Beaches, hikes, sunsets and some pretty shoddy tours - welcome to Koh Phi Phi, the surrounding islands and all they have to offer.

After our stint in Phuket Old Town, it was time to depart, and get a speedboat over to Koh Phi Phi. This seemed like a much better option than the four-hour long ferry, as it only took one hour, but honestly it was the worst. This is completely my own opinion, and I think it's important to note that I do generally get seasick, but my god. We were packed in like sardines, and it was absolutely red hot with no AC. Due to the speed in which we were travelling, we were bouncing over the waves like madmen and I was just praying I wasn't going to be THAT person who spews on board with everyone watching. Thankfully, we made it to the gorgeous shore of Phi Phi. The walk to the hotel was a challenge, as the sun blazed down on us and we were harassed by what felt like 3000 people selling tours, boat trips, massages and whatever else. It was all white noise to me as I was still focusing heavily on not immediately barfing upon arrival!

Anyway, we got to our hotel which was tucked so perfectly away from the madness by the port, and had the cutest little bar outside overlooking the beach. Our bedding, on the other hand, was questionable… a Chelsea F.C throw on each of the single beds that were pushed together to make a double. Thank god we weren't on our honeymoon - that'd have been a right mood killer!

I know everyone says Phi Phi is just a massive touristy, party island, and it definitely can be that if you want it to be, but we found it to be so much more peaceful than the reviews. Maybe that's due to the location of our hotel, and the quietness of the little beach area on our doorstep, I'm not sure. There were bars and restaurants all along the beach front, so you were guaranteed to see a good sunset, and many of them had impressive fire shows every night.

The island has a few viewpoints you can walk to. We went to viewpoints 1, 2 and 3 over the course of our stay, but on the first walk up there, we made it to viewpoint 1, and on the way to viewpoint 2, we saw a sign for “Bob Bar”. Given that cannabis was legalised only a year ago in Thailand, many of the locals have turned into Bob Marley obsessed, weed smoking hippies! So, we knew by the name that this would be some kind of Reggae Bar and we decided to check it out. We were right. The bar was situated on the side of the hill facing the sunset, hammocks hung in the trees around the bar, and there were tables and chairs in all shapes and sizes all over the inside and outside space. It was beautiful. We sat in the sun listening to the music with a few beers and just thought “this is a bit of us”.

We watched the sun go down from the bar, and with the last bit of light in the sky, finished the walk up to viewpoint 2. It was a much clearer view of the island than viewpoint 1, with it being higher up, but it was pretty crowded as everyone had gone up there to watch the sunset. With that, we headed back down the million steps and went for some dinner.

Walking around the island, we ignored most of the advertised tours until we saw “Jungle Trek”. We were immediately interested, as our minds rushed back to the memories of trekking through the jungle in Borneo with Joe. We went to the counter to find out more and we were told that we'd be going to viewpoints 1, 2 and 3, trekking through a jungle and likely seeing a load of animals (especially monkeys), visiting a local village, swimming in the sea at a remote beach with cocktails, then snorkelling with bioluminescent plankton! We'd be starting at 2pm and getting back at 8pm. Of course, we loved the sound of it and booked onto the tour.

Keeping in mind that viewpoints 1 and 2 were about a 15 minute walk from each other, I didn't feel the need for a half an hour rest at each place. Granted, the hike up to the first viewpoint is challenging so a short break there was definitely necessary, but another half an hour at the next viewpoint seemed a little excessive.

Anyway, after all the viewpoints, it was finally time to get into the highly anticipated jungle! Now, call me dramatic, but when I heard “Jungle Trek”, I imagined that out of the 6 hours we were there, we'd spend more than 45 minutes in the actual jungle!! The guide, a French ex-pat, seemed terrified at the thought of seeing a monkey and had brought a water pistol and a catapult as his weapons of choice. Thinking back to Joe in Borneo, this was laughable.

We marched on (quite literally, as the guide was trying to get out of the jungle as quick as possible), and came out the other side into the local village we were also excited about. Cut to disappointment number two. Our time here was spent sitting outside of a corner shop while the guide stocked up on the ready-mixed cocktail cans (queue disappointment number three), and decanted them into his flasks. Another half an hour went by, and on we went for the walk to the remote beach… we finally got there and it was pretty nice.

The sun was about to go down, and we'd brought our snorkels so we could escape the group and explore the underwater world in this new bit of sea. Our guide hollered at us to get out of the sea after about an hour, and when we got over to him, we realised it was **cocktail time**. Plastic cups and ready-mixed cocktail from the shop up the road… what in the 16 year old’s Friday night on a park bench was this?! Anyway, after two small cups each, he'd ran out annnnd the heavens opened. Still wet from the sea, a bit chilly because the sun had set, and now being soaked by the heavy downpour, we all huddled into a cave to sit for the next hour and a half while we waited for the boat to pick us up and take us snorkelling with the bioluminescent fish.

The conversation had run pretty dry by this point and we were all just a bit miserable. There was no point putting our dry clothes on, because we were going to go snorkelling, but at the same time, we were just sitting damp and cold. Finally, the boat came and we dragged ourselves, and our last glimmer of hope for this trip, over towards it. The boat drove for a solid minute and a half, two minutes at a push, before stopping at a cliff that I could have bloody swam to, if I'd known that's where we were going! We plummeted into the water and to be fair, there were some glowing plankton knocking around. This was probably the highlight. Treading water in the dark, face under water and seeing some twinkling lights. This… was the highlight… of the JUNGLE trek.

Thankfully, we were heading back to Koh Phi Phi and I couldn't wait to just have a warm shower, get changed and go out for the evening and reminisce about wtf just happened today! In true jungle trek tour fashion, we were ejected from the boat about 30m from the shore, where we waded our sorry arses and belongings towards the sand, leaving a trail of water droplets all the way through the town centre and back to our hotel.

