Finally time to leave. Stayed the night before my departure in Ao Nang, as I was flying out at 10am and wasn’t quite sure I’d be able to get a boat in the morning. Met a couple of English climbers – and played pool and darts with them.

The darts was actually lots of fun – a version I’d never played before – they called it cricket. Very tactical. The aim is to get the least points. Now, you have the numbers 20->15 and then Doubles, Triples and the Bulls (outer or inner rings). You have to hit each number 3 times (but if you get a double it counts for 2 etc.) Once you have all three hits on a particular number (or double or triple) then you’re safe – but if you hit the number again, you give your opponents points.

For example, I hit the number 20 three times , but you’ve only hit it twice. If I hit it again, you get 20 points.. A really fun game actually.

Then back up to Bangkok… had 24 hours up there, wandered around seeing temples and the palace.

And all too soon time to go home. Amazing trip though. Just amazing.

Had a fun last night on the island.. we headed climbing – just a few easy routes, and then there was a fire party over at Tonsai – so away we headed to see Job2Do playing (an excellent reggae acoustic type gig thingy!)

It was heaps of fun, and two things worthy of note – one was jumping though a fire hoop (not hot at all!)

And the other was heading out drinking with (and I admit I’d no idea who he was until it was explained) a guy called Tim Emmett.

He’s a world class (madman) climber / deep water soloer. This link is of Tim, Chris Sharma, and a few others deep water soloing in Croatia. Stunning pictures.

And that, pretty much, was the end of my time in Rai Lay. I will, without any shadow of a doubt, be back climbing there again within the next 2 or 3 years. Hopefully next year!

After the rest day it was back to climbing until I left. This is a pic of Kyle on a really fun looking 6C over on the Phra Nang side of the peninsula.

There was a certain amount of partying done too. It’s quite easy to have *slightly* too much, from time to time. But that’s ok ;)

But the highlight for me anyway, was when we went deep water soloing. We hired a long tail (boat) for the day, and a kayak – (well two of each) and 15 of us headed out. So off we went amongst the islands, and when we saw one we liked the look of we’d head over to it, get into the kayaks…

and start climbing straight onto the rock. When you got tired, or had enough, you just fall into the water. It was heaps of fun.

This pic is of Robert getting kinda high on the rock

and then jumping in…

Just so much fun though. Some of the starts were kinda hard. Often you had to grab onto stalactites straight off the kayak and start climbing. This was a little too hard for me (at the moment – but I will be back) – This pic Aaron having established himself on one of the stalactites.

Really was one of the best days though. We then went out for dinner in ‘The Banyan Tree’. A restaurant over on the Tonsai side. It was the best meal I had there, absolutely fantastic. Would highly recommend the vegetable tempura as being incredible value for money.

On the way home we went for a swim in the phosphorescent water. Just floating in the warm glowing water looking up at the perfectly starry night was an excellent way to cap off the day.

Then it was more climbing – this one a pic of me top roping some quite fun 6C on Tonsai wall. I really want to get back to Rai Lay when I’m climbing just a tiny bit better than I currently am (so next year ;) When I can really enjoy leading these climbs.

It was an incredibly scenic place to be though – this is the view from Eagle Wall (you have to get a boat out there – and then walk back at low tide)

There was some fun easy climbing on Eagle wall.. this is me leading the 6a+ (quite tricksy I thought). It’s a huge pillar.

So generally it was 3 or 4 days climbing and then a rest day (or two). On one of the days we headed to Krabi again (hired a taxi for the day) – and walked up 1237 steps (I think) up to a Buddhist temple. Great views out over the province – but it really was hot climbing up there.

L->R Aaron,Aaron(yes, another)&Heather;, Mandy & Scott, Simon.

Front – Me, Jesse.

The steps really were quite steep though. At some places it was more like a ladder than a staircase.

After that it was time to relax, so we headed to the hot pools (yes, still wonderful to relax in in hot weather!) It was great just soaking until the sun went down.

On the 21st (which happened to be my bday) we went off to Krabi – to see if we could help with the tsunami effort. We took a bus there (definitely the cheapest way of getting around)

Left to Right – (Mandy, Me, Aaron)

We got the address of the regional HQ (in a Chinese temple area) and off we went to find it. It was – disturbing – to see the boards with pictures of bodies recovered. Brings it all home a bit. You see, you’d *hardly* have known that anything had happened to the area. Well, where we were at any rate. There was some construction going on – but it wasn’t obvious that it was reconstruction after a tidal wave. It was little things – like one place we often went for breakfast (BoBo’s) only has 2 menus left as all the others got washed away.. But really, for the most part it’s just as perfect as ever it was. And it’s really sad for them as it’s the height of their high season and the numbers just aren’t there. Though it was heartening – in the two weeks we were there it was definitely getting busier towards the end.

So yes, we went to give them our water purification gear (which they loved) and medical supplies, and to see if we could help. Perhaps if we’d been able to help for a month or two it might have been different, but in the event they did not call us.

It took me a minute to realise what all the boxes piled up were for.

But on the whole everyone is getting on with it (as much as they can anyway) and really pitching in and putting it all back together again. All they need – indeed the best way to help is really just to go there and spend your money.