Diving and Rock Climbing

the next morning we got up at 6am and headed to Adventure dive shop where we grabbed a quick breakfast and Cody, Katherine, and I met up with our fellow divers for the day. We were the first dive group to the pier and we headed out to bin dai or something like that which was about a 20 minute boat ride. Basically they just gave Cody a personal instructor which was clutch, and Katherine and I were with these two other guys lead buy another divemaster. We hopped in and immediately i could see that the Andaman Sea was tons better than diving up by Ko Pha Ngan! I saw and followed a huge sea turtle for about 10 minutes. this thing was big, and he just didnt mind me at all, that was really cool. Saw a sea horse which was yellow and had a buddy. Saw some weird crab thing that was supposed to be important but i didnt understand the handsign, haha. real student of the game here. I even got so see a shark, but only for a second as it swooped away. I think scuba is a great recharge and it is so awesome just being that far underwater and exploring all the coral and fish and anemones. As for Cody, who had never done any scuba in his life, they had him watch a 20 minute video and they just tossed him in, hahaha. His instructor was really cool and they had a blast. We all saw this jellyfish get torn apart by some fish which was nuts. All in all, scuba diving is addictive as hell and the folks that take you do it everyday of their lives so they obviously love it.

We grabbed some food and chilled out on the beach and discussed our next move over a chang and a sunset. Decided to head to Railay beach for climbing the next day and that was a good call. WE just zonked out when we got to our hotel. I actually used the recomendations that i had gotten about the area this time which was much smarter. we stayed in Ao Nang at a place called Andaman and it was nice, plush, and cheap as hell. there was a sauna(like you need that, just step outside), full weight room and workout area and the lady who ran it was really nice and quite small even for a thai gal.

Woke up around 7 the next morning and rolled over to Railay by longtail boat. Definitely think we did railay better this time. we got a rec for a good climbing company and headed directly over to the cliff. So basically this is how it works. You get your equipment and get to the climb site. then you look up and are like which of these do you think i can do, crazy thai nutcase. the dudes are little pros and they teach you how to tie the knots and everything and you proceed to chalk up and get ready. As they belay you you just grapple your way up this ridiculous cliff. there were like 6 climbs you could do there and we did the 4 hardest. The hardest one we did was a 6a or b, whatever that means, and it consisted of us climbing 30 meters, like 90 ft, up the limestone until there is this one part where there are basically no holds at all. you just kind of jump and use your feet a lot. it was hard, but definitely nothing upside down or anything. When you get to the top and look back over your shoulder you see so far across the see and the other islands that you are like, damn i am really really high right now! Then you are glad that a little thai guy about half your weight is waiting to have you come on down. Rock climbing was great for so many reasons. First off you get an amazing work out and you use muscles you dont usually use. You get to hang out with people who are in ridiculous shape and jave been tons of cool places. And you get so look down on the area you are hanging out in to see the lay of the land. It was a great experience and I will definitely do it again. I will say though that after 4 hours of climbing we were dead tired.

Checked out Tonsai beach and had some Tom Yam Kung there, which is spicy prawn soup with vegetables etc, and chilled out there for a bit. While waiting for our longtail boat to have enough people to go back to Ao Nang, I played the Thai version of hacky sack. They use a really hard wooden ball that is a little bigger than a softball but thatched with wood or bamboo or something, definitely not as comfortable as a hackysack. I had a blast and held my own with the locals. We got back to Ao Nang and we took showers and headed out.

So i had told Cody how good the indian food here was so we found an indian place and sat down. Holy hell this butter chicken was amazing. We were both just eating like wild animals after having climbed so much. We had garlic naan, cucumber yogurt, i had Butter chicken, and Cody had Chicken Vindaloo. Great food. We went out to an irish pub wehre the guy couldnt finish a damn song so we switched to chang bar and played pool with other travelers.

Next day took the bus to Phuket and grabbed indian food again and went out and then this morning Cody left on his flight. Apparently the market is picking up so I have to kind of decide if I am going to ignore it, buy a computer here, or fly back to trade. Full moon party is in 7 days...