Our ship docked in Phuket, Thailand early in the morning, but we actually spent the day in the adjacent province Phang Nga. It was nearly a 2 hour trip by bus across the island of Phuket to the mainland (joined by a short bridge). There was plenty of time for our guide to tell us about customs of Thailand and how he lost his job as a coconut harvester because they have trained monkeys to harvest coconuts. We drove past rubber plantations, and it was interesting to see that they plant pineapple in the rows between the young rubber trees so that the plantation is producing something before the rubber can be tapped.
We switched over to a long tourist boat at the pier in Phang Na bay, then spent a few hours on the water touring the islands.
We boated through a limestone cave, and took a few pictures of the island used in James Bond, "The man with the golden gun".
We then stopped at a fishing village held up on stilts in the water. The guide and the material for the tour called it the "Muslim fishing village" because all the people who live there are Muslim. They clearly cater to tourists - one side of the village is restaurants with piers for the long tour boats. Through the restaurants, there are shops selling all sorts of souvenirs (pashminas, shell or pearl jewellery, ice cream bars).
Then we boated back to the pier for a tasty buffet lunch. Particularly good was the chicken cashew stir fry. There were also fresh lychees and other (hairy) berries to sample.
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