Thailand day 9: Krabi

Monday, December 24th

My last day was one of the best. I packed up and checked out at 9am and went for breakfast. I ran into Shannon and Naomi again and we chatted over breakfast for a while. By 10am, I was back on the moped headed toward Khao Phanom Bencha National Park (the correct way, this time). I stopped a few times along the way to admire the environs and got to the park around 11am. There I took the trail to the large waterfall. It was really spectacular (and unfortunately didn't show well in the pictures). It has many different cascades. Once again, I found myself with the run of the place for the most part and enjoyed the solitude. From there I took a path up above the waterfall and into the forest. It was actually quite a strenuous hike and after an hour or so, I was wondering where exactly I was and if I'd make it back in time to catch my 7pm flight. By a half an hour later, I emerged back near where I started, with a t-shirt drenched in sweat and sore feet and calves. But this was my last day, so onward ho.

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Since it was still early, I decided to take in a couple of stops on the way back. The first stop was Tham Khao Pheung cave. After a short hike, I arrived, saw a few bats, and was inundated with swarms of mosquitoes and decided it was time to move on.

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The last stop was Wat Tham Seua which is built into a cave. But that wasn't the most interesting part. Rather, climbing over 1200 steps to a mountain top, 360-degree view point was. As always, it was hot and humid, so I passed many defeated tourists on the way up but I pushed on -- past the aggressive monkeys, to the top. It should be noted that on the way up, a monkey literally jumped on my back, took off my backpack, and stole my water bottle from the side pocket. What I had been considering cute little animals were now officially on my "Dead to Me" list, ala Stephen Colbert. Aside from a bit of shock, I was fine and made my way to the top. I didn't have much time left, so after a short respite, I climbed back down and rode back to my hostel where I returned the moped and showered and then caught a 5pm bus to the airport for my 6:50pm scheduled flight.

What's a vacation without a scare involving an international flight? So, yeah, my 6:50pm flight should have gotten me into Bangkok around 8:00pm which should have given me 3 1/2 hours to kill at the airport before my 11:30pm flight back to Tokyo. But no. It was delayed over 2 hours and didn't leave until 9:20pm leaving me an anxiety inducing 1 hour to make an international connection. Thankfully, AirAsia, was phenomenal about the delay. I told them about the connection and they pulled out all the stops. They gave me priority boarding (it's open seating like Southwest) and I got to board first and sit in the front. When we disembarked at 10:30pm, my bag was sitting on the tarmac waiting for me and I had a personal van to take me to the terminal while everyone else filed into large buses. At the terminal, I got a personal escort all the way to the check in desk and was there in plenty of time, even if it hadn't been delayed by 20 minutes, which I welcomed.

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The rest was pretty standard. After a 2 hour time change, I arrived in Tokyo at 7:30am, cleared customs and immigration, took a bus to Yokohama station, the subway to my stop, Motosumiyoshi and hoofed it 15 minutes back to the apartment and was welcomed by a freshly baked lasagna by my wonderful girlfriend.