Rock