Maya Bay - Phi Phi Leh

visited November 2014

Sunset from The Beach - Maya Bay attracts thousands of visitors but not too many are around this time of day. Shot should click-expand nicely


The unsettled national park island of Phi Phi Ley is about 6km from the pier at Phi Phi Don, 50km from Phuket's main pier, 40km from Krabi town and 30km from Lanta's Saladan pier - image Google Earth


Trip destinations and route (modified Google Earth)


My plan is to stay on every island in Thailand with affordable accommodation. The problem with Phi Phi Leh/Ley/Lay/Le is that until recently it was impossible to stay overnight on this National Park island. A few years back someone started overnight camping trips there - that doesn't seem to have lasted, but it is now possible to do a one night Maya Bay Sleep Aboard visit. I've done lots of sleep- aboards in various parts of the world and enjoyed them immensely, so I jumped at the chance.

**sleeping on the beach -"don't tell anyone!" says the young Thai tour leader. As if - with at least one travel-blogger and a whole lot of people who are going to write reviews for their booking company and others. btw I got the impression with the fairly slick dinner/post dinner entertainment/sleeping organisation and the indifference of national park staff to our presence  that this sleeping on the beach was not to much an unusual occurrence.

It took about 30minutes to motor across to Ley. First stop was off the Viking Cave. These days the public can't access it (I went in on a day trip in the late 80s) but our boat's tour leader gave an interesting talk about the birds' nesting and why it is called Viking (birds' nesters, trapped by bad weather in the past, spent the time painting - apparently viking style paintings).

The tide that day was too low for the usual snorkeling in nearby Phi Le Bay, so that was postponed until the next day and we........

.....motored around to Maya Bay.

Still a reasonable amount of boats and people for 1730 but nothing like the ridiculous jam you get earlier in the day, as can be seen by....


....this pic, shot around 1000 in March 2013 from my Phuket to Phi Phi Don ferry ,which always does a circumnavigation of Phi Phi Ley before docking. Click-expand for detail.
This ferry is called the Phi Phi Cruiser - half the passengers are day-trip people - the circumnavigation of Ley is the only exposure they get to the island and this is as close as they get to The Beach. I personally would be unhappy - there are better day-trips out of Phuket.

A quick unscheduled snorkeling session in the north of the bay before we headed for the beach saw sadly deteriorated coral since my last session there in the late 80s - some fish to look at however.

And then to The Beach......

From the south - time 1900


And the north. Note smaller beach background left easily waded to at low tide. Tour guide said water in that region good for spotting harmless small black tipped reef sharks. 


A bit later


Later still


These days, the area in back of The Beach has a series of paths thru the tropical scrub - didn't exist in the late 80s, but that was before THAT movie. National Parks has set up at least two canteen areas where you can buy basic eats and drinks (including beer - for the past 5 years or so NP has had a no-alcohol rule, this was the first I've heard of the relaxation of the ban - later comfirmed at Ko Rok). There are 2 toilet/shower blocks behind The Beach too.

One of the paths leads to the other side of the island where a platform gives you a look at an east coast inlet.


Platform/inlet from the boat next day


This shot shows the behind-beach area fairly well. The clearing we ate in is close to the beach right of center. Most of us slept in in a sandy section off the beach against the far right headland - wider than it looks from shot's angle. The east coast inlet can be seen background center.
(image dreamerattractions.com - but this site seems to be currently defunct)


National Park canteen foreground - our boat people set up dinner in area behind, used structure background left as guests' bag storage/boat's utility storage area. Pessimist tezza checked region in shot for shelter - figured if it rained there was enough sit-up shelter for us, forget about stretching out. No mattresses bought ashore anyhow.