Time in Krabi

Pictures (I know why you're really here)

Michael, J, and I arrived in Krabi in the early evening, we grabbed a taxi to the hotel (a really nice place called White Sand quite a ways off the beaten path, recommended by Raleigh and Nick). It's a 3 story small building with significantly nicer amenities than our AirBnB in Chiang Mai, but certainly not a resort - the perfect mix for our needs.
We ate Thai food at a nearby (10 min walk) restaurant - what I assume is the Thai version of a greasy spoon. The bathroom was a toilet in an outhouse out back and the place to wash hands for that was a spigot which was also being used for laundry. Michael and I had our first coconuts, turns out fresh coconut water is nothing like the packaged stuff that's sold at a premium. Straight from the nut, it's sweet and refreshing. Most of the fun there was actually scooping out the jelly-like flesh and deciding with every bite if I actually liked it or not.

Friday morning was an early start for me, I woke up around 4:00am local time, ran 2.5 miles along a pre-sunrise beach (sand running is hard), and paced up and down it after the sun came through. It was pretty cloudy; so the perfect sunrise, I did not see. An incredible array of shells, rocks, and crabs litter the beach - also, unfortunately some litter.
First activity of the day involved venturing out to the more touristy Ao Nang beach to see what was around. Of course the best way to do that was with motorbikes! We asked the front desk where to rent them and seemingly with magic, she was bringing 3 motorbikes out for us. She handed us helmets and the keys and that was it! Training was provided by J, who has his own motorbike in Chiang Mai. A 20 minute open-air drive down local roads with no apparent concrete traffic laws brought us to a buzzing market on the road where we had some coffee, explored, ate lunch, then walked along Ao Nang beach below. The overcast sky seemed to be dropping as a haze prevented us from seeing any of the fairly nearby islands (read: towering rock formations) clearly.
On our way back from the beach, we detoured through some farm land to get a closer view of some of the rock formations (dubbed the cliffs of insanity by me).
Once back to our quiet area, we did what one does in paradise: relax on the beach. laying and reading turned to swimming, then in drying off I went playing in the sand of course! I made a friend, Kevin, a 5 year old from China who helped me dig a 4.5ft hole and let me practice my Chinese.
A quick shower and change of clothes and we decided we wanted to try Thai's Italian food. Down the road we motorbiked to get very fancy pizza, risotto, and pasta before calling it a night.

Saturday we were picked up at 7:00am and dropped off at the Krabi Diving Center. We were fitted with wetsuits and masks then got in the back of a truck for a quick ride (basically back to our hotel area) to a beach with hundreds of these wooden boats with outboard motors (the most outboard possible, as the entire engine was resting on a gimbal on the back of the boat. The engine had a 15 ft rod with a propeller at the end which allowed the driver to steer. All of the boats were sponsored by the same purple and gold bank. A 30 minute loud boat ride to some of those "islands" and we were ready to begin lessons. The instructor, Gao, knew I was certified, that Michael had been before, and this was J's first. After verbally explaining basic safety measures and claiming he would be in charge of Michael and J's BCA (Buoyancy Control Apparatus), we back-flipped into the water for some more lessons. Turns out that wasn't needed, and similar to the motorbikes, Gao lead us down right away. We went on 2 separate 40 minute dives, the second one was about 14 meters (45ft) deep at the lowest. Incredible fish, sea anemones, urchins, coral, sponges, and more. We saw four lion fish total, definitely the highlight for me.
After the second dive, Gao gave us a meal he picked up from a street vendor before boarding - rice, egg, spicy onions and peppers, and squid, including an entire squid about 5 inches in length. I tried the rings of the squid but wasn't brave enough to attempt the whole guy. Watermelon was also cut up for us, which we chowed down on the loud drive back to shore.
Diving took a lot out of us so a nap was in order, of course.
We rented motorbikes again to head into town and eat at an Indian place, which was incredible.
The night ended with us drinking some local beer (Chang) on the beach, as one does in paradise.

This morning, we're heading off for a 5 mile hike, maybe updates from that soon.