So much activity

The streets are always so busy and congested. The only time I ever saw them quiet was when the Princess was coming through. The whole street turned dead quiet and then there were about five police cars proceeding her black Mercedes and about five following. After they passed it was like someone hit play again, right back to the noise and traffic...

Abandoned...

There are lots of buildings like this one that started out great and then halfway through they ran out of funding. These buildings are just left here as big cement blocks that have turned into homes for the homeless.

This is a very sad but common site in the Philippines. There are shanties like this one just lining the streets. Welcome to a 3rd world country.

Tobacco Field

I'm sweating just thinking about this lady. She's 55 years old and has been working these fields all her life. She wears so many clothes to protect herself from the sun, which is scorching hot. I think it was about 90 degrees that day. After a full day of working in the fields she has earned about $4 dollars!!

Tsunami

No matter where we went on Phuket or any of the surrounding islands, there were Tsunami warnings and signs everywhere! I'm not sure how much good they are going to do if there's not more of a warning system but at least they show routes to high ground. There was one sign that had a separate route for locals and tourists. Not too sure which was better but we decided we would follow the Thai if anything happened!!

Phi Phi Island tour

We went on a day trip to visit a few of the surrounding islands. This is pretty much what the whole trip looked like. We stopped and went snorkeling at two different locations. The first spot was neat but a lot of the coral was dead. The second spot was gorgeous and we saw a shark! They told us there were black tipped shark but not to be afraid of them. I felt like I was in an aquarium and was strangely not afraid whatsoever. Snorkeling in Canandaigua lake is never going to be the same after that.

The Beach

This is the infamous Maya Cove. The place where The Beach was filmed with Leonardo DiCaprio. The sand was so fine it was like walking on flour. I think when they filmed the movie it used to be a little beach not too many people knew about. Now it's a National Park and can get so crowded that you can't even see the beach! Luckily it was only semi-crowded when we were there.