No disaster links today. (That’s a choice, of course, not an actual state of affairs, as we all know.) Anyway, the background in the screenshot above interrupted my moderate (so far, I reckon last season was better) enjoyment of The White Lotus. It’s a phenomenon I have written about before, that recognising scenery wrecks your suspension of disbelief while watching TV and movies. Life is tough in so many ways, eh.
I was quietly pleased, though, that my identification of the location was instant and the memory vivid, because my cruise through these spectacular islets (in a much less fancy boat, natch) took place way back in early 2009, even before this blog lurched into existence. Look:
How could you forget something like that? It's in Phang Nga Bay, in Phuket, Thailand. I was there on a working trip, my second time in the country (or third, if you count a stop at Bangkok airport after aborting in just Singapore my 1977 overland OE to England. Ran out of money. Had enough to buy a souvenir bronze letter opener though - which I last used just this morning). It was a very busy famil, and what with being on the go all day and evening, plus everything being so vibrant and colourful, the five days felt much longer.
The cruise out in the bay, even, though very pleasant, had its tensions too - most notably squeezing inside a couple of these hollow islets. We did it in rubber inflatables, and when it turned out that the tide was a bit on the high side to get easily through the tunnels, they told us to lie flat with our heads in each others’ laps while they let some air out of the rafts, so we could just scrape through, pulling ourselves along by grabbing at the rocky roof, and scaring off the little bats clinging there. OSH would not have been impressed.
We managed it, though (the second island was much more of a challenge than the first one, above) and it really was lovely inside - very quiet and peaceful, with egrets perched on mangrove branches and brown spotty jellyfish in the super-clear water. All my laid-back chill was wrecked later on, however, back at my hotel, the Indigo Pearl resort with its enthusiastic industrial chic theme, when I once again took four wrong turns in the grounds on the way back to my room. I blamed exhaustion and lingering jetlag, but really the designer needed to take some responsibility. Also, the creepy big metal spider on the mosquito coil burner? That didn't help with the ambiance. Not something those rich people in The White Lotus had to put up with, I bet.
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