Our Travr family started our journey through Thailand south with a flight to Krabi. Though its maybe not technically an island, we had to take a longboat taxi to Railay beach so it certainly had an island feel. There was a bit of beach on either side of a narrow strip of land, no more than a few hundred meters wide and 1 km long , with towering limestone cliffs on either side. We climbed to the top of one for some views, and as if that wasn’t high enough, we also climbed the trees to get a little higher.

Travr is cool because if books the journey, mostly the transportation and accommodation, but besides a couple of meals and a handful of activities, you’re left with a lot of free time to eat when/where you want and try things that float your boat. The problem was that all the Travr activities were exactly what I wanted to do, so I got to relax and get some more massages and poolside time.

We went ATVing in Krabi, which meant 13 excited young adults shown up, signed their lives away, got a helmet and an ATV, and were set free. A sentence or two for a safety talk, but no lessons or instructions  on how to drive an ATV. We drove around, sticking together as a group, but I’m still impressed no one got hurt or disappeared on their bike. I was certainly tempted to do a little off-roading and a few close calls and tree crashes later, we all came back in one piece.

We had incredible sunsets, infinity pools, and pool games before heading on to Koh Phi Phi. It’s a slice of paradise, and a slice of party, inseparable from each other on this tiny island. We took a longboat tour to do some snorkeling, cliff-jumping, and checked out the eerie, inhabited Viking cave. I got attacked at Monkey Beach, but others were lucky enough to have friendly monkeys pose prettily on their knees or shoulders.

We stayed at the PP Princess resort, which had only handsome European and Moroccan pool boy waiters, making the pool a very attractive place to waste time at. Sadly the pool shut at 7pm, so we had to find other things to entertain us in the evenings; Thai boxing and beer pong where a thing, as well as fire dancing and neon/black light discotheques.

At Phuket, we had yet another beachside pool to enjoy, with buckets on Happy hour and Bangla road calling us out in the evenings. We made it to one ping pong show, and I can’t even begin to start explaining what we saw there. Acts that were just as shocking as impressive, and disgusting to witness but too interesting to turn away from… obviously cameras weren’t allowed and words can’t begin to express the sights, so I’ll just stop there. Go see your own ping pong show if you dare!