious. Below Helene has added some pictures for you to see!

On the third day, at about one o’clock we left Cameron Highland for a boat trip to Kuala Lumpur; a five hour drive to the capital of Malaysia.

Technorati Tags: Cameron Highlands, Rafflesia, Scorpion, Smoke House, Tea Plantation

The architecture and temples of Penang/ Georgetown

We arrived at Georgetown february 14 after a three hour boat trip from Langkawi. Georgetown is the third largets city in Malaysia with 600 000 inhabitants and is located on the island of Penang. Above you can see the Victoria Bell Tower that symbolizes the founding of the city when the British East India Company colonized the island in 1786. Overcharging taxi drivers met us at the ferry station and took us to the guesthouse Hutton Lodge. The guest house was centrally placed in the city and only a few minutes’ walk from the main tourist attractions.

Georgetown is mainly recognized for its diverse cultures mixed together and shaping in the city’s architectural landscape. UNESCO made the city itself a world heritage site in 2008. From the colonial era to modern day, Chinese, Malay and Indian people have lived side by side with westerners. Churches, mosques, Buddhist and Hindu temples are erected just a few blocks away from each other. It is good to see that people with differing ideologies have coexisted for centuries in this now prospering city.

The first day in Georgetown we spent our time exploring the historical buildings. We got a map at a tourist offices that made it easy to walk from one historical building to the next, and gave some information about each place. Generally, the most well-known buildings are from the colonial period when the British East India Company controlled Penang. The heritage from this period is concentrated in the old town which makes it easy to explore. We visited many of the buildings including Fort Cornwall, the Parliament building, the Victoria Clock and the national museum. However, a few places left a stronger impression than others.

Of all the places we saw in the city, the one that made most impression was a small old church yard from the 18th century. The atmosphere was much unique, and it felt almost like walking and breathing in history. There were no flowers at the tombs, but nature had decorated the place with wildly growing green landscape covering weary tomb stones. When we bowed down to read the inscriptions we learned the lives of people living centuries before us. We red about women who have lost their children way too early of diseases easily cured today, people dying for their faith or murdered by bandits on their travel. We learn about their dreams, their visions and their hope. The place holds a mysterious peace and describes vulnerable lives in an eternal perspective.

Another place of interest was the Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion that has been become a UNESCO world heritage site. The house is over hundred years old and used to be light blue, but is now painted strikingly blue for marketing purposes. It used to belong to an old Chinese business man who also bought the building on the other side of the road to make sure no one blocked his view. The house has a Chinese architecture using natural elements in the design and has hidden secrets everywhere that brings meaning to the building. For example, hundreds of tiles in the entrance hall seems to be perfectly following a pattern. However if you look closely you will see that a few of the thousands of bricks are purposely placed the wrong way symbolizing that nobody is perfect and it is human to make mistakes. The building is technologically advanced, for example are water pipes in the walls designed to cool down the house and the pool in the open area of the house is skewed with asymmetrical spill pipes that makes the water circulate. In a world where energy efficiency is on the agenda, the house has served as a role model for energy sustainable households.

For our second day we visited the Snake Temple on the island after seeing spectacular images on google of snakes snaking their way around alters and wall paintings. However, when we got there this happened only in a little room where they charged for photographs. In the temple itself there were no snakes at all! But in a small garden area outside we spotted four of them lazily sleeping in the trees. Since we had taken the trip so far we went to the snake farm located beside the temple area where they had a ten-meter Python snake weighing more than 200 kg. Luckily they kept it in a cage. However, a eight-meter golden Python was let out of its cage and snaked its way around on the ground. Helene was eager to take photographs and Helge was a bit scared. Including tenths of deadly snakes they also had monkeys, turtles and other reptiles. If you come in the weekend you may see snake feeding when they throw living chickens into the Python cages! You may think this is not so freiendly to the chickens, but we were glad that the snakes were full when we visited.

At our last night in Peneng, we visited the Kek Lok Si Temple which was a spectacular view in the evening when thousands of lamps lit up the place. With the occasion Chinese New Year, they had for a fifteen day period put all their bulbs on to create stunning visions. Hundreds of people came there just to take their picture. When they turned on the lights, the temple looked less temple and more like a spectacle and it was both and pretty, cozy and romantic to walk around.

