Day 15 Snorkeling trip on Ko Lipe
- Heike Panagoulias
- Jan 5
- 5 min read
Updated: Jan 12
Another excursion was on my agenda today. I had already been looking forward to a snorkeling trip on Ko Lipe. The hotel had of course organized a driver to take me to the meeting point. On the back of the moped, we set off across Walking Street to a diving and snorkeling provider. A few tourists who had also booked an excursion had already arrived here.
We were assigned to our guide and went to the boat together, another traditional longtail boat of course. We slowly got used to getting into these boats, the small ladder and the rocking boat. You also have your shoes in your hand because you are wading through the water and your bag or rucksack. As we all took our seats in the boat, I heard a familiar language. There was a young couple from Switzerland on board. Speaking German for the first time in over 2 weeks hahaaaaa. That was nice!
We were again a very diverse group of mixed ages from Switzerland, England and China.
We set off and drove to one of the surrounding islands. Here we passed North Point Beach and the view from the water was quite different.
We saw many small, rocky islands. It took us well over an hour to get to a neighboring island, Ko Hin Son. One small island in particular stood out on the way, it was a real eye-catcher!
We also made our first snorkeling stop nearby. Unfortunately, the water was very murky today and the pictures were not as nice as on Ko Phi Phi. In addition, there were some small, harmless jellyfish. If you touched one, it hurt a little, but after a few minutes it was forgotten... if you hadn't touched the next one in the meantime. There was only a small red mark on the skin, which disappeared again after a few minutes.
After a short snorkeling stop here, we continued on to Ko Lo Ko. It was a small island where we only made a short stop, as there was only one beautiful little beach here.
It was gorgeous and you could get a bit high up on the rocks here. As you can see, it was quite windy here! A beautiful spot on earth!
There wasn't much more to see here, so we moved on to the next stop, the island of Ko Ba Tuang. All of these islands we were on belong to the Tarutao National Park, a so-called marine national park in the Strait of Malacca in southwest Thailand. It is the first marine national park in Thailand and was declared one in 1974.
Tarutao is a Malay word meaning “old” and “mysterious”. Legend has it that these islands disappeared from the world for a long time. The beautiful Princess Langkawi was wrongly executed for adultery and had cast a curse. Since passing ships were robbed by pirates for centuries, the curse was believed to be real.
There are colorful corals in the waters of Tarutao National Park. However, many reefs have been destroyed by dynamite fishing. There are a variety of bird species, Malayan bears, macaques, monitor lizards, langurs and tiger pythons.
Our next destination was Ko Dong Bay, also known as Monkey Bay. Here we got our packed lunch, Pad Thai and a drink of water when we got off the boat. I wasn't interested in the monkeys, so I looked for a wonderful spot in the shade right on the beach and enjoyed my lunch.
We continued along this island until we came to our next snorkeling stop. Unfortunately, the water here was also very murky today and we swam around the jellyfish as best we could.
It was a shame! But I still had a lot of fun. It looked a bit better in reality than in the photos and videos. I enjoyed the ride on the longtail boat and the view of the many islands we passed. I also had really nice company with the young couple from Switzerland. Incidentally, they were the first German-speaking people I had ever met.
We had another long journey ahead of us. The next island was Ko Hin Ngam. What was special about it was the gravel, black gravel. We only made a short stop here as there was nothing to see apart from this special feature. I just found it very amusing how dedicated our guide was. You can see him in action here. It was not possible to anchor here, so he had to keep the boat here during our entire stay.
Our last stop was an area marked out with buoys in the middle of the sea. The boats were only moored to the buoys here. That was something different. So far, we have always snorkeled close to land. However, some of our group didn't want to go into the water here, as it was naturally deep and the land was quite a distance away. I thought it was great! I liked it, even though unfortunately we didn't see anything underwater.
Now we went back. Despite the poor visibility under water, it was a really nice trip and we saw a lot. We docked at Pattaya Beach, where we had also started from.
My way back to the hotel led through Walking Street, the heart of the island. This was an opportunity to pick up some sticky rice with fresh mango. What a treat!
It was now late afternoon. I treated myself to a coffee in the hotel bar and lay down on the platform provided for guests. You could enjoy the relaxed evening atmosphere from here...
As I do every evening, I made my way to Walking Street later in the evening to see what I could find for dinner tonight. I ended the evening at my favorite beach bar. It was another nice, relaxed day with new impressions.
Conclusion of the day:
Some of the tourists who were also on today's excursion went back to the hotel unhappy. The visibility while snorkeling was really poor in places, swimming around the jellyfish was no fun, the guide couldn't speak English...
“There are many paths to happiness. One of them is to stop complaining.” Albert Einstein
had said that. He was right. We had a wonderful day and saw many beautiful islands and beaches. The pictures speak for themselves. It could perhaps have been a little more beautiful. But let's look at the wonderful moments and things we were able to see today. Here in this paradise. Not everyone has the opportunity to do this in life.
Let's see the happiness that is right before our eyes.
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