Today we woke up early for a bus we booked to Ao Nang, a less traveled beach near Krabi, one of the many islands and peninsulas that characterize southern Thailand. We had originally intended to traverse this path via ferry, but it turned out they only ran twice per week so we had no option but to book the bus. The bus was an experience. Featuring twelve seats and no trunk, the mini bus that showed up had two people in it before it even arrived at our hostel, and we quickly picked up two more bringing us to eleven passengers. We piled into the van, stacking our bags to the ceiling in the aisles and on the empty seat and getting as close as possible to each other. It was a five hour journey, and in addition to bumpy roads our driver could best be described as "aggressive". However, the scenery that we drove through was incredible, and those that weren't enraptured by the woody cliffs and ocean views managed to fall asleep.

When we got to ao nang we quickly moved into our hotel, where we had a set of nice and cheap villas set against a towering cliff. We got lunch and got into a longboat for the ride over to the higher end tonsai and railay beaches. These beautiful beaches are not accessible by roads, due to their location on the bottom of the peninsula and the small mountain cliffs separating them from ao nang. Our boat weaved through small rocky islands and deposited us on the mostly empty tonsai. Here, we stretched out for a few hours on one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, that also happened to be deserted. Some sunbathed and others climbed up through a set of ladders that were bolted into the sides of the cliffs overlooking the beach to reach an incredible elevated viewpoint.

Railay and tonsai are, at high tide, separated by a jungle hill/cliff area, but once we had waited for low tide we were able to walk through the ocean around it. Railay west beach is lined with several beautiful resorts and is called "sunset beach" and for good reason. We watched from the more populated, though still largely empty beach front as the sun went down behind the island mountains and the sky flooded with red, purple, and blue light, contrasting with the clear blue of the waters and green of the islands. It was incredible.

Then we rode back to ao nang in a long boat, showered, and met up with some friends from Harvard who were also in ao nang for drinks at one of the many local bars featuring interpretations of American music and went to bed.