Continued from Part 1

We headed to the Muslim floating village. The village is attached to an island rock with the village mosque and graveyard on the island (that is on lad), the rest of the village is on stilts - the houses, the school, the restaurants, the shopping area and all!

Approaching the Floating Village

Nearing the Village

The walkway to the restaurants is also on stilts

Having lunch with our newly made friends.

The Village School Playground, built over water

Houses on stilts.

The floating shopping street. You can see water from the little gaps on the ‘road’ sides.

Beautiful views of the bay seen all the way from the boat.

We moved onwards to a lovely spot in the ocean where a huge liner was anchored in the middle of nowhere and served a rental shop for canoes. We climbed into the huge ship, wore our life jackets and stepped onto the sea canoes, agreeing to click each other’s pictures and email them as it was impossible to click our own.

 

Yes, we went in there! had to lie down within the canoe to pass.

And in there too!

Looking back on others following where we came from.

Got to see this above as in many places - mesmerizing!

We were served a refreshing cold drink on the ship after the canoeing.

 

Leaving the lovely bay behind as we came back in the boat

Captain Sanika at the wheel

 This was a memorable day indeed! We came back to the hotel. Sanika was so tired, she slept at 5 in the evening and woke up the next day! Leaving Phuket the next day seemed even more diffcult after this wonderful experience. On to Bangkok now!

The 4th day promised so much and we were not disappointed at all. We sailed again with Simba Sea Trips - this time to the Phang Nga Bay (pronounced Pang Na) bay and had an extremely adventurous day. We were picked up from the hotel and transferred to Royal Phuket Marin from where the tour began. We sailed over the lovely green water, explored two caves on foot, visited James Bond Island, had lunch at the Floating village followed by a tour of the village, explored caves in canoes and saw breath-taking picture-postacard views throughout the day.

 

Breakfast on the boat

  

The first cave - Mangrove Cave (you will see why the name). It was completely dark in the cave, we carried flashlights - the pictures have the camera flash. And then came the water - waist high!

Is that the other end of the cave? No, it opens into a clearing with a mangrove! At high tide, you’d get stuck in here!

The cave opened to this view.

A lovely sight

 

The second cave  - Ice Cream Cave. Stalactites and Stalagmites - cave formations.

 

The formations look like ice cream. And again, it was pitch dark, this is only the camera flash.

The cave does not ‘open up’ to anything. Only a tiny opening in the wall with water behind.

 

The opening without us blocking the view. And the smaller stalagmites which Sanika called ‘Dinosaur Nails’.

 

James Bond Island - featured in ‘Man with the Golden Gun’. A very touristy place after the rest of the seemingly untouched bay. We only stayed there for a short time, took kitschy pictures and left for more beautiful spots.

Continued in Part 2 - Too many pictures this day to stuff in one post.