A Must Visit

Visiting the Phi Phi Islands in Thailand was one of the most incredible experiences in my life.

Originally when we were planning this trip, we were unsure which tour group we wanted to go with. Should we do a sunrise trip? What about a morning trip at normal hours since we’d probably be tired (and so we can get our free hotel breakfast (thanks Hyatt status))? After some back and forth, we decided to do the sunrise trip and it was the best decision we could have ever made.

For context, this blog post is written about our experience visiting in January 2023. We were staying in the Kamala Beach area of Phuket at the Hyatt Regency Phuket (blog post for that coming eventually). We chose this tour from Viator — we’ve used Viator several times for our previous trip to Italy so we trusted that site. Our tour included the national park fees in the original price so we didn’t have to pay anything extra. It had great reviews so we weren’t concerned!

Phi Phi Facts

The Phi Phi Islands are notoriously famous in Thailand for their beauty. There are six islands that make up the Phi Phi Islands. There are ferries that go to Koh Phi Phi from Phuket, Koh Lanta, and Krabi or you have the option to take private tours. One of the most famous destination is Maya Bay. In fact, Maya Bay was featured in the film “The Beach” with Leonardo DiCaprio. Maya Bay was closed for over three years and reopened in January 2022. We paid our visit a year later in January 2023. You aren’t allowed to swim in the waters of Maya Bay and sharks lurk in the water (we saw a baby shark!).

Tour Time

A couple days before our tour, we received a message from our tour guide. Here are some key pieces of information from that message:

PICKUP TIME : 04:55am on Thu, Jan 19, 2023
LOCATION : Hyatt Regency Phuket Resort
TOUR : Phi Phi Sunrise

WHAT TO BRING:
• Passport number (no need to bring actual passport)
• Cash or credit card if you have a balance owing
• Hotel towel
• Light shoes (sandals, flip flops/thongs)
• Sunscreen
• Camera

Destinations: Royal Phuket Marina (30 mins), Maya Bay (1hr), Pileh Bay (40 mins), Monkey Beach (10 mins), Viking Cave (45 mins), Nui Beach (45 mins), Phi Phi Holiday Resort (lunch), Bamboo Island (1hr)

A friendly reminder when sampling Thailand’s wonderful street food…!
In the case of last-minute cancellations due to food poisoning, sickness, or any other reason, we have a process of how we handle these cases.

Bright and early at 4:55am, a driver showed up at our hotel as we were told. We drove around to other nearby touristy towns to pick up several other tour guests. We made it to the Royal Phuket Marina at 5:30am where we were greeted with a light breakfast of fruit, yogurt, coffee, etc while everyone got checked in. We shortly departed after into the pitch black Andaman Sea.

That experience in and of itself was unbelievable. Firstly, I couldn’t believe that we were in Thailand. My fiancé and I spent months planning and it was our first trip to Asia together. But secondly, we were in the middle of this massive sea early in the morning, with no idea what the day held for us. Our boat raced to the Phi Phi Islands as the sun rose, and they even stopped our boat to watch the sunrise.

After awhile, we made it to the giant rock formations in the distance and rounded the corner to reach the boat landing. We walked about 5 minutes to reach the famous and photogenic Maya Bay. This is when we realized our sunrise tour was WORTH IT. There weren’t any crowds at all! Our tour guide mentioned that Maya Bay can see up to 8000 visitors in a single day whereas there was about 30 people on the beach when we arrived. With the high amount of visitors, Maya Bay was at risk the last few years and therefore went under the rehabilitation program. Our tour guides gave us beach mats to sit on, coffee or water, jackfruit sticky rice, and we spent our time there walking along the beach, wading in the water, and getting some iconic snaps. The tour guides are definitely something too — they were snapping pics of us jumping above the water for the ‘gram. The beach filled up quickly as we enjoyed out time there.

Shortly after, we headed out and as we left, we could see tons of boats approaching the landing. We went to several hotspots mentioned above, went swimming/snorkeling in three different spots, and visited the famous Monkey Beach. We were warned of how crazy these monkeys can get so we kept our distance.

The snorkeling was top tier and we saw our second shark of the day and many different types of fish.

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As the day went on and we sailed by different islands, we eventually stopped at Koh Rang Yai where our tour was the only group on the beach. They gave us some sort of veggie spring roll and a packaged Thai snack as we sat and soaked in the sun. I wandered off to explore the beach and snap some photos/videos.

Finally, we headed back to Phuket. We were exhausted but once we arrived, a delicious buffet lunch was provided. There was a wide selection of popular Thai foods from pad thai, curry, and rice. I worked up an appetite from all the snorkeling so I had to go and get seconds. Finally, we departed via the morning shuttle bus and were dropped off at our hotel.

What an adventure!