Koh Phi Phi does have a wild side that’s full of drunken tourists on their gap year, and we decided to visit the strip one night and see what all the fuss was about. Feeling like village elders, we went to the first bar on the strip. The only other group in there consisted of four obnoxious lads from Germany trying to show off at pool, but they were rubbish. We drank up and headed for the next place. A vibrant little sports bar in the middle of the strip where most people were lining their stomachs with pizza before the wild night ahead, but we got ourselves a window seat and had a few cocktails as we watched as the tourists who went from tipsy to wasted and drastically less clothed. Finally, it was time to pay a visit to the Reggae Bar, where drunken tourists swing punches at each other in a Thai Boxing ring, in an attempt to win some free beer (just what they need!) It was every bit as wild as it sounds. Friends of the drunken nominees in the ring, screaming and cheering them on, shots being knocked back and a room full of people anticipating each winner. We had a great laugh, to be fair, but given that the average age of everyone in there was probably 21 and they were gravely unwell, we bid the venue farewell and moved swiftly on. The rest of the night was a bit hazy, but it was a lot of fun anyway.

After many mixed feelings and some weird experiences, we were ready to leave Koh Phi Phi behind, and head for Ao Nang. Ao Nang is a small, beach-side town in the district of Krabi, and has a few strips with shops, restaurants and bars. It was a lot quieter than Koh Phi Phi, and didn’t have too much going on, but it was great to just perch ourselves in a bar and watch the world go by. One visit worth noting, that we didn’t know about before, was the Mountain Buddha Temple. We went there, without any expectations, as we just wanted to walk out of town and see more of the area. It was amazing! The details and the paintwork of the temple, and the steps up to it, were excellent! To get to the top of it, the 140 steps are so steep, I had to hold the banister most of the way up! The view from the top though, wow. You could see for miles! Right over the edge of the town and into the surrounding cliffs and mountains in the distance.

During our stay, we ate a few times at a gorgeous restaurant called Plant-Erian. It was a bit out of town, but closer to our hotel than the town was, and it had some of the most delicious vegan meals we’d eaten in months! We tried so many things on the menu and were never disappointed! There’s a nice mix of Asian and Western dishes, and I’d definitely recommend going there if you’re ever in Ao Nang, and want a good, hearty feed. Another delicious place was an Indian restaurant called Little Govinda’s. Both the food, and the service, were spot on, and I’d recommend it to anyone who loves authentic Indian food.

We’d been umming and arring about whether or not to go on a Longtail boat, given my sea-sickness, and the quality of the tour in Phi Phi that we were still getting over… but there wasn’t much else to do in Ao Nang, and we did want to visit some other islands and do a bit more snorkelling… So we booked. One full day on a private longtail boat, where the driver will take us wherever we want, spend however long we want there and come back before dark. Amazing! I’d seen loads of TikTok videos of people doing this and some were saying it was the best thing they’d done in Thailand! We were so excited! The videos showed lovely picnic hampers at the front of the boat with delicious fruits and drinks laid out beautifully, cushions and blankets draped all over the deck to sit/lie on, and stunning scenery in the background.

Well… The scenery was there. But the boat… a virtually paintless brown wooden boat with no cushions or anywhere on the deck to really sit comfortably, and a boat driver who told us exactly what route we were doing. We didn’t know the islands, so who were we to argue?

We went to Railay Beach first… the place we saw ourselves doing last as there are a few bars on there and thought it’d be a nice way to spend the evening… but no, we went there while everyone from the resorts were out eating breakfast. We went for a swim anyway and snorkelled around the bay. Not much in the way of fish, we thought we’d call this one in early and head back to the boat. We’d taken a picture of the boat, as it was one of about a hundred lined up on the shore, and noted a café it was in-line with, so we were pretty confident we’d find it. We couldn’t. The instructions weren’t clear, thinking back, because the woman who sold us the tour said we’d be dropped off at one beach whereas he dropped us off at the one on the other side of the bay. We thought there’d probably been a miscommunication, so we walked over to the other beach. Nope, not there either. We didn’t have his phone number so I sent a message to the woman who’d sold us the tour and asked her where we should be. She didn’t open the message. Feeling fed up, we walked back to the original beach and thought we’d just wait there. Who did we see waving at us from across the sand? Our driver! He’d been fishing. Fishing!! I’m all for the drivers doing what they like while we’re galivanting off on the islands, but please at least communicate, so we know what time to meet, and where!

He didn’t say anything about it, and we went off to the next island. Poda Island. There was nothing on Poda Island, so we just basked in the sun on the sand with a beer, and watched a family having a full-on photo shoot in the sea. It was nice and relaxing, and we could see our driver (thankfully) fishing off the side of his boat, so we were feeling calm. We told the driver we wanted to do more snorkelling, so he drove us out to a good snorkelling spot (and fishing spot for him), and the coral reefs and tropical fish were in abundance!! We saw so many! It was truly magical, as we swam around pointing out new fish we hadn’t seen before, and practicing diving further towards the seabed. Next on the list was Chicken Island (because it looks like a chicken – kind of). This wasn’t an island we could walk around on, but we could snorkel around it and we found even more beautiful fish and corals there. You can guess what the driver was doing by now. Finally, we went to our final islands: Mor & Tub Islands. These were fairly quiet and had some lovely pristine beaches on them. We sat by the rockpools, watching crabs go in and out of their nooks, and enjoyed the last stop. Overall, I’d say this was a good activity to do because we got to visit a few islands and spend a lot of time snorkelling – which was the main goal – I’d just recommend spending a bit more time choosing the tour you go with, and making sure it does meet your expectations.