Exploring Railay Beach

Riley was so excited to be on Railay Beach and after a night of clubbing he woke up, well, you can write your own joke here.


This is actually Phra Nang cave, Phra Nang referring to the Princess Goddess who is believed to reside inside.


The cave symbolizes a woman’s womb and the phallic symbols, well, speak for themselves. Local folklore says that anyone who carves a penis and tosses it at high tide along the Krabi coast will be blessed with fertility if the aforementioned "carving" finds its way in to Phra Nang cave.


This is a sacred place and should be treated with respect, but Riley had already angered the Gods of Angkor Wat so how much more damage could be done.


We had the standard Southeast Asia breakfast of mini-hot dogs and orange colored juice, greatly missing the taste of Laos, and then signed up to go snorkeling this afternoon. We walked around town a little and just took it easy. It was overcast but at least it was not raining.... Yet....






It was low tide and you could walk out very far with many boats now resting on dry land. The nice thing about the change in tides is that nothing can grow when it’s dry half the time and underwater the other half, making the ground nice and sandy when swimming.




With it being low tide it made for the perfect time for Riley’s first exposure to ocean water, and we would walk out to a nearby limestone formation.


Riley quickly learned how important it was to keep your eyes closed underwater.


If you look closely you can see Kim and Riley on their way out.


This is what it looks like at high tide.


Kim and Riley on their way back.


After drying out we headed out in search of lunch. Along the way we checked out some of the other caves and formations.






We also got to preview tomorrow’s activity, climbing to secret lagoon.






Turns out that maybe Riley did anger the Gods and the weather took a turn for the worse, the seas appeared angry my friend.








It then rained down buckets of water and our snorkeling was canceled. But at the same time Riley in the cave is one of my favorite pictures, so it was totally worth it, as we had more days to try snorkeling in the future. View from our room, it’s not foggy, that’s rain.


It only lasted 10 to 15 minutes and we were ready to head out again for some more exploring.






Riley found a swing.


And then we found some monkeys and Riley would learn that you should not go up to them and flash gang signs. These guys are mean and not afraid of you, they will run up and steal anything you don’t have secured, and you will never see it again. Well maybe see it, but it will be way up in a tree with no chance of retrieval.




We sat down for an appetizer and Riley searched for the distant memory of chicken nuggets and French fries without luck.


While we continued to explore Railay Beach we found these locals playing what can best be described as volleyball, except they use a small bamboo ball and can only use their feet.




It was a nice relaxing day, we didn’t have to be certain places at certain times, there were no long stories to hear about nothing, our minds could just check out. And that was when we found the local marijuana supplier.


Actually, that’s not fair of me to assume that just because he was a Rastafarian looking guy with a huge Afro and playing reggae music, that he was also able to obtain some weed. But I bet this guy has some great weed.


His name was Sam and he was a great guy, we even ran in to him a few times around town. The best part about his beach side bar was Jenga.




We had a few more drinks and some appetizers, then Kim and Riley went back to the hotel while I found a nice place for my first Thai massage. These women are amazing, for 250 baht (around 8 USD) they will give you the best one hour full body massage you will ever have. And for a few extra baht they will throw in some extra tugs and squeezes, but I’ll save that for another day. It was already a happy ending to another happy day.

VIDEO: Thailand Day 1