We were booked on to a 4 hour tour of the island for this morning so were collected at 9am by our minibus. We managed to fit a fair bit into the time and it ended up being about 6hours instead! The first stop was at the Plai Laem Temple and the Joa Mae Kuan Im where there were various buildings and sights to see. The detail on the buildings is incredible and some parts are glittery and shiny! There were various monks present but they have nothing to do with women so we had to stay clear! Then we went on to see the Big Buddha statue which was huge!! We walked up the 73 steps and were treated to some excellent views over the bay. The Buddha itself was 12 metres high and sat at the top of the steps.
Then we went to a view point which overlooked our beach. The viewpoint was at road level and although quite away above sea level, not enough for amazing views. It was then on to see the grandmother and grandfather rocks which is where a love story is meant to have ended tragically. Next stop was to see a monkey show! It was a show where they did tricks but where they helped the workers by knocking the coconuts out of the trees! We watched as one climbed up the tree and spun each coconut until it fell to the ground! Much easier than getting a ladder and doing it yourself! We also got free coconut to eat and drink..yum! We had the chance to let a monkey sit on our arm! He was very grumpy looking and kept yawning and showing us his very sharp teeth! He left me with a big scratch from where he jumped off! While watching the monkeys one of the tour guides noticed a snake at the base of the tree. He was just a green snake and not harmful but still scary to see a wild one! Mark was less than impressed as he is always wary of them in the wild!
From the monkeys we went on to see a mummified monk! Loung Pordaeng died over 30 years ago while meditating and is still in the same position! It was very weird to see! We also met a little girl who had everyone fascinated! She had a big gong which when she rubbed it made a noise, however whenever anyone else rubbed it, it did nothing!! She wouldn't give her secret away but she was lovely and very smiley and happy!
Our last stop on the tour was at the Namuang falls. These falls originate at the mountain in the heart of the island. From the carpark you could hire elephants to take you on the very steep walk to them or a 4x4..we opted for the 4x4 as we want to do elephant trekking in Chiang Mai. The falls were lovely but weren't in full flow because of the lack of rain, however once we had just got back to the carpark and under shelter, we experienced a torrential rain storm! How we wished we were still at the falls! After admiring the elephants, including the cute baby ones having a shower, we were taken back to the hostel!
We then had various errands to run, including booking train tickets and buying food for our looooong journey tomorrow. We are getting a ferry to the north part of the peninsula and then a coach to Bangkok where we will catch the overnight sleeper train to Chiang Mai. We also managed to squeeze in a bit of shopping..well it ended up being quite a lot of shopping! Oops! We then had the mammoth task of rearranging our bags and sorting them out to make more space!