May 11 - Krabi, Thailand

A small, ocean-front town with friendly people, Krabi is idyllic. Time is slow here but passes before you know it.

Our guest house is toothbrush-clean and positively luxurious with a balcony, private bathroom with outdoor shower and sea-side cottage decor. We wander around town and hang out at the dock. Play a pick-up game of badminton in the street. Do laundry. Pity and avoid the mangy dog on the corner who has understandable bouts of viciousness. Take longboats out to Railay Beach, where we swim in the ocean, play in the sand, and lie in the sun. Johnny gets his sports fix watching old boxing and soccer matches on TV. We shop and pretend we live here.

To see the islands off the coast of Southern Thailand we are told that the best, or rather least expensive way is by organized boat tour. We know that we’ll be giving up certain freedoms with our time for on these tours nothing is left to whim, but we write it off as a part of the travel experience. The tour guide blows one long whistle to disembark the boat and two short, shrill ones to return. “If you are not here when I blow the whistle, we leave you.”

There is an interesting collection of people on our tour, including an enthusiastic Canadian woman who’s just finished an intense Thai boxing course and her Brazilian manfriend whom she met scuba diving a week ago; a quiet and intense German who looks like a Cold War spy, brings his own expensive snorkel gear and snorkels too long at each stop, holding up the boat’s departure time (it is to him that our guide’s words of warning are directed); and a young Canadian man and his Thai fiancee.

We learn over lunch that the Canadian-Thai couple met on-line a few months ago and have finally met in person. After one week he proposed. Over the course of our one-day island tour, the relationship passes through several phases: as the tour starts, she sits on his lap, facing him, and they kiss and cuddle. Later, when he snorkles, she feels neglected and hurt but they passionately make up. Still later, they write their names in the sand, an equation equalling “TLA”. Their dynamic resembles those on MTV’s “The Real World” and we can tell there will be more drama in their future.

I wonder how Johnny, Willa and I would be described.

We visit some of the beautiful islands Thailand is famous for: Ko Phi Phi Don, Chicken Island, Bamboo Island. And the ones Hollywood has made Thailand famous for: Ko Phi Phi Le (The Beach) and “James Bond Island” (The Man With the Golden Gun.) Even in low season, the boat-loads of tourists are intense and the experience deflating. But the islands themselves are stunning.

There are islands everywhere, most of them small (one could walk around some in 5 minutes, others in a day) and many of them uninhabited. The water changes in color - jade, emerald, aquamarine, blue, black, and all of it clear. Limestone cliffs reach up to the sky and beaches are lined with white sand and palm trees, pine trees, giant boulders, slab rock and coral.

In Krabi, we sample restaurants and street carts. Walk around the city market and eat mangoes & sticky rice, sketchy fish cakes, and curries so hot our noses and eyes run. Boom Donuts has warm, sweet donuts filled with creamed corn, Dairy Queen (yes) the best sundaes and Muslim Restaurant the best roti and curry.

In Muslim Restaurant, men gather in the front corner of the room, talking and drinking tea, while the women prepare and serve the food. The men wear worn loafers, dress pants and button-up shirts hang loosely over their protruding stomachs. Willa wanders over and they laugh at her audacity in reaching for their cups of tea and she laughs at them laughing.

In the evenings we walk down the street to the Night Market, which serves up grilled whole snapper rubbed with salt; salads of spicy onions and string beans; curried crab; Thai ‘boudin’ sausage stuffed with ginger, pork, glass noodles and spices; and fresh fruit smoothies made with stunning amounts of sugar and condensed milk.

We meet and make friends with a young Canadian woman who moved to Krabi last year. She is a fantastic city guide and knows where to get the best tea, the best yellow rice & chicken, the best pharmacy, etc. She gives us new music from her itunes and we are grateful.

Willa and I walk down along the water for a final visit to the fish park. Circling two fountain pools are 3-feet statues of sea life: a sea lion, a mollusk, a crab, a sand dollar, and so on. Willa walks up to each one, studying and touching, moving on to the next.

A group of young boys run by, laughing and shouting. Willa laughs, too, and toddles after them. They ignore her and climb up onto the dolphin fountains, snouts between their legs, and pretend the water shooting out is their pee. I’m crushed for Willa, but she’s moved on and is hugging the shrimp, pressing her face against where its neck would be.