Return to Ao Chalong and went ashore to both shop and dine.
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| Big Buddha from Ao Chalong Anchorage |
Dining en route to the shops, it became apparent that Thai style curry, (not spicy) is way beyond Jo's not spicy/hot tolerance gauge . After swapping meals, with Steve, its been unanimously decided that possibly sticking to Pad Thai noodles, unless dining in heavily 'touristed' areas might be safer for her.
Shopping was a success, so returned to the boat via a taxi, as we had frozen goodies and stopped en route to grab a bag of ice ,as the cockpit fridge seems to have given up the will to live. It's not vital but it is handy for drinks, and the storage of veges and fruit, when it was working.
It was I suspect about here on the journey, that I apparently parted company with my phone, as I alighted from taxi to buy the ice. I think it slipped from my pocket onto the seat.
We arrived back at the very long Ao Chalong Pier, caught the wee transport 'bus', back to the seaward end and it was now I felt for the phone and realised I was in fact, sans phone.
Yes, the taxis display both the number and name of the driver. Could any of us remember it? Of course not! I was pretty sure that the number was a combination of an old postcode. Jo thought the drivers surname was something like ????? and I was pretty sure his first name was Watsur or Surwat. The boys had no idea!
The only thing to do, with the very limited information I had, was to return to the taxi rank and hope that as the street system was basically a one way set up , with the exception of a 5 way roundabout about 500m from where we had been dropped at the pier, that our friendly driver had returned to the same rank, located as it was, outside the supermarkets.
A 15 minute hike back to the rank and there was the taxi- but no driver.
I asked the other drivers ( in fluent English!) if they knew where the driver was as I had lost my phone and maybe it was in the taxi.
Yes ,yes madam, ( perhaps the trend setting bright pink board shorts, with the offendingly shallow pockets, aren't really disguising my age, I note I'm getting called madam more often) just wait we phone him. Yes, yes he find phone.
About 10mins later, he reappeared on the back of a motor bike with phone in hand. I think he may have been in the process of taking it the near by police station.
Reunited with my phone, (which during the intervening 30mins of being phone less I had realised is actually like my brain these days, in fact it retains far more information than my brain does, now I think about it ) and declining the offer of a lift on the back of a motor bike, I returned to the pier, with life returned to its normal harmonious status.
Steve had delivered the others and he shopping back to K'Gari and then come back to the pier to await my return. He hadn't been back long, as he had in fact had to refuel the dinghy after almost running out of petrol on the return to K'Gari with the shopping.
Just a we set off,so was a woman in another dinghy. She was rowing . She explained she was returning to her yacht under oars as still “no part”, for her motor had turned up. We offered her a tow, for which I imagine she was most grateful as it turns out she was almost as far away from the pier as we were.
The road stead at Ao Chalong, especially where we had anchored for our envisioned stay of only a couple of hours is a bit like the track at Le Mans. The tourist traffic, especially morning and evening is fast and furious. We heaved anchor as the returning wave of boats could be seen heading our way, and made for Banana Bay on Coral Island (Koh Hae). This is allegedly a less frantic anchorage! We arrived there about 1700 just in time to participate in a “sandwich manoeuvre” by two tourist catamarans, both overtaking us as they raced to the floating jetty to pick up their passengers. I wouldn’t have minded “playing", but I did find it a bit disconcerting not knowing what the rules of the game were!
Safely anchored in 19m- it shelves steeply, of allegedly sand , we ran out 80m plus the bridle- I never feel comfortable without at least 4:1 ratio of anchor chain, the more the better!
The tourists all departed and we had the place to ourselves. There is 'resort' in this bay, but it appears to be more of a day time resort, but clearly staff stay on the island overnight.
A quiet night at anchor. We did in fact drag during the night. I think we moved about 20m, but all was well.
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