March 11, 2015
Snorkeling around Koh Lipe: Wrapping things up in tourist Thailand
I cycled to Sunrise beach on the east coast first thing in the morning. Koh Lipe is a small island so it didn’t take very long at all to get there and I was surprised to find that there were very few people out to actually see the sunrise. In fact there were more stray dogs than tourists, but the line of bungalows and restaurants along the beach indicated that there would be plenty later on. As with Pattaya beach there were long-tailed boats all the way along the beach rather spoiling what might once have been an idyllic place for a swim.
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I had heard that you could swim out and snorkel at a couple of small islands just off Sunrise beach, and that was what I planned to do. However, when I returned to Walking Street to find a mask and snorkel to rent my eye was caught by one of the many advertisements for snorkeling trips. It was a day excursion to many of the uninhabited islands in the vicinity of Koh Lipe which visited five or six different snorkeling spots and cost a very reasonable twelve pounds, which, most importantly, included a free lunch. I imagined that the snorkeling on these other islands would probably be better than just right off the beach here, and so, without really thinking it through, I signed up.
Our meeting point was Pattaya beach at 8.30am and once I saw the crowd of people queuing up to collect their masks and fins I soon realized why there were so many long-tailed boats on all the beaches. If I had been under any illusions that I would be doing something adventurous and unique here they were soon shattered as I boarded the boat with several other tourists and we headed out almost in convoy alongside a dozen other boats across the sea. It took a whole hour to arrive at the first snorkeling spot and when we got there already it was completely overcrowded with boats, to the extent that we decided to skip straight ahead to the next location.
The next spot was quieter and so the captain threw down his anchor (straight onto the coral) and we were told we could jump in. As I’d never done any real snorkeling before I was super excited to do this and was the first one flippered up and overboard. Splashing into the water at first I saw only greyish coral, but after paddling around for a bit I soon started to see fish of all shapes and colours. I saw those black and yellow stripey ones with the hooked fin, and one that was half black and half white, and ones that were really bright turquoise and pink, and I saw a sea snake, and lots of starfish. It was really very enjoyable and I swam around exclaiming “Look at you!!!” everytime I saw something exciting which came out very muffled through my snorkel.
I wanted to swim around here all day, but before I knew it we were all back at the boat and it was almost time to move on. There was one other member of our group who wasn’t back yet though, so I grabbed my camera from the boat, hoping to capture some of these beautiful fish on film. I could do this because my camera was waterproof and so I jumped right back in and tried to snap some shots underwater as I snorkeled. But the camera kept switching itself off. I got one photo taken before the whole screen went black. It seemed the seal had come loose over the years and it was no longer a waterproof camera after all. Oops.
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So my camera no longer functioned underwater and from this point on no longer functioned above water either, but the loss did not, as you might expect, make me unhappy. Far from it – I was glad to be rid of it. I had grown tired of looking at beautiful things and thinking ‘that’ll make a good photo’ and I wanted to get back to looking at things and actually just appreciating it and experiencing it as is. Being without a camera for a while would give me that opportunity and I was able simply to enjoy the experience of the rest of the day. We went to a couple more snorkeling sights which were not as good as the first, and then lunched on an idyllic white beach next to turquoise waters. My fellow travelers all hailed from various parts of Europe and most interesting among them was a Dutch girl who walked with the aid of a stick. She had suffered a neurological disease which had paralysed her nervous system and left her bedridden with doctors telling her that she would never walk again. Luckily she hadn’t paid any attention to these doctors and now walked everywhere, determinedly, with this stick and here she was snorkeling in Thailand. An inspiring girl.
On the way back to Koh Lipe we stopped at an area of strong current where hundreds of fish swam, fish with bright yellow and black stripes set on a purple background. Ropes had been strung out and held in place by buoys, and we could swim out holding onto these ropes and snorkel surrounded by these fish. I soon worked out that the best way to do this was to hang onto the rope with my feet, so that I was facing the fish, and they would swim straight up to my face. It was a great experience, but overall the snorkeling trip had been a bit of a disappointment. We’d spent most of the day on board the boat moving around, and hardly done any of this very good snorkeling. “There are more fish off the coast of Sunrise beach” another traveler assured me.
I wanted to leave Koh Lipe for Malaysia early the next morning, so when our boat got back to the island I quickly rented my own snorkel and headed back to Sunrise beach. I still had a few hours of daylight left in the day and so I waded out past all of the long-tailed boats and began to snorkel. Soon I started seeing lots of fish swimming about, nibbling at the coral. I saw all of the ones that I’d seen before, plus even more exotic looking ones, including a type of swordfish which I gave a wide berth to. My favourite, though, was a pink and brown one which had flappy fins, and when it saw me it faced straight towards me as if saying hello. I moved on, but the pink and brown one soon came back and faced me again. A little later it greeted me once more. I really had made a friend here. Then I saw another one doing it, and realized it wasn’t just one fish, it was just what all the pink and brown ones did. Nice of them all to say hello though.
Overall the snorkeling off Sunrise beach was much better than the excursion had been, and I should really have just done that all day and regretted signing up for the trip. So if you’re visiting Koh Lipe, don’t do what I did. All of the long-tailed boats spoil the beaches and damage the coral. Bad, bad, bad. As for Koh Lipe itself, it’s all designed for tourism, is expensive, and bore little resemblance to the Thailand I knew and loved. That being said I was glad I’d visited it, because tourism is such big business in Thailand, particularly on the islands, that you haven’t really seen all of Thailand without witnessing that aspect too. The next morning I boarded my boat to Malaysia, my time in Thailand was up. It had been a great country, one of the best I’d been to for cycling.
If only the motorcycles could stay on the right side of the road.
Today's ride: 5 km (3 miles)
Total: 38,778 km (24,081 miles)
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