So after a sleep-in and doing absolutely nothing yesterday for a few hours in Bangkok (which was a nice change of pace) and a 12-hour overnight sleeper bus, we arrived in Phuket at 7am this morning. We couldn't check into our hotel at that hour so we fed our faces, hired a scooter, and hit the road. Phuket is a massive island (Thailand's largest) situated off the west coast of the country in the Andaman Sea. The island has a population of 350,000 and derives much of its income from tourism. The biggest attraction here is the beaches, but there is also this 45 metre-high Buddha plonked on a hill that offers good views over the southern part of the island.

Hmm, bit hazy. Well who cares - this isn't what we came here for.

We came for this - beach time!

Phuket flexes serious muscle in the world's best beach category. Its beaches are wide and luxurious with jade-coloured water - it's almost paradise but not quite. We will be visiting an absolute paradise in a couple days though (hint: The Beach). The island has several noteworthy beaches and we intended to visit most of them over the next two days. First up, Hat Nai Han on the southern tip of the island. We got here about 9am - it was almost empty and the surroundings were amazing! Good start :)

Beaches two and three were Hat Kata and Hat Karon - two more great spots with flawless beaches but the surroundings were large resort complexes and a bustling main street.

Then we hit the town and beach of Patong - Phuket's most developed beach and its most popular. The main drag along this three-kilometre stretch of beach is chocker with hotels, restaurants, shopping, nightlife, and Thailand's special knack for seediness hehe.

Here are a few images of Patong's main street and beach immediately after the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami. Phuket suffered extensive damage, especially the beaches we'd just visited. As many as 250 people were reported dead in Phuket, including foreign tourists.

Good to know.

There are another few beaches we'd hoped to see, but after a mostly-sleepless bus journey here last night we were pretty knackered and returned to base (Phuket Town) for a nap. We came back to Patong later in the afternoon to see out the rest of the day.

I'm too sexy for my shirt.

With the sun setting, I went in to play with the waves...

...and Kristina played with my camera.

This is our hotel's cat - Kristina stole him and brought him upstairs. She's getting broody for a pet (as long as that's all she's getting broody for).

Miss January.

It was back on our beasty little 110cc scooter today to check out some of the Phuket beaches we didn't make it to yesterday.

We started right up the top of the island this morning and made our way south along the west coast throughout the day, stopping at every beach along the way.

First up was the virtually deserted Hat Mai Khao, part of the Sirinat National Marine Park. According to Lonely Planet, sea turtles lay their eggs along here between November and February. We didn't see any (or step on any), and in fact had this entire beach pretty much to ourselves apart from a small group of locals having a get-together up in the tree line (and staring at us). Video here.

Miss February.

A little further south is Phuket International Airport with its runway starting just over the beach. I rather liked the paint job on this one hehe.

They don't get quite as close as they do on the Caribbean island of Saint Martin (like here for example) but it's still pretty cool if you're into big loud machinery. Video here.

Miss March.

From there we followed some hilly roads through the forest / jungle to the next beach.

And this was it - Ao Bang Thao with its several restaurants right on the beach, and after seeing them everywhere since we first started this trip we finally got ourselves some coconut milk fresh outta the coconut. This area is home to Phuket's mega-resorts (serious pampering at serious prices). There was some Russian bitch sitting behind us who did nothing but complain to the waiters about this and about that. She didn't see anything she liked on the menu, so she demanded a soup be made up especially for her and then rattled off a list of ingredients - most of it seafood. There was a seafood soup on the menu incidentally, but it obviously didn't meet Madame Russia's requirements. Inevitably, the soup came out with several things missing because of the language barrier, but that was no excuse and she let rip at them all again. She was clearly one of these moneybags staying in one of the resorts, and expected everybody to bow to her whim accordingly.

Beach number three was Hat Kamala, and it was another fairly quiet one. We were surprised at just how free of tourists these beaches were, but the reality is most of the tourists all head to Patong (where we were yesterday) and rarely venture any further. We met a chick a few days ago who said she hated Phuket - it was all just party party party. Patong certainly is that, but Patong is only one tiny part of Phuket. I learned a long time ago that your holiday is what you make of it. If you can't be bothered to venture out then that's what you get.

Miss April.

Mr May.

By 3pm we'd lost the sun. It was looking pretty rough out to sea and I thought we might get a ripper thunderstorm to enjoy, but it never happened :(

Miss June.

What we did get though was this bloody incredible sunset that lit the whole bay up orange and red, and after watching it over a cold one we called it a day. More beaches tomorrow no doubt, and then we're off to another couple of islands to spend the rest of our time here (again, my hint from yesterday: The Beach :)

So this was pretty much our whole day today - just swimming at the beach (Patong), and hoping for the sun to come out.

He looks comfortable. Anyway, today was our last in Phuket. Tomorrow morning we jump on a ferry bound for the stunning Ko Phi Phi Don and Ko Phi Phi Lee islands for a few nights.