Mostly, people in Penang was helpful and friendly with a few exceptions. Of course, we will spend the paragraph on the exceptions! For example, the first day, Helge was standing waiting for Helene beside Fort Cornwall as she took her time taking photographs. Twenty meters away there was a taxi stand and suddenly one of the Indian drivers came over and started to talk. Helge was a bit annoyed because after one month in Asia he does not like taxi drivers very much. Anyway, he tried be friendly as the driver was just doing his job. The taxi driver asked where we were going, which was about one kilometer away. The taxi driver said he will take us there, but Helge first asked for the price. The price turned out to be too much that we bothered to take the taxi. Helge said no thank you to the driver! Then the taxi driver became very angry and rude telling us we had wasted his time, and that now we would have to pay anyway regardless of taking the taxi or not. He was yelling at us. Helge became furious but managed to walk away before exploding. He did not want to talk to the taxi driver in the first place. We just walk away from mr. taxi taxi as we didn’t wanted to listen to his crap. 

If you not are not coming for the beaches at Penang, then two days is enough on the island. It is also good for shopping. You can go on an organized tour, but it is also easy to look around on your own with the busses on the island. From Penang we took the five hour drive to Cameron highland (next!).

Technorati Tags: backpacking, Georgetown, Kek Lok Si, Penang, Snaketemple

Blog post from Langkawi

Langkawi is our first stop in Malaysia as we have now left Thailand after nearly a month travelling from Bangkok to Koh Lanta. We arrived in Langkawi, officially known as Langkawi; the jewel of Kedah, on the 10th of February 2010. Langkawi is a beautiful island located on the west coast of Malayasia. It is quite big and offers nice water sports as well as eco-tourism. It is quite tranquil compared to many of Thailand’s islands and more modernized and developed. This is also reflected in the tourist attractions and transport possibilities. It is currently a tax free island so many products that tend to be hugely taxed are very cheap. The first thing you see when taking the boat to Langkawi is the big eagle watching over the harbor. The eagle represents the island and Langkawi means reddish brown eagle. Travelling the island you will see a lot of eagles soaring in the skies.

We stayed at Zackry’s guest house that has a nice relaxed feel to it with lots of friendly faces. The standard is quite average for a hostel, but free tea and a self-service mini-bar fridge by the pool is nice additions. You can rent fairly good automatic gear scooters at the place which is nice to travel around the island for about 30 ringgit, see below.

There are a couple of “must sees” on the island, for example the cable car (see picture) is very nice and a lot scarier to ride when you travel upward the hill than watching from below. However, once you are in there is no way out and you are destined for a fantastic hill view of jungle, beaches and endless sea if you make it to the top. If you go after dark, you will in addition to the small city lights see the spectacular lights from all the boats that have anchored around the island.

Exploring the island on a motor bike is also very nice and the wind made up from the speed helps cooling down the warm body. We visited Masuri Mausoleum which is a small historical museum built around the legend of Masuri who was a woman so beautiful that her mother in law had her killed due to envy of her beauty. You can read the more about the legend here. At the mausoleum you learn the history behind the curse of the island, as well as exploring living in the 1800s Malaysia and see a nice bird park. It is a nice place to spend an hour or two.

If you have any interest in agriculture or heritage living, you should also have a guided tour at the rice museum where you get to know how rice, the most basic food for most of the world population, has been farmed for centuries and been a main way of living in the past. Make sure to have the guide as it will make it much more interesting. They also have a variety of plants where you can taste and smell the leaves of Oregano, Aloe Vera, several types of ginger, Timian and a lot more. We also saw how they make coconut milk, learnt the difference of male and female coconuts and tasted freshly made cocos.

We drove to the north coast of the island that is really a hidden gem compared to the touristy south. Watching sunset on the northern beaches is really amazing and you can have the beach more or less for yourself. Unfortunately we did this on the last day of our stay at Langkawi, and if we had more time, we would go back.

A last must do thing is to do water sports on the island as this is cheap. We went for a jet-ski ride whichwas much fun and went incredibly fast. We didn’t do this, but you can go on jet-ski ride half day tours to the islands surrounding Langkawi.

The variety of activities at Langkawi combined with great beaches, the city of Kuah and the jungle forest makes up a good holiday and you can easily relax for a fortnight without being bored. We had a great time and would love to go back. Together with Koh Lanta this was our favorite island for our island hopping tour. From here we will travel inward in Malaysia after almost a month of beach life.

Technorati Tags: around the world trip, Langkawi, Mahsuri, Malaysia, Water Sports

Blog Post from Koh Lanta

Koh Lanta turned out to be our favorite island in Thailand for many reasons; both the nature with the stunning beaches and the relaxed vibe of the island makes it a fantastic place for a holiday. The size of the island is big also enough to cope well with the tourists and you meet great local people that are friendly during the holiday. Initially we planned on staying for three days, but ended up staying three more days because we enjoyed ourselves so much.

