Last night when we were visiting with Mike, we asked him about his visa for the Andaman Islands. The Andaman Islands is part of India, and you can’t go there if your Indian visa doesn’t have a special stamp saying you are allowed to visit the Andamans. Mike did not have such a stamp. So, the first priority of the day was to get the visa situation rectified.

We got a taxi and went to Phuket Town, several miles north of Ao Chalong. While in transit, we gave the taxi driver the address of the agency we were going to and he said he didn’t know where it was. He instantly flagged down a passing car and pulled over. He told us it was his friend and he would see if his friend knew. Talk about good timing. Fortunately, his fried did know and within a couple minutes we were back on the road.

The taxi took us on an inland main highway that reminds us of the main road through Denpasar in Bali, with an odd assortment of commercial buildings all along the way, both in architectural structure and appeal, and in terms of the types of businesses in the buildings. We turned off the main road in search of the agency that works with the Bangkok Indian High Commission on visas. Phuket Town is crowded and busy, made up of mostly unattractive two to four story buildings with little architectural appeal, most in need of some maintenance. We dropped him off and continued north on the same main highway to an area of town called Boat Lagoon to buy boat parts and oil. The highway looked much the same all the way to the turn off. When we turned off the highway, we instantly went from industrial to ritzy. Boat Lagoon is a relatively new, high dollar complex with housing, hotels, a marina and many shops.

The agency told Mike that no such stamp was needed and sent him away. Mike didn’t think that the agent knew what she was talking about because Eric and Christi had gotten the information about the stamp direct from the High Commission in Singapore, and they both had the stamps on their Indian visas. Mike called the embassy in Bangkok to find out what he needed to do to get the stamp and was transferred multiple times. He tried calling the Andamans to find out if the stamp was really necessary and also got transferred several times. After endless hassles and frustrations, he found out that the special stamp is only required when you enter the region by boat, not by plane. We had been emphatic with Mike that when he applied for his Indian visa that he needed to make it clear he was going to the Andamans, but we hadn’t told him he needed to be ultra clear about his mode of transport, as well. He never specified he was traveling by boat, and thus never got the stamp.

Meanwhile, Eric and Christi wandered around the many, many shops in Boat Lagoon looking at what they had to offer. Most stores are small, specialty shops. Once we had exhausted the stores inside the complex, we went back out to the main road where we knew there were two more boating stores within walking distance. The stores along this stretch of highway are mostly industrial, such as plumbing supply, paint supply and so forth. There are also a few restaurants and houses along the way. There seem to be few zoning regulations. We never found what we were looking for, but we did find some 10 micron fuel filters in a couple of stores that are normally hard to come by, so in that sense we struck gold. We finished our shopping at about 14:30 (2:30 pm).

The plan was to go to the grocery store in Phuket Town on the way back to the boat, drop off all the supplies, then go back to Boat Lagoon to meet Fafner for dinner. When we devised that plan, we hadn’t realized how long and expensive the cab ride was. There was no point in going back to Kosmos. We had lunch. We asked at both massage places we had seen if they could take us, but they were both full. We went to a nice hotel and used the internet and read until it was time to meet the Fafner crew and Mike.

We went to dinner in a section of town called Laem Hin, not too far away from Boat Lagoon. We were going to a restaurant floating on pontoons in the water. We walked down a relatively long and very rickety pier made of wooden planks. The nails were all rusted through, so the planks generally moved when you walked on them, the wood was warped, making the walkway uneven and easy to trip on, and it looked like there was quite a bit of dry rot on the wood. Fortunately, no one fell through the floor and we all piled into a long tail boat, which was almost as rickety as the dock.

It was a quick two minute ride out to the restaurant. It looks like the fish farm, a floating shack with nets around it. You can actually see the staff scoop out the selected seafood item from the net and take it in the kitchen to cook it up. Guess there is no doubt it is really fresh. We walked around the nets and looked at the fish inside them. We couldn’t see very many fish, though we did see a lot of eel. There is a big puffer and a small leopard shark that we suspect are pets and not dinner items.

We sat down and ordered a variety of dishes and specified “no spicy”. One of them was the cracked pepper crab, which we have heard rave reviews about. It was really good, but it made your lips burn. All of the food was good, but most of it was a little hot for our tolerance level.

Back at the pier, there were no taxis around. Both Karen and Eric said “I know a taxi driver we can call to come and get us”. Ironically enough, it turned out to be the same guy, Koy. What are the odds of that? He wasn’t available, but sent one of his friends. A few minutes later, a minivan pulled up with a lone driver. We figured it must be our taxi. Jeff went over to confirm. It turned out the guy was in the Royal Thailand Military and was most offended at being mistaken for a taxi driver. Oops!

The driver dropped off the Fafner crew, then took us to the entrance to the Royal Phuket Yacht Club. We walked down to the dinghy dock. As we were getting close, a security guard came up to us and said “Problem. Your Boat. Problem. Your boat”. We could see two other guards were in a dinghy hand paddling out into the bay. We could see some red and blue light in the distance. We had no idea what the problem was. Eric and the security guard hopped in Kosmopolitan and sped off well, our dinghy is only 2 HP, so sped may be a generous word full throttle is probably more accurate.

The two guards rowing returned. It was clear they had seen the problem and had hopped into a cruiser’s dinghy to try to take care of it themselves, but the situation was better served by a power motor. At the dock, Christi and Mike tried to ask the newly returned guards what was wrong, but they spoke no English. Christi pulled out the Lonely Planet and pointed to the “useful phrases” section. The guards pointed to “Help. Emergency. Need police”. Uh oh. What was Eric getting himself into?

Meanwhile, Eric is still not sure where they are going or why. The guard keeps signaling to go forward as he scanned he horizon. He finally spotted what he was looking for. It was a dinghy that had come loose from the dock and floated away. Phew. They retrieved the dinghy and brought it back to the dock. Christi and Mike were relieved when they saw Eric coming back with the dinghy in tow. We still have no clue as to what the red and blue lights in the distance were.

We have to say that we are really impressed with the guards. We can’t believe that they even noticed the dinghy had floated away. There were a zillion dingies at the dock and this one was dark in color and very hard to see. And they did everything they could to save it, commandeering another little boat and rowing out by hand, then recruiting us to help. They could have just said, “oh well, too bad for that guy.” We would be devastated if we lost our dinghy and it is so reassuring to know that these guards are there looking out for us. [44]