We arrived in Ao Nang, a small beach town near the larger town of Krabi on Thailand's west coast after a two hour drive from Suratthani. I'm sure that this has a lot to do with this weather, but this place was likeable from the moment we arrived. There seems to be more of a laid back backpacker scene here and the beach is nicer with a paved walkway and plenty of places to stay with ocean views. Unfortunately, we seem to have hit the first weekend of high season, so the prices and tourist population have gone up quite dramatically. After nosing around hotels that were already full, we finally found the Ao Nang Heritage Hotel, a grand establishment a 5 minute walk from the beach near one of Ao Nang's two McDonalds. The manager gave us two adjoining rooms on the top floor with ocean views for the same price that the other hotels were asking for for standard rooms.

      Last night we watched Thai boxing matches that take place right outside of town in an arena in which seats cost a whopping 500 baht. I'm sure, however, that locals don't pay a cent because the only 500 baht seats were filled with white tourists while the nosebleed seats down on the floor by the ring were packed with Thais cheering for their favorite. When we paid for tickets we were given a sheet with the bouts listed out. We couldnt figure out what the numbers stood for- 28, 35, 48, and so on, but we found out immediately upon entering the stands. They were the weights of the fighters in kilograms. Yes, there was one who weighed only 28 kg. Because most of them were children. Out of the 9 fights the average age must have been barely 12 or 13. It threw me off to watch small children beat the crap out of eachother. All of them were quick as lightening. One second and they had already kicked and put their foot down again. Amazing. All of them. Can you imagine being able to have a 20 year career by the age of 29. No wonder many muay thai fighters retire in their mid twenties. They must be worn out by that age.

      Through the hotel I booked a half day cooking course at the home of a woman nicknamed Ya who used to run a restaurant but now teaches cooking school to tourists- I'm sure that this is the more lucrative business choice given that we paid 1000 baht a head and there were 12 people there on a Saturday morning. Ya was a blast- she spoke in doubles: "chop, chop", "cut, cut", "eat, eat", joked around, and made this great hum of approval once in a while. She taught us to cook red, green, and Massaman curries, several types of Thai soups including tom kha kai, green papaya salad, and phat thai. The food we made was better than any food I have eaten here so far. The secret to great Thai food is stinky shrimp paste and lots of coconut milk. I saw a keffir lime for the first time and it looks like a warty lime or a stunted bitter melon. The peel and skin are tremendously aromatic. After sampling all the food we cooked, I was stuffed and barely rolled out of there back to the hotel.

          Once I returned to the hotel in early afternoon, I was determined to do something active other than cooking and eating. I walked down to the beach and proceeded to stoll purposefully up and down the sand strip. Quickly bored with this, I rented a colorful orange kayak for an hour for only 100 baht (about 2.50 dollars) and paddled up and down the coast. The water was fairly calm, but the air was filled with the constant buzz of motorboats taking tourists from one island to the other. The noise interrupted my paradise. That, and my nagging fear of sharks. I know that the chances of one of the boats hitting me is probably 1000 times the chance of a shark leaping out of the water to take a nip out of me, but I couldn't help myself. I made sure to paddle strongly and slap the water every once in a while to make sure the great big sharks knew who was boss. If one even tried a nibble, it would have gotten a tremendous smack on the schnozz. After growing tired of cruising along the sand beach, I decided to head off towards some rock formations near the east side of the beach. It took quite a while to get out there and the water must have been pretty deep, but the trip was worth it. A towering limestone formation that looked big from afar was simply massive when I stared up at it from its base. The craggy limestone cliffs pockmarked with caves and dropping straight into the water are impressive,and even more so when viewed from the water, a tiny little dinghy floating about in a world of water and waves (and hungry sharks).