It is a lot to do on the island, you can visit the incredibly cozy old town, gypsee village, tourist market at the pier, the national park with lighthouse, jungle and monkeys, and lots of great and not crowded beaches. It is a bit like Koh Phangan except everything is better, including the roads, beaches and attractions. Maybe not as famous as Phi Phi and Phuket, the island actually rated the best place for couples and families by Thailand’s tourist information bureau.

You need a scooter to get around on the island, so drive safely. However, there is less traffic on these roads compared to some of the other islands. Also, the drive is nicer since you often ride close to the beach with beautiful views. You can also meet elephants and monkeys along the road if lucky.

The first days at Koh Lanta we did some beach hopping. The beach at our resort wasn’t that nice for swimming due to rocks in the water, so it was better to go somewhere else. It was so hot that during daytime it was the only place to stay. The perfect beach spot is below a fairly big tree that will provide some shadow to rest in.

When not at the beach we explored the island and went to the national park that is accessible on the southern tip of the island. This is the only place where roads are not so good, but they are still better than the Koh Phangan muddy roads. At the national park we saw hundreds of small crabs running on the beaches. At the light house we had a rest with the breeze coming in to cool us down.

We also went for a long tale snorkeling and island boat trip that was fantastic including more variety of fishes, Emerald Cave exploration, observing hundreds of bats sleeping by the mountain, and lunch at the best beach we have seen so far. Entering the cave was quite dark and claustrophobic but coming out on the other side was a spectacular experience with a secret beach surrounded by tall mountain walls (picture below is the view you get when laying down on the beach area inside the cave).

The long-tail boats are nice to travel by and costs about half of what you pay to travel the speed boats.
At the pier there are lots of tourist shops where with local art. Some of the shops have prices on their items, but you are still expected to bargain on them, as this is a sort of game they like to play. It is a nice place to shop for souvenirs as some of the shops are quite big and well organized. The picture below is from a resturant at the pier.

Technorati Tags: Koh Lanta, Koh Lanta Bats, Koh Lanta Boat Trip, Koh Lanta Caves, Thailand

Blog post from Koh Phi Phi

Koh Phi Phi, or Phi Phi islands were our next stop from the Krabi area. The Phi Phi islands are in fact two islands. The first is Phi Phi Leh which is a national park that is famous from the scenary in the movie The Beach. There are no resorts or shops on the island (except for a small restaurant) but you can sleep over in tents at Maya Bay if you want to get close to nature. Phi Phi Don is more or less a tourist island with night clubs, restaurants and tourist shops. Both islands have good beaches; however, the tidal water makes it best to tan and swim in the morning. There are no real road and no traffic. However, the islands are small so it is easy to walk around and find your way.

We stayed at Amadan Beach Resort which is the best resort we have stayed at this far. The lady boys in the reception were helpful, breakfast was included and it was a clean and nice area. This was probably a more up market area and most of the backpackers stayed in the down town district. We stayed on the island for three days, and if your goal for a visit is more experience than partying this is sufficient to see most of the attractions.

The Phi Phi islands are very good for snorkeling so we went on an island/ snorkeling day trip with a long tail boat organized by our resort area. It was a terrific tour that brought us close up on all types of fishes and underwater life around many of the islands. It is a variety of life, in both colors and sizes below the water and you easily spot lots of fishes and plants. We stopped at Mosqiuto island, Bamboo island and Maya Bay at Phi Phi Leh. At monkey beach we say monkeys, and since it was the first time on our trip we thought it was very cool. Helge also stepped on Kråkebolle so we had a painful experience with a tweezer when we got home.

We also had a walk in the jungle in hunt for the viewpoints of the island. Unfortunately took the wrong way and walked for about two hours in the warm and humid forest. From three different viewpoints we could see the island from above. However, we stumpled upon some butterfly swarms that were beatiful (see picture below). On our way down we met a lot of monkeys, and one of the monkey kids we fed with some leftover fruits from our juice. It seemed to enjoy it and tried to communicate that it wanted more.

Allover Phi Phi is a very nice island, but except for the beautiful nature, you don’t feel that you are that far away from home, as it is more Scandinavians than local people on the island and there are few shops and attractions that are aimed at the tourist market. With the small size of Phi Phi Leh, it seems to be tourists everywhere you go. This is of course good if you want to meet people and there are lots of restaurants and bars to chill at; we recommend Papaya where you get Thailand’s biggest potions and reat food, but there are also many good Italian restaurants. Still we liked it better than Koh Samui and would recommend everyone with a tighter schedule to go straight to the Andaman coast for visiting Koh Phi Phi, Koh Lanta and Koh Lipe.

Technorati Tags: Koh Phi Phi, Phi Phi Island, Phi Phi Snorkelig, Phi Phi tourism