Tucked away in the very southern portion of Thailand, near the border with Malaysia, lies Koh Lipe, a formerly hidden gem among Thailand’s world-famous islands. The island has seen an increase in development and tourism in recent years, but still retains its raw nature if you can get away from the tourist areas. Though the island is small, it still has all the things you’d expect from a Thai island getaway: gorgeous turquoise waters, long-tail boats with dark-skinned captains, pretty beaches with sunburnt tourists, plenty of water activities, fresh seafood, stray dogs, and beach bars along multiple coasts.
The proximity to Malaysia means that the demographics here are noticeably different than the rest of the country: the Muslim influence from Thailand’s southern neighbor is very palpable, from the hijabs worn by the women to the presence of mosques to the Muslim and Indian flavors in the food.
Though you can get to the island from Malaysia by way of Langkawi, most people will fly to Hat Yai, stay one night in town, and take a bus/boat combo the next day. To take advantage of our night in town, Lummi and I took a car to Greenway Night Market and perused the stalls selling everything from clothes to toys to knock-off handbags to pets. We made sure to treat ourselves to some Hat Yai fried chicken – famous enough that I’ve seen it in America – and roti prata.
Once we were on the island, it was pretty much the choose-your-own-adventure that we were expecting. We spent our days swimming, eating, getting massages, reading, and laying around and doing nothing. Diving, snorkeling, and the other usual island activities were readily available for the more active tourists.
Our excellent hotel (Cabana Lipe Beach Resort) was adjacent to the gypsy village on the island, so we had to go through the tiny village every time we left or returned to the hotel. It was actually a very welcome, very tangible reminder that life on these islands is usually not easy for the locals and they don’t always reap the rewards of booms in tourism.
In an effort to protect the beautiful nature of the area, some people on the island have organized a weekly trash pickup, a unique and wonderful opportunity for travelers give back to the community a bit. Every Monday morning at 10:00, dozens of tourists meet on Sunrise Beach and an armada of long-tail boats whisks them away to a beach that needs cleaning.
On our day volunteering, we spent almost an hour riding to the north coast of Koh Rawi, one of Koh Lipe’s larger, but uninhabited, neighbors. We all worked up quite a sweat picking up garbage for an hour on the edge of the jungle, but were rewarded with a plunge in the ocean when we were finished. It was disheartening to see so much garbage that had washed up onshore: mostly plastic and foam, but also a lot of light bulbs, oddly. Even though so much trash was left behind after we had filled up all our bags, it was pretty satisfying to haul away enough to fill two dump trucks. I couldn’t help but notice the irony of the trucks spewing a ton of smoke into the air, so I guess we’re trading trash for air pollution?
Afterwards, the organizers made a small speech and treated everyone to lunch. It was a special experience and I highly recommend it to anyone visiting the island.
Good food is to be found all over Koh Lipe. In hindsight, it’s surprisingly hard to offer restaurant recommendations since we usually picked out places on a whim, though Forever Restaurant is memorable because we had read about it on another travel blog and made a special trip to go there. The home-cooked meal of crab omelet, eggplant and okra curry, and Burmese tea leaf salad was well worth our trek (on foot and by taxi) across the island.
As for nightlife, we found ourselves almost exclusively at Maya – a trendy lounge with the best music on the island – and the reggae bar on the beach, where one could indulge in a cold beer, a frozen drink with a flower in it, or a cheap joint with even cheaper weed.
For our only big activity on Koh Lipe, we hired a boat and a driver to take us on an afternoon trip to a few beaches on the other islands. We stopped for swimming at a couple nice beaches, but the main attraction was clearly Monkey Beach, named for its citizens, who hunt for scraps of people food and scamper around the beach to the delight of camera-toting tourists.
The skies had been a bit cloudy the whole trip, but we finally saw a beautiful sunset on our last night on the island. The sunrise the next morning was almost as spectacular and we made sure to capture both with lots of photos on the beach.
