Day 22 Back to the marina



Stalactites hang from the rock face

We stared to make our way back to the marina, stopping at some Ko Hongs Dan had read about. The first took us through a long dark tunnel; once beyond the first couple bends it was pitch black, bats could be heard roosting on the ceiling above. The tide was still too high to find the entrance for us on the first round, but the others who took the second trip in could see a thin sliver of light beneath a rock and swam under it into the Ko Hong. The second was accessed by a short tunnel, underneath which kayaks can paddle at low tide. When you get to the end it looks like the scene from the land that time forgot.





Bats hang from the ceiling in the tunnel, visible only by the light of the camera flash

It was Nigels birthday, so Em baked a delicious chocolate cake from scratch which we all enjoyed in the cockpit with some coffee, tea and young coconuts Dan had purchased earlier in the trip; he kept them in the fridge and the ice cold coconut water was very refreshing.



Nigel cuts his birthday cake, notice the slant to the cake from baking it while the boat was heeled over

We made our way carefully back to the marina, it was low tide and the charts showed we would have just 4 inches of clearance under the keel at the best of conditions. There are no marked channels and it’s a good thing the bottom is soft since we did touch a couple times, requiring backing up ever so slowly and moving over just a bit to clear. We made it as far as the entrance between the outermost finger pier and the fuel dock, but the pass was just too shallow to get in so we anchored off the marina for the night and would come in during the rising tide in the morning.
We had dinner at a small restaurant a short walk from the marina, the food was good but it was more tourist Thai rather than the real thing; I had ordered the salt crusted whole local fish, a dish I had been wanting to try, and ended up with a filet that seemed to had been previously frozen. Nigel ordered a bottle of champagne and we all had a toast to his birthday (39th I think).
We took the dingy back to Skyelark and did our best to finish up the spirits on board as Dan will be on a strict work and health regimen once the charter is officially over. I spent the night on deck again, enjoying the cool night air one more time before I start to make my way home tomorrow.