Friday 13 February 2015

Tonsai Beach

Tonsai is a smaller bay and right next to its higher-end neighbor, Railay.  Its main attraction aside from the beach is that it is surrounded by massive cliffs and so it attracts mostly rock climbers.  It felt like Flagstaff transplanted into Thailand.

We stayed at a place called Andaman Nature Resort.  Resort is a loose term I suppose, the thatched bungalows felt like glorified camping.  Actually, I have stayed in tents that felt more stable than these guys.  It was nice nonetheless but I couldn't help thinking, "Stevie would die if she saw these!"  (She's my friend back home-hates nature).

I had this weird fantasy about staying in one of these things during our times of traveling in Asia, but this was our first.  It was felt very exposed, you could see the ground through the floor boards and there was only electricity at night.  Meh, the mosquito nets were functioning and it cost $15 a night for both of us.  Most of the people staying here were on extended climbing trips.

A monkey on someone else's porch.

Cliffs on all sides.  The tourist town was located on a U-shaped walking path starting at both ends of the beach.  The left side of the path had all the restaurants and hotels and the right side had jungle full of building waste and garbage.



It was beautiful.  Anywhere we went, we were looking up at the cliffs.

We spent an entire afternoon sitting on the beach watching the ships and the tide come in.

Tonsai was great but it had a weird vibe (probably also because I don't think any non-tourists actually live there).  Most people were there for the climbing so it felt a little sceney as non-climbers.  There were also a lot of people randomly meditating or doing yoga or fire dancing or other hippy-approved activities.


I took a few pictures of other tourists during our beach sit.  I really liked this one for some reason.

Sooo many dreadlocks.


Alec was also thoroughly entertained.

French dudes in their teeny-tiny swim bottoms.

This is the biggest palm tree I have ever seen.  It was huge, I estimate 4-5 stories high.  I wonder how old it was.

Walking back to our bungalow enjoying a coconut shake.  Shakes (fruit blended w/ ice) were an excellent part of Thailand.  Tonsai was full of take-away shake stands, everyone including me walked around with their plastic cups.  This also felt weird and wasteful but it was great.


Hey monkey enjoying a jack fruit.  I am pretty sure it wasn't a durian (they look the same) because I couldn't smell it.  I brought home dried and double wrapped durian to share with Anders because of curiosity; I'd never had it and had always heard that it smelled terrible.  You see signs around Thailand and other countries in public places saying "NO DURIAN" because of the smell.  I can confirm that it smells awful and tastes like farts in your mouth.  Why do people eat it, so gross.  That's the end of my durian story.

Cool plant.

1 comment:

  1. Don't misrepresent Stevie- she loves nature. She let Mads play near grass.

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