Colossal Waste: Around The World 2011 Day 7: Phuket, Thailand

Our entire day today is built around a tour we booked called the James Bond Island Speedboat Tour. There are hundreds of islands off the coast of Phuket, and most of them have always been completely ignored by non-indigenous people. But in 1974, a location scout for The Man With The Golden Gun was shown Ko Tapu (meaning "nail"), a limestone outcropping in a remote bay. It is a beautiful and stunning topographical feature, and they used it in the movie.

As you might recall, a main feature of the Bond franchise was that it showed remote locations around the globe that few Westerners would ever visit. After all, air travel was not so common in the 1960's and 1970's. Now that air travel is affordable and common, and people from around the world are visiting Thailand, Ko Tapu is officially called James Bond Island and hundreds visit it every day.

The fast needs to be broken every morning.

I was trying to get a shot of the rubber trees. Thailand is the biggest producer of rubber in the world. Odds are that the tires on your car came from trees like these. This kind of fact always amazes me. I had completely forgotten that rubber even came from trees.

If you want to go on a speedboat tour, you begin with the Marina.

Tell me that this marina with its condos could not be located in Florida.

The above yacht is called Sannok. As John Gillis reminded me, Spalding Gray referred to sanook in Swimming to Cambodia, his amazing monologue that was turned into a movie. Sanook means pleasure, and according to Spalding if something does not involve sanook the Thai people will not touch it with a ten foot pole.

Barbie with the people joining us on our speedboat tour.

They pull out of the marina and move as fast as possible, probably to both entertain us tourists and to get where we are going efficiently. By the way, we took the tour from ALP, Andaman Leisure Phuket, and they were wonderful. I would highly recommend them. And I enjoy that their promotional materials include these quotes: "The most interesting tour," "Great experiance," "Different than the other trip," and "My best day." You know me. I love when non-Westerners advertise for Westerners. There is a purity to it.

I figured that I should show you our view as we headed towards the unknown very quickly.

Barbie and yours truly at the back of the speedboat.

When I saw this... this... this rock sticking out of the sea, I had to take its picture. This sea is literally littered with these limestone rock islands shooting out of the water. But this was the closest we got to our first one, and boy was I excited to take its picture.

A closer look. Soon enough we pulled up outside a cave and in pairs the speedboating tourists hopped into canoes with guides.

Yours truly and our guide, whose name we did not know but based on his shirt we naturally referred to him as Yamaha Guy. You keep the same guide for two cave tours, so that you can tip accordingly.

Approaching the cave.

Getting closer.

And then we were in the cave, where pictures they do not look so good. I bet Barbie has some great ones with her flash camera. The iPhone flash is most definitely lacking.

You exit the cave into this remote lagoon in the center of the limestone island.

Unbelievably beautiful.

Monkeys are THERE.

Just imagine being surrounded on all sides by these limestone walls, covered in vegetation.

Panorama.

Time to go back in THERE.

I love this shot.

Okay. I get it. You have seen these limestone island. I took, no joke, 421 pictures today. It took Herculean effort to narrow it down to 69.

There it is, Ko Tapu. Seems like a good place for a James Bond Supervillain to have his headquarters. I made that up, but I could be right. I do not remember how this site was used in the movie.

Not a bad place to swim.

Proof that we were there, and the above pictures are not scans of brochures.

One last look at Ko Tapu, panorama style.

I greatly enjoyed seeing that our speedboat's anchor was very casually set into soft sands. There are not many currents in these remote bays.

On the road again...

For lunch, we arrived at Panyi Island. The village is not on the island, but is built over the ater next to the island. Legend has it that this place began with three families from Indonesia over a hundred years ago, who tied together a few boats and began their floating village. Now it is a combination of piers and boats, but there is still nothing built on land.

Of course I took multiple pictures. When am I going to see a floating island again!

The lunch buffet was excellent. The Indonesian families that began this village were, of course, Muslim and to this day the entire population is Muslim. Our guide warned us repeatedly that there would be no alcohol served. Barbie and I, of course, were glad to hear it.

Barbie's boyfriend for the day. Born in India, raised in Australia, 23 years old, and my height. Show Barbie a young, tall, handsome, brown boy and naturally she lets him know that 1) he is gorgeous and 2) he should be a model and 3) she should know, because her son is a model. (Hi Nate!) We got along great with him and his girlfriend and his girlfriend's parents, who were all wonderful people.

We had lunch THERE.

I am not tired of these pictures. Look at the colors.

Jellyfish. Run! Actually, the guides touched it. Apparently around here you do not have to fear jellyfish.

Every time you canoe through a cave and appear in a cove, you take a picture. Every time.

It occurs to me that people who do not look at the larger versions of these pictures are cheating themselves. If you do not want to open every pic in your browser, and who would, I recommend check out out the Picasa album here. You can click Slideshow and see al the pics much larger.

Yes, this picture is included because this lovely Asian tourist kept her iPhone (in its pink case) in that position for her entire canoe ride. I suspect she has an hour of video recorded today.

This is, believe it or not, the last picture you are going to see of limestone. Take it in.

And now, for your viewing pleasure, the Phuket Speedboat Tour video.

The speedboat now headed over to Na Ka Island, so that people could order drinks and swim in the Andaman Sea.

Not a bad view. To be completely honest, there are boats moored to the immediate right and left. However, with expert cropping one can be convinced of idyllic isolation.

Barbie's feet make a rare appearance.

This gentleman's bright orange speedo read Budgie Smuggler on his bottom. I suppose he thinks that the front of his swimsuit appears to have a small bird hidden inside.

We can now prove that we have swum in the Andaman Sea and the Indian Ocean.

Na Ka Panorama.

My wife is THERE.

Soon enough it was time to head back to Phuket.

They really try to entertain you with tight turns. I was entertained. I tried my best to get the horizon flat so that you could see how far we were tipped.

Vrooom.

Back in the Royal Phuket Marina.

You're welcome.

In case you wondering, the schools in Thailand apparently consider it safe to place a canopy over the back of a pickup truck and call it a schoolbus. Again one has to conclude that Thailand does not have many lawyers.

Rubber trees. These trees become your tires.

Back at the resort, we made a reservation at the J.W. Marriott's Italian kitchen, Cucina.

Amusingly, all the Thai people working here refer to it as koo-see-nah.

Could you picture this restaurant in any American city? Yes you could.

But name an American city with this view from an Italian restuarant?

Cool menu with the fork and whatnot.

The coolest way I have ever seen salt & pepper & other seasonings placed on a dinner table.

Barbie started with the Caesar Salad.

I started with the mushroom soup.

We shared a pasta with a long name I do not remember. It had asparagus and crab, and was very tasty. It also had, without warning, a very spicy element to it. Mouths and lips were on fire.