After a wonderful time in Malaysia (though a rough ending), it was finally time to make it to Thailand. Our friends we met in Malaysia went to the tiny island of Koh Lipe and absolutely loved it, so we figured that was the perfect place to start! Unfortunately Christine had one last hurdle in her string of bad luck – she found out she had Covid her 2nd day on the island. Not the most ideal, but the quarantine in our bungalow at least gave time for her knee to heal. You have to take the little wins sometimes!

Koh Lipe

While Christine kicked off her Thailand adventure with a good ol’ bout of COVID, food poisoning, and a knee sprain, John enjoyed the island paradise of Koh Lipe kayaking, snorkeling, hiking, and nursing Christine back to health. Koh Lipe is one of Thailand’s furthest south islands in the Andaman Sea, a region famous for its coral reefs and white sandy beaches. One of the first things we noticed was the explosion of cannabis shops that cropped up in the last few years. Coming from Malaysia, where possession of weed is punishable by death, it was a surprise to see marijuana sold out in the open. It seems that both Koh Lipe and Dua Lipa are playing by New Rules (ba dum tss!).

Koh Lipe was first inhabited by nomadic fishing tribes in the early 1900’s. In the 1970’s and 80’s, they started opening guest houses for visitors to the island. As the island gained popularity, resorts began purchasing beach-side property and forcibly removing the existing inhabitants. Today, as you walk around the island, you’ll notice fancy resorts next to much-less-fancy neighborhoods where the locals live.

We spent our first night at sunset beach, where tourists congregate to watch the…sunset. There was also some fire dancing, regular dancing, and a local lady (named Madam Yoohoo we would learn later) yelling “yoohoo” and singing “ten baht ten baht ten baht ten baht” to the tune of “olay olay olay olay” while she walked around selling snacks. She became the mascot of our time on the island, no matter where we were we felt like we could hear her yoohoo’s in the distance. The next day, John hiked up to the viewpoint on the neighboring Koh Adang with a birds-eye view of Koh Lipe. During Christine‘a quarantine, John also rented a kayak and a snorkel and paddled out to an island just off Sunrise Beach called Kla Island. He swam with lots of little fishies and some not-so-little ones. One of the fish, called trigger fish, is known to bite humans with its giant humanoid teeth when it feels threatened. John didn’t know this, so he followed it around and got as close as he could for as long as he could. Thankfully, this particular fish did not feel triggered!

John also went on a full-day snorkeling tour around the archipelago that Koh Lipe is part of. The coral and fish were incredible and unlike anything he’d seen. Memorably, one guy on the tour sliced his foot open on a rock and had to get stitches at the local clinic. As if that wasn’t enough, he lost his wedding ring on the boat. We think he might have taken a rock from Koh Hin Ngam, a beach they visited where a myth says that taking a rock brings bad luck. 

One night, John found a Mexican restaurant on the island serving fish tacos. They were arguably the best tacos we’ve had since Mexico, so he was excited to bring some back to the hotel for Christine. But wouldn’t you know it, they gave Christine food poisoning. Not quite the nice gesture it was meant to be!

Koh Mook

After Christine’s isolation period was over, we made our way to our next island paradise – Koh Mook (or Muk). Located about a 4 hour speedboat ride away from Koh Lipe, it definitely wasn’t our favorite form of transportation. It was probably the roughest boat ride we’ve ever experienced (and mind you it was a beautiful sunny day, it was just a tiny boat out in the middle of the ocean). The first hour or so was a good test of our meditation skills (aka our not-vomiting skills) but thankfully our Dramamine finally kicked in and then we were both falling asleep. 

Similar to Koh Lipe, there are no cars on Koh Mook. Your only options are motorbikes or tuk tuks to get around the island. The moment we got off the boat we were surrounded by tuk tuk drivers, all quoting the same price and not budging, which of course we later learned had a steep tourist tax added. It’s always fun cramming the two of us and our big bags inside a tiny tuk tuk. We almost got stuck in the sand a couple times on the way to our hotel!

Koh Mook itself is very different from Koh Lipe – so much quieter, about 1/100th of the tourists, and shockingly no weed shops (that’s how you know it’s not a touristy place). There were dozens of little restaurants along the beach and we tried almost all of them by the time we left. The best meal we had was definitely the fresh seafood barbeque – each night restaurants display their daily catch, then you choose which you want for them to barbeque. The squid we got was some of the best we’ve ever had!

Luckily Christine tested negative for Covid the day we got there, but unluckily John started to feel sick so we assumed he had finally caught it. That meant it was solo adventure time for Christine! The main activity on the island is a snorkeling tour that takes you around a couple islands and to the beautiful Emerald cave. For the cave, they park the boat about 20m outside then you swim the 80m through the cave to a “secret” beach. And by secret, I mean thousands of tourists from islands all over visit it everyday. But it was very beautiful! So much so that after we were sure John didn’t have Covid we redid the same tour together!

The coolest part of Koh Mook was the sea turtles that visited the pier every night after dark. Once you walk about halfway out the pier, you start to see rock-looking circles under water. If you wait long enough, the rock will turn into a turtle and it will surface for air! It was amazing, we probably saw like 20 turtles. And we almost missed it – the only reason we found out was because we shared a tuk tuk with a guy one day who told us about it. We visited every night after, it was definitely a highlight!

Even with a bit of a rough start, our time on these southern islands was so beautiful. It’s easy to see how people fall in love with this country!

Christine & John