For our first excursion we decided to go to James Bond Island. It's the part in "The Man With The Golden Gun" where the plane lands in between two islands on this perfect, little sandy beach and I'm sure some kind of sex/shooting scene ensues. I don't know, I've never seen it, but the place looked cool, so we went.
We were told to be at the frond desk at 8:30am. I wish someone had taken a picture of my face when our tour guide, Tiger, arrived. It was probably the face of "Is this guy serious?" mixed with "Should I get in the car with him?" He was around five feet tall, wearing white Croc's, with...wait for it, a towel over his head with a white hard hat. OH...and a flower tucked in his collar...a red hibiscus for mental picture's sake.
We get in the SUV and are on our merry way.
Let me side note for a second. The SUV was a Toyota Forerunner, very nice and clean and had the MOST AWESOME musical feature. It was a small touch screen in the back seat that we could control. The music ranged from: Kenny G, Michael Jackson (who I have a story about later), Bette Midler, Phil Collins, Michael Bolton...you get the gist. We were soft-rocking our way around Thailand.
Tiger begins the conversation like this, "My name is Tiger, like 'meow', like Tiger Woods. My friends say I look like Tiger Woods because of my black skin. When my wife is not around, I am a Tiger, when she comes to visit, I am 'meow.'" This was all in broken English, mind you. "My wife, she used to look like Olive Oil, but after two kids, she looks like Bluto. She's a polar bear." Tiger was OBSESSED with large people. I'll get to that later. He then asked Brian what he did for a living and he replied with, "I'm in the US Military." "OH!!!!!!!!!! You wear stars on your shoulders?! You the big boss man?! Do you shoot people with guns?!" For those that don't know, stars on your shoulder makes you a General. It was pretty damn funny.
After an hour of Tiger's hilarious commentary, we arrive at the dock to get in the "long boat" for the ride to James Bond Island. This boat was probably 30 feet long, with slats to sit on, covered by a tent, powered by a car engine with a paddle. Yes, a car engine. YES, that's what I said.
We motor our way through mangrove forests and out to the ocean. This place is fabulous. The mountains are covered in greenery, the water is clear and huge rocks just pop up out of the water. It's so neat-o and a very unique setting, for sure...especially with Tiger as your narrator. There were two mountains that he called "Booby Mountains." The entire time we were on our excursion, he had taken our camera and was our personal photographer. This was a great thing as we now have TONS of photos of the two of us together; however, we also have TONS of pictures of large people in canoes, large people at the temples, large people everywhere, booby mountains, elephant butts, etc. TONS, people.
We arrive at the island and it was swarming with tourists. It was cool to see the place, but it had definitely been taken over by the locals selling crap. This beautiful location now has tons of shanty-looking shops to buy touristy trinket crap. It totally takes away from what the place COULD look like, but I'm sure there are other places nearby that are just as beautiful without the shops. I could stop bitching and remind myself that we DID sign up for the touristy crap...what was I expecting? So, there's that.
After the island, we had lunch at a floating city. Seriously, the entire thing was floating in the middle of the bay. People build on to whatever is already there and it keeps growing. This restaurant, however, was my first experience with the "squatter" toilets. It's a hole in the ground, with little planks to place your feet that you hover over and hope you don't get your feet. I was not successful and tinkled all over myself. That's all you need to know.
After lunch, we boated to another floating place that rented canoes. Brian and I got in one canoe with a paddle-man and Tiger got into another canoe with his own paddle-man. We canoed into caves, saw bats and natural rock formations. It was amazing and one of the most beautiful places I've been. Canoeing into an open-air cave....I really have no words for how beautiful it is. It's like a scene from the movies.
Our canoe-paddle-man was Thai Muslim. He told us this very quickly and subsequently asked where we were from. We replied with Qatar...it's a safe country to reply with since he had just informed us that he loves Allah. He somehow deduced that we were from America, though, and would say a name and do a thumbs up or thumbs down. They were as follows: Obama - thumbs up, George Bush - thumbs down, Osama bin Ladin - thumbs up. GET ME OFF OF THIS DAMN CANOE. Brian gave him his cigarettes as a tip, I quickly hopped back on the long boat.
Once we were out of the grasps of the Thai-Muslim-Osama-Lover, we headed back to the dock. The tide had fallen significantly. By significantly, I mean about 5-6 feet. We could see nothing but the roots of the mangrove trees we were previously eye-level with. We hopped off the boat and back into the soft-rocking Forerunner to head home.
Tonight we had our single-table roof-top dinner. It was fabulous...the best food I've ever had and that is saying a lot. Like promised, there was no seafood and the wine was room temperature. The chef brought us some Chinese "good-luck balloons." They were the lantern balloons that you light on fire and they float away. They are beautiful and it was another cool thing to do that I had never done before...which seemed to be the ongoing theme of this trip.
