We started the day off by going on two boat dives near Phi Phi Don Island. The 1st dive was off Bidah Nok and the second dive, known as Whale Shark Corner, was off the island that the movie “The Beach” was filmed (Phi Phi Lei). The diving was beautiful…tons of fish everywhere and lots of colorful coral.  The dive staff at Island Divers were super nice and fun.  After diving we went back to Phi Phi Don and had lunch at our favorite Italian restaurant, Amico’s, where we had lunch every day (great thin crust pizza).  In the late afternoon we went on our second boat ride for the day back to Phi Phi Lei Island to spend the night on the beach at Maya Bay, famous from the movie “The Beach”. We stopped in the middle of the bay and to go kayaking and snorkeling…the water was a gorgeous shade of turquiose!  At dusk they loaded us from the larger boat onto a little Duffy boat and took us to the beach, but the tide was super low, so when the bottom started scraping we had to get out, grab our stuff and walk the rest of the way in the water.  During the day Maya Bay is packed with boats full of tourists, but at night it was just us, the 15 other campers and the Thai crew.  Well prepared travelers that we are, we made cocktails with the bottle of rum and cokes that we brought with us.  Armed with cameras and cocktails in hand, we walked along the beach and saw the most amazing sunset over the ocean between two huge cliffs.  Back at camp the locals had formed a circle and were singing and playing the drums.  Instead of joining the group of campers, we decided to join the circle of locals instead.  They were all so sweet and so much fun!  They had us cracking up as we all tried to remember the lyrics to the songs they were playing…it was definitely a group effort to get through some of the songs.  That night on the beach was probably one of the most beautiful things we’ve ever experienced…it’s hard to describe with words, but I’ll try.  There was the most amazing plankton in the water that glowed a whitish blue and glittered like diamonds…you could go in the water and move your hands and feet and it would light up all around you. The mountain cliffs were silhouetted against the bright star filled sky behind them…we even saw shooting stars. The cliff to the right of the bay looked like a monkey head and the one to the left looked like a gorilla’s head.  To top it all off there was a lightening storm rolling in overhead that was lighting up some of the white puffy clouds in the sky…it was like a light bulb was being turned on and off.  It was absolutely stunning! 
 
After they performed a fire dance show on the beach they gave us straw mats and sleeping bags to lay on the sand.  It was too warm to sleep inside them so we used them for extra cushions and slept in our light weight sleep sacks instead.  Shortly after we got settled and laid down it started to rain.  Everyone grabbed their mats and made a mad dash for the end of the beach where the cliffs gave some shelter…the rain still hit my feet but it didn’t bother me because it was still so warm. It only lasted for 10 minutes, then the sky cleared up and we moved our beds back to the beach under the stars.  Apparently the people who decided to stay under the cliffs had problems with rats and crabs crawling on them while they were sleeping and some guys even wanted to be taken back to their hotels…but we were okay since we slept by the water, we may have had a few crabs crawling around us but I was so tired I barely noticed. 
 
The next morning we woke up early and walked to the other side of the island to watch the sunrise.  Then we did yoga on the beach, had breakfast, took a group picture and went for a swim…it was so nice, it felt like our own private beach. They started loading everyone up on the boat to head back to the big island, but we were having such a great time that we didn’t want to leave, so the owner of the camp and island said that we could stay longer and go back on his speed boat with him and his two sons instead of going back on the slow boat with everyone else.  It was so much fun racing across the water next to the beautiful huge limestone cliffs.  He even took us snorkeling in a gorgeous little bay that was surrounded by tall cliffs on all sides. Then he took us snorkeling at Monkey Beach where we saw tons of beautiful fish and the coolest neon purple starfish with black pricks coming out of it and a white sea snake that almost blended in with the white coral.  After that he took us to the back side of Phi Phi Don Island.   To thank them we invited him and his sons to lunch, but he had to go so only his younger son, Adam, joined us.  Adam is so sweet and speaks great English and French.  Since we were all a little stiff from sleeping on the beach we asked him if he knew of a good place to get massages.  He said his mom’s friend (who’s a ladyboy) owned P.P. Garden Massage, so after lunch he took us there.  It felt so amazing that one hour wasn’t enough, so we got 2 hours instead and were in sheer bliss!  What a wonderful 24 hours…it couldn’t have been any better!