Railay Beach, Thailand
/(Dec 29th - Jan 1st, 2017)
On our last morning in Chiang Mai we had breakfast at Cafe Arte where we enjoyed some coffee and banana and peanut butter roti topped with chocolate and almonds (dessert for breakfast!). Then we packed up and headed to the airport to set out for our first beach destination: Railay Beach. Once we landed in Krabi, we took a long tail boat to Railay Beach which is a small peninsula between Krabi and Ao Nang. The small town is only accessible by boat due to the high limestone cliffs which cut off access to the mainland. The tide was low when we arrived, which made for an extra long walk to the shore and then to our hotel (with all our luggage in tow). Luckily we made it to Bhu Nga Thani Resort just in time before a crazy rainstorm began. It was raining sideways and was extremely windy so we waited it out with some lunch and tropical drinks. Once the skies finally cleared up, we headed out to the pool to relax the rest of the afternoon.
The next day, us girls immediately went to the pool after breakfast as we wanted to take advantage of all the relaxation, sun, and pool time we had left on our trip. The guys weren't as interested in laying out all day so they headed over to explore the West side of the island in the morning and then met back up with us a few hours later. In the afternoon Allen and I spent some time searching for fish in the ocean (one of his favorite vacation activities!). It takes a lot for me to get into the ocean (it has to be crystal clear and bath water warm) so Allen was very excited when I swam along with him. We only had one pair of goggles so he did all the diving and just pointed out the interesting fish he found.
We had been pretty spoiled with amazing culinary experiences throughout our trip, but didn't expect much from the food on Railay given how remote the town was. However, much to our surprise, we found an amazing Indian restaurant (Kohinoor Indian Restaurant) that had delicious, but very spicy food. I think we were all sweating by the time we left the restaurant, but were full and very happy with the meal.
On New Years Eve, Sam, Allen, and I headed back over to the beach to do some more swimming and relaxing on the beach. Erik was pretty burnt from the day before so he hung back to do some reading in the shade. We did some more relaxing by the pool and took advantage of the hotel's swim up bar. It was so nice to not have anything to do for a couple days after being on the go for so long. As much as Allen and I love to see as many things as possible when we travel, we always try to take a few days to relax and recharge. It might still be too much for some people, but provides a good balance for us. We had lunch at the same Indian restaurant as the night before and loved the food just as much as the first time. We ended our afternoon with some spa appointments (because in Thailand, why not?) and then got ready for the "big" New Years Eve party at our hotel. They had been setting up for the event for three days so it seemed like it was going to be an epic party...
We were welcomed with drinks, appetizers, and photos. There were lights and decorations everywhere and the dinner buffet was EXTENSIVE. There were performances scheduled throughout the night with everything from traditional Thai dancing to fire dancing. It was a unique experience, but not what we were expecting. The MC for the night received a lot of awkward silences as she asked extremely awkward/inappropriate questions to guests in an attempt to engage the crowd. People started leaving pretty quickly and we followed suit after a couple of hours. We bought a bottle of sparkling wine and some Chang beers on our way over to the West beach which was packed with tourists waiting to ring in the New Year. We heard that there was supposed to be a large firework show right off the beach so we found a place to sit and drink our wine and beers while we waited for midnight. There were several hotel parties happening on the beach that included live music and dancing so we enjoyed watching the celebrations all along the beach. Just minutes before midnight, it started pouring rain. Everyone ran for cover and the beach was completely empty in a matter of minutes. Being the true Pacific Northwesterners that we are, we took the opportunity to find a spot on the beach and just hid under our beach towels until the rain stopped. The rain stopped just in time for a countdown into the New Year. Hundreds of soaking wet tourists counted down the last seconds of 2016 together and watched exactly 1 firework go off...yep only 1. We waited around for another 15 minutes hoping there was going to be more, but no other fireworks ever went off. I don't know if the rain had anything to do with it, but needless to say, we were pretty underwhelmed. There were a few individuals on the beach that set off their own fireworks and we saw some Chinese lanterns floating about a mile away, but that was the extent of our New Years Eve show.
We made our way back to our hotel and took a nap for a few hours before waking up at 3am to attempt catching some of the UW Husky bowl game. We tried to connect to ESPN multiple different ways, but ended up only being able to stream the game on ESPN radio. We listened to the first half of the game, but given the local time time and the current score we called it a night at half time. We fell asleep dreaming of a Husky come back victory, but unfortunately woke up to an even worse final score.
We had one last breakfast (and lots of coffee) with our dear travel friends before we parted ways for the last portion of our trips. Allen and I caught a long tail boat out to a ferry that took us to our next beach destination: Koh Phi Phi.