This is Ko Phi Phi Don, the largest and only inhabited island of the Phi Phi Islands. This place is absolutely overrun with tourists - absolutely overrun. It's a shame. These islands came to prominence when the second-largest island, Ko Phi Phi Lee, was used as a location for the filming of The Beach in 2000. Before then, only the most adventurous travellers ventured out this far. Ko Phi Phi is a popular base for diving, snorkelling, kayaking and so forth, but our main reason for coming here is the aforementioned island of Ko Phi Phi Lee. We've organised a private long boat to take us around the island tomorrow and then leave us for the day in Maya Bay on the beach where The Beach was filmed. What's more, we're setting off at 6:30am to beat the countless hordes of tourists that pile in there every day. My only concern is the weather. If there was one day on this whole trip where I wanted clear sunny skies it was the day we visit Ko Phi Phi Lee, but it doesn't look as though that's going to happen :(

At 6:30am this morning we set off on a private boat for the 15-minute hop over to Ko Phi Phi Lee. And this is it. The reason for the early start was a) to beat the tourists, and b) to beat the forecasted rain.

Ko Phi Phi Lee is the second-largest of the Phi Phi Islands and is uninhabited. The island consists of a ring of steep limestone hills surrounding two shallow bays plus a fjord-like inlet. The cave on the right is known as 'Viking Cave' from which there is a thriving bird's nest soup industry (more info on that here - I'd never heard of such a thing).

This is that fjord-like inlet, called Pi Ley. There is a small coral reef at the entrance but what really grabs you is the incredible colour of that water!

We pulled in here and our man shut the engine off. It was complete silence apart from the gentle lapping of the water against the cliffs, and my camera getting punished.

After a quick stop we continued circumnavigating the island. Before long we pulled into this bay and got our first glimpse at one of the biggest highlights of this whole trip (at least for me).

This is the stunning Maya Bay - one of the most pristine and perfect beaches on the planet. As I've mentioned before, this was the filming location for The Beach, and to quote Daffy (the nutcase) from that movie, this beach is "Perfect, real perfection. And I'm not just talking about 'Oh that's nice', it's the real fucking deal ok?!" And he's not far wrong, that is if you can get it to yourself. We arrived about 7:30am, and the only other people in sight were the half dozen who had camped here overnight (done as part of a tour - the only option for staying overnight on the island since there are no accommodations or anything else here for that matter).

Absolutely incredible - if this doesn't impress you then I'd love to know what does! And just like before, it was completely silent - the calm before the daily storm of tourists later in the morning. I was pretty happy with how this panorama came out, but even so it really doesn't do the place any justice. Video here.

After the usual round of obligatory photos, it was into the turquoise water!

Straight out of the movie :) Except they plugged the entrance of the bay with an extra limestone cliff using CGI to make the beach appear completely enclosed.

Our man left us some snorkelling kit before he buggered off and left us in peace.

So what did we find in The Beach beach? Fish!

I know what I'm having for dinner.

We had the run of the place for a good hour or so, but from about 9am onwards more and more boats started swarming into the bay. We decided to go explore some more of the island before it became completely overrun, and again - stunning! Controversy arose during the filming of The Beach due to 20th Century Fox's bulldozing and landscaping of the beach area to make it more "paradise-like". The production altered some sand dunes and cleared some coconut trees and grass to widen the beach. Fox set aside a fund to reconstruct and return the beach to its natural state. However, lawsuits were filed by environmentalists who believed the damage to the ecosystem was permanent and restoration attempts had failed. Regardless, the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami took care of it. Lonely Planet claims the tsunami dramatically improved the look of Maya Bay due to the fact that the high waves cleaned up the beach and removed all the landscaping the Fox production team had added. Sorted!

When we arrived back at the beach, this was the scene. It was about 11am, the bay was swamped with boats of all shapes and sizes, and the beach swamped with tourists. I mentioned yesterday that prior to this place becoming famous thanks to The Beach, very few tourists ventured out this far. Times have certainly changed. Most of the package tours from Phuket and surrounds arrive here about lunchtime, but most of them are fleeting visits only and by about 3pm the place is virtually empty again. Regardless, this daily invasion is rather unfortunate given the natural beauty of this place - the locals do an amazing job to keep it in such immaculate condition despite this.

To escape the chaos we swam across the bay to the opposite beach and watched the mayhem from afar in relative peace.

I looked at about five different weather websites last night for today's forecast, and of course none of them agreed with each other. What I interpreted from them however is that it was going to piss with rain here all week, and if there was a borderline good time to take a trip out to an incredible beach then it would be this morning when a small window of half-decent weather was possible. Well that certainly turned out to be the case, and thank Buddha because if there was one day on this trip where I wanted sunny weather it was this one! When we left just after 1pm the clouds were rolling in fast, and it's pissing down as I write this.

So that was that - another item ticked off the bucket list and our last full day in Thailand. Tomorrow we start our jaunt down through Malaysia by taking an eight-hour (ouch!) minivan to our first destination - won't that be fun.