MIKE AND JESS' TRAVEL DIARY

I am lumping these days together because we did the exact same thing on both.

 

Originally, we were supposed to go on our second climbing trip on the 12th. Mike’s toe was not looking healed enough and we were both very run-down, so we decided to have a free day. On the 13th, we were planning to take a longtail to nearby islands. Again, we were a bit too lazy and uninterested.

 

Both days, we hopped into the pool right outside of our room and relaxed. We walked a few feet outside of the hotel to get food for most meals. In the evenings, we had dinner and went to one of the thousand bars nearby. The big rage here are “buckets.” These are sand buckets (colorful plastic buckets we give to kids to play in the sand with) and the bartenders fill them up with ice, and your cocktail of choice. Yes, a children’s toy bucket filled with Mai Tai or Kamikaze. They give you a couple of straws and charge you $5. As you can imagine, by 8pm most visitors are drunk and stumbling around. Most bars even have beer pong and other drinking games. It feels like upon arrival on this island, everyone else was handed a memo that says, “Men: You must wear tank tops cut so low your nipples are out, walk around our dirty alleys barefoot, Oh and you cannot forget, be as loud and obnoxious as possible. Women: Dress as if you are trying to attract these types of men.” We are not really judgmental people normally, but we felt very out-of-place in this crowd.