honeymoon tales: snakes, crabs and the lizard i didn't know about

I was in the bedroom, unpacking my Hello Kitty suitcase. Bathing suit on, I was ready to hit the water. If only I could find my beach cover-up.

"Are you afraid of snakes?" Jim yelled from our Thai sala-style living room next door.

I thought about that for a second, walked past the mosquito netting draped around the bed and to Jim, who stood with his back to me in the sala of our Thai-style beach villa.

"Yeah. Why do you ask?" I asked, eyes searching the thatched-roof ceiling, where Jim's eyes were trained.

On hearing my voice, and in much closer proximity than he probably anticipated, Jim turned quickly to face me. He shrugged with a forced casualness.

"No reason."

I stood there, trying to decipher the look on his face, the source of that unfamiliar look in his eye. Jim moved towards me and my eyes wandered up higher, above his head - where a green snake slithered along the bamboo framework of our Thai-style beach villa.


Photo courtesy of Jim

I suppressed a scream, badly. My body went into convulsions and I involuntarily jumped as I turned to run back into the relative safety of the bedroom. I was pretty sure I had peed myself a little bit, too. I found my cover-up and reached for my sunglasses.

"I'm going to the pool." I rinsed off in the outdoor shower, carefuly examining every tree branch on my way to the pool.

Ten minutes later, I was frolicking in the infinity pool. It was a warm, humid day and I leaned against the edge of the pool, sighing as I stared at the islands in the distance. Jim can't take as much sun, so he sat back in the shade at the corner of the pool.



"Are you afraid of crabs?"

"Yes, why?"

"There's one right by your foot, on the wall of the pool."


Photo courtesy of Jim

Without a word, I paddled to the far side of the pool. Jim didn't do anything about the crab. So I stayed at the far end until I was able to convince the two teenage Australian girls who were vacationing with their parents to fish the crab out of the pool using the Italian boy's red pail and return it to the beach.

I told Jim right before I started to hit the "publish" button on this blog post what I was blogging about.

He laughed and asked, "Did I ever tell you about the big lizard?"

I thought about that for a second. "Do you mean the lizard you pointed out to me on the wall of the villa? The one in the sala?"

He considered this and gestured, "The ones on the wall of our villa that were about this big?" indicating six inches with his forefingers.

"Yeah."

"No. I meant the one that I saw outside our villa, by the spa. That one was about the size of my forearm. I think it was a Komodo dragon."

"So whenever there was a lot of thrashing in the bushes outside our villa and you said it was probably a gardener working, you really meant it was a Komodo dragon?"

"Yeah."

"No, you didn't tell me about the big lizard."

honeymoon tales: ko yao noi

Jim and I flew into Phuket for the first half of our honeymoon. Our driver picked us up at the airport and drove us through the jungle and past rubber tree plantations. Within thirty minutes we were at Bang Rong Pier (picture below), boarding a long-tail boat for an hour ride to the resort.


Bang Rong Pier, photo courtesy of Jim

On our island resort of Ko Yao Noi, there wasn't much to do once the sun went down. And by that I mean nothing I want to blog about in any detail. Satellite television was available upon request, but I didn't realize that until I read the brochure when we returned home. I just thought there weren't any, by choice, in the 15 villas that comprised this resort. A choice I agreed with completely. There was a phone, but no directory and I assumed, nothing else on this island but another resort on the other side.

Every night, we'd watch the sun set over the limestone karsts just offshore. The lights from nearby Krabi (an hour away by boat) would twinkle in the distance and that's when we'd put down the books we were reading and head to the restaurant for dinner. Jim and I methodically went through the menu, having tried a good variety of dishes by the time we left. Desserts were wonderfully tropical items and my favorite was the bananas in coconut milk. Afterwards, we'd walk thirty feet back to our villa, a gazillion bright stars above, illuminating the way. We fell asleep every night listening to the sounds of frogs and the ocean at our doorstep.


Sunrise through the trees.

Just before sunrise, we'd hear the sounds of birds chirping and whistling and much to my surprise, we would wake up to watch the sunrise. The coconut palms scattered around the resort and at the edge of the grass helped to shade our villa from the brilliant morning light, filtering it, and framing our view of the limestone karsts in the water.


Low tide sunrise.

Other early risers would take the kayaks out for a early morning trek around our little, long island. Thanks to the karsts, the water is incredibly calm around our island and perfect for kayakers without experience or ability. I was almost tempted to try it, but decided to float in the pool instead. I repeated that choice about three times a day, almost every day. Not a bad start to a honeymoon.


Me, not kayaking. Photo courtesy of Jim