Oh, and to get back to the Michael Jackson part...According to Tiger, "Michael Jackson is a lady-boy that loves tomahawks." Do what you will with that information.
We were told to be at the frond desk at 8:30am. I wish someone had taken a picture of my face when our tour guide, Tiger, arrived. It was probably the face of "Is this guy serious?" mixed with "Should I get in the car with him?" He was around five feet tall, wearing white Croc's, with...wait for it, a towel over his head with a white hard hat. OH...and a flower tucked in his collar...a red hibiscus for mental picture's sake.
We get in the SUV and are on our merry way.
Let me side note for a second. The SUV was a Toyota Forerunner, very nice and clean and had the MOST AWESOME musical feature. It was a small touch screen in the back seat that we could control. The music ranged from: Kenny G, Michael Jackson (who I have a story about later), Bette Midler, Phil Collins, Michael Bolton...you get the gist. We were soft-rocking our way around Thailand.
Tiger begins the conversation like this, "My name is Tiger, like 'meow', like Tiger Woods. My friends say I look like Tiger Woods because of my black skin. When my wife is not around, I am a Tiger, when she comes to visit, I am 'meow.'" This was all in broken English, mind you. "My wife, she used to look like Olive Oil, but after two kids, she looks like Bluto. She's a polar bear." Tiger was OBSESSED with large people. I'll get to that later. He then asked Brian what he did for a living and he replied with, "I'm in the US Military." "OH!!!!!!!!!! You wear stars on your shoulders?! You the big boss man?! Do you shoot people with guns?!" For those that don't know, stars on your shoulder makes you a General. It was pretty damn funny.
After an hour of Tiger's hilarious commentary, we arrive at the dock to get in the "long boat" for the ride to James Bond Island. This boat was probably 30 feet long, with slats to sit on, covered by a tent, powered by a car engine with a paddle. Yes, a car engine. YES, that's what I said.
We motor our way through mangrove forests and out to the ocean. This place is fabulous. The mountains are covered in greenery, the water is clear and huge rocks just pop up out of the water. It's so neat-o and a very unique setting, for sure...especially with Tiger as your narrator. There were two mountains that he called "Booby Mountains." The entire time we were on our excursion, he had taken our camera and was our personal photographer. This was a great thing as we now have TONS of photos of the two of us together; however, we also have TONS of pictures of large people in canoes, large people at the temples, large people everywhere, booby mountains, elephant butts, etc. TONS, people.
We arrive at the island and it was swarming with tourists. It was cool to see the place, but it had definitely been taken over by the locals selling crap. This beautiful location now has tons of shanty-looking shops to buy touristy trinket crap. It totally takes away from what the place COULD look like, but I'm sure there are other places nearby that are just as beautiful without the shops. I could stop bitching and remind myself that we DID sign up for the touristy crap...what was I expecting? So, there's that.
After the island, we had lunch at a floating city. Seriously, the entire thing was floating in the middle of the bay. People build on to whatever is already there and it keeps growing. This restaurant, however, was my first experience with the "squatter" toilets. It's a hole in the ground, with little planks to place your feet that you hover over and hope you don't get your feet. I was not successful and tinkled all over myself. That's all you need to know.
After lunch, we boated to another floating place that rented canoes. Brian and I got in one canoe with a paddle-man and Tiger got into another canoe with his own paddle-man. We canoed into caves, saw bats and natural rock formations. It was amazing and one of the most beautiful places I've been. Canoeing into an open-air cave....I really have no words for how beautiful it is. It's like a scene from the movies.
Our canoe-paddle-man was Thai Muslim. He told us this very quickly and subsequently asked where we were from. We replied with Qatar...it's a safe country to reply with since he had just informed us that he loves Allah. He somehow deduced that we were from America, though, and would say a name and do a thumbs up or thumbs down. They were as follows: Obama - thumbs up, George Bush - thumbs down, Osama bin Ladin - thumbs up. GET ME OFF OF THIS DAMN CANOE. Brian gave him his cigarettes as a tip, I quickly hopped back on the long boat.
Once we were out of the grasps of the Thai-Muslim-Osama-Lover, we headed back to the dock. The tide had fallen significantly. By significantly, I mean about 5-6 feet. We could see nothing but the roots of the mangrove trees we were previously eye-level with. We hopped off the boat and back into the soft-rocking Forerunner to head home.
Tonight we had our single-table roof-top dinner. It was fabulous...the best food I've ever had and that is saying a lot. Like promised, there was no seafood and the wine was room temperature. The chef brought us some Chinese "good-luck balloons." They were the lantern balloons that you light on fire and they float away. They are beautiful and it was another cool thing to do that I had never done before...which seemed to be the ongoing theme of this trip.
Oh, and to get back to the Michael Jackson part...According to Tiger, "Michael Jackson is a lady-boy that loves tomahawks." Do what you will with that information.
Sounds amazing! More stories more photos. Or, send me a postcard.
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