Thailand... Are we nuts?! Nah: The airport trouble is over, and while politicians keep bickering in Bangkok, the rest of the country is ripe for exploration. Claire Duffett just spent two weeks in southwest Thailand sailing the Andaman Sea from Krabi to Phuket.
When Leo DiCaprio agreed to star in the film adaptation of “The Beach”, we wonder if the environmental activist knew he was about to turn one of the world’s most beautiful islands into the Cancun of Thailand.
Although Phi Phi Lai, the actual island where the movie was filmed, remains a national park, the adjacent Phi Phi Don is now the definition of tourist hell. Thousands of drunken gap-year kids storm the town’s Irish pubs at night. During the day, they shuffle between the endless diving and snorkeling companies lining the impromptu town’s fake streets. Rickety longboats ferry tourists across rocky seas to the main attraction--Phi Phi Lai--every day.]]>