Koh Lipe
Thailand, 2014-01-31 01:00 by Laerke
At first coming to Koh Lipe was a bit of shock to the senses. Coming straight from laid-back Koh Bulone I felt like we’d made a mistake to come to this island that just seemed over-run and overdeveloped. It probably did not help that we started out with a walk across the island in the afternoon heat with our heavy bags on. We did not have a map and we walked way too far, past the island’s very large dump site where trash was burning sending toxic smelling smoke in our faces. The place we had planned on staying had closed down. Every other place where we asked for rooms was full. The entire island seemed full – or actually overbooked. I hated it already. In the end we decided that we’d camp again, we had seen on Tezza’s website that some people had camped at the sand spit at the very end of sunrise beach. I hailed a taxi (meaning a motorbike with a sidecart) and the sweet lady driving it agreed to take us. As soon as we were on the way with her we started to feel a bit better, we were no longer carrying the bags and the wind in our hair was nice – we were going somewhere! We did get bogged down in the sand at one point and Martin and I pushed her and the motorbike through it, I would have liked a video of that! We got to our intended camping spot and it was beautiful! Right by what is possibly the prettiest beach on the island and the sun was starting to set into what promised to be a gorgeous sunset. We did feel a little bit weird about setting up a tent there, were we on somebody’s (the resort to either the left or right) land? I had asked about accommodation at one of the resort’s reception and they were of course full, so it was not like they could sell us any rooms anyway. And there was one other tent already pitched. So we set up our tent and enjoyed the sunset that was the prettiest we’ve seen on our entire island hopping trip.



Setting up camp
I woke up to the sun rising the next morning painting the sky a delicate pink before the sun properly broke through and another beautiful day started. We used the day to arrange for our trip to Koh Rawi the following day, buying food for that trip and then we just lazed by our tent overlooking the gorgeous beach. I’m pretty sure we had the best view on the island, it sure didn’t get any more “beach front” than this!



The sand spit at Sunrise beach on Koh Lipe
The next morning we got picked up in a longtail boat right in front of where we had stayed, great service :) We had booked onto a day trip that as the last stop would drop us off at a beach on Koh Rawi where we would camp for the night and then get picked up the following day. There was only one other person on our tour; a nice Italian lady, and the three of us were all smiles as we set off. The water changed in colour from perfect torquise near the shore to a darker and darker blue as sailed off. It was a calm and quiet day and the water was still and almost velvety. Memories from our sailing trip in Komodo national park in Indonesia came to me. Soon we reached our first stop in the middle of the ocean, several other longtail boats indicated that this was a popular place! We donned our masks and plopped in, there was a really strong current and I had to swim relatively hard not to be swept away. As more and more snorkelers got in to the water it got pretty hectic, and combined with the current and a far from perfect visibility it was a bit challenging. The view under water was worth it though, the most colourful coral I’ve seen in a long time lured us closer. I’m glad we got some of it on video so I can review it again now without swimming full force into a current :) Back on the boat I overheard some of the boatmen talking in Malay and I asked our captain if he too spoke Malay – and he did! He perked up visibly by being able to communicate with us suddenly and he and I chatted away in a great mix of Malay/Indonesian and Thai. I loved it! Being this far south in Thailand and only about 50km or so from the Malaysian border it seemed quite a few people spoke Malay.
The next snorkel stop was my absolute highlight of the trip, as soon as I emerged my head under water I was amazed – this was the best snorkel site I’ve seen anywhere in Thailand! The coral stretched for a far as I could see and it looked healthy and thriving and my favorite part – there was LOTS of soft coral mostly in the form of sea anemones filled with clownfish! It is always exciting to find Nemo :)



The sand spit at Sunrise beach on Koh Lipe
I spent a long time snorkeling, even when I started to get cold I didn’t really want to go back up, also having my GoPro to shoot videos and take photos with seemed to distract me from the cold :) I was like a kid on the beach that is having so much fun that even when their lips start to turn blue they doesn’t wanna come up.

Captain Doo explained to me that the next intended stop was the black pebble beach on Koh Hin Ngam but right now the rangers would be there collecting 200 baht per person (the national park fee) so he instead suggested that we’d do that stop a little later when the rangers were gone. Fine by us, so we headed over to two bays on Koh Adang where we swam, walked the beach and had lunch. Then we returned to the black pebble beach, a bit of a natural oddity as all the other beaches in the area are fine, white sand beaches. Martin speculated that a large ship had dropped its cargo of black pebbles here at some point :)



Our last stop of the day was a beach on Koh Rawi, here Martin and I would be getting off and camping for the night – all alone on the beach! Captain Doo helped Martin clear a spot for the tent while Patricia and I swam. It was a beautiful, long beach with crystal clear water and corals and reef fish just off shore. Not long after we wawed goodbye as Captain Doo and Patricia headed back to Koh Lipe. We were all alone, and we were loving it!



Left: Captain Doo. Right: Another boatman on the black pebble beach.
We spent the rest of the late afternoon swimming and sunbathing and just taking in the pretty scenery around us. At dinnertime we prepared our simple dinner of tuna sandwiches and not long after we were lying in our tent looking up at the beautiful starry sky. The next day proceeded in much the same way. After lunch we packed up our tent and while we were busy doing that a crow swooped down and stole the last of our bread AND a piece of banana cake that I had very much been looking forward to eating! Damn those smart crows.





Getting ready to leave the island
This little trip was the perfect ending to our 16 days island hopping adventure off the very southern Andaman coast, and as we sailed back to Koh Lipe we were a bit nostalgic as we were leaving Thailand the next morning by ferry to Pulau Langkawi in Malaysia...