We finally got some great snorkling in today! I still find the requirements for good snorkling visibility a little hard to pin down; even with nice calm and sunny weather sometimes it’s a little murky down there. But not today!

We headed up to Koh Ma / Mae Haad for lunch and a dip in the freakinwikked beautiful coral reef. Tabitha finally got some good use out of the waterproof container for her camera (we may post a few soon). I think it was the best day for snorkling we’ve had yet, though I admit the amazingness of being completely surrounded by tropical fish and corals is finally starting to wear off.

There is a new cicada or cricket this week that sounds exactly like a dentist drill. Thankfully it only does it’s thing for an hour around sunset, but good god that takes the cake for most annoying bug. Ooh, and speaking of bugs, Taluka found two massive spiders in their little bungalo. No pictures, but – spreads fingers out – they said they were that big.

Yesterday we finally took our first longtail trip (see picture) to visit Bottle Beach. The driver-captain-guy was awesome; if you ever need a boat from Chaloklum call Mr. Dan. Only 100 baht and smiles are included! ^_^

Despite being one of the hardest beaches to get to, or perhaps because of it, Bottle Beach is coated with bungaloes and teeming with tourists. Nice beach though; deep swimmable water with big fun waves that we could almost body surf in. Colin did some bouldering and found yet another abandoned bar out on the rocks. He fell through the ageing tile roof while climbing around on top but came away with just a few scrapes. He’s itching to start kiteboarding again in Baan Tai once the wind picks back up.

I’m itching to try the fancy-schmantzy but tragically named ME ‘N’ U restaurant tonight. Let you know how it goes..

Just a quick note. Luke and Tabitha are visiting which is really fun. We’ve been doing alot of sitting on decks drinking coffee and beer and this and that. Today looks good for snorkling!

I also really want to thank rgsteele for buying us a flickr pro account! Which is responsible for the new high-res version of the image posted above. From now on I’ll be posting full versions of everything.

Sarah and I have been to Myanmar!

It’s been three months so it was finally time to do a visa run.

We have a tripple entry visa. Each entry is good for 3 months (after extending it for another month in Smaui). All we had to do was leave the country and come back. Stamping the visa with the 2nd entry.

Alot of people have to do this so it’s pretty easy to find a tour opperator offering the service. We ended up doing it along with a half-dozen other people from Koh Phangan.

It took us 24 hours door-to-door but that includes dinner twice.

We started off on the night boat. Which is pretty funny. It’s an old really slow boat with no seats but thin matresses spread out under the 4 foot ceiling. It left at 10 and arrived at the ithmus at 4:00am (a journey which usually takes 3 hours).

From there we all bundled into a van and drove across the Ithmus of Kra to Ranong Thailand. Which is seperated from Myanmar by a very large river. We had to check out of Thailand in Ranong and then were driven to the port and bundled onto a longtail. The port at Ranong was GREAT. So many boats and people going hither and thither. As soon as I saw the place my shutter finger just went nuts.

The chartered longtail took us to Thai immigration (standing in the river on stilts) to confirm the checkout (every boat has a young boy who runs passports and ropes around). And then across the very large river to Myanmar. There we checked into and out of Myanmar in the same motion (with 10$ american to smooth the way). And got on the same boat back. Then into the same van back to the east-coast, and onto a ferry that takes 3 hours istead of 6 to make the crossing home.

One beatutiful sunset later we were eating dinner in one of our favourtite restauraunts (congratulaions Won and Steve on the marriage!) and then home to bed.

So we popped over to Myanmar just for the day.

Some of the pictures are up on the flickr account. I think alot of them turned out quite well (although out of order, damned free account!).

Hey.

Still here in Thailand. Not really up to much. Just enjoying living in a house next to the beach in a tropical paradise.

Gin and Tonics have become very popular. As have the hamocks strung all over various decks. Reading good as well as bad books (Pete’s book is highly, highly recomended. Write me an email for an online version if you haven’t read it)

The wind has finally provided. I have finished my kitesurfing course. Which has, perhapse paradoxically, perhapse inevitably, left me in a worse place than when there was simply no wind.

See now I have to rent gear at steep prices or buy gear at steep prices in order to chase the sport. Which I find amazingly fun. Which was basically inevitable. Tempted to buy the gear. There is kiteboarding pretty well everywhere after all. (including Tokyo, which is pretty high on the places-to-move-to-next scale)

Food continues to be good. We got a small bag of curry paste that is the base ingredient in various curries we have been preparing. All subtle variations of eachother.

So far the crush a bunch of peanuts curry is being slightly eclipsed by the throw in a huge amount of garlic curry.

Also found a place that sells decent bread and a place that sells decent new-zealand cheese. Which sews up breakfast and snack time.

Yes. Well when the most exiting thing in your day is the gin blind taste test (larios > gordons) you know that life is being extremely pleasent.

Cherio.

– The Apes

This must be one of the last rainstorms of the season. There is a guy out in the water bailing out his longtail boat. We’ve hardly seen a cloud for weeks, and to be honest I missed the rain a lot. It makes such wonderful sounds on the roof and gives the ocean and amazing effect (although we haven’t been able to photograph the effect yet). Everything is so picturesque.

Looks like our job with the dogs is working; I would have expected all of them to come crowding up to the deck but we have only Brave (who is welcome) and Rope (the most stubborn one by far). I tossed Rope off a few times to give him the idea he isn’t welcome in our shelter, but he beat me back to the door both times and tried to squeeze inside. He’s upset about being wet, but I don’t think he sees the correlation.

We’ve heard that monsoon season has been so light this year that it hasn’t filled the resevoirs high enough. The same thing happened three or four years ago, and the summer after parts of the island were without running water for two months. We’ve enjoyed the good weather but aren’t looking forward to having to bathe in the ocean. Another reason we’re looking to be elsewhere when our visas expire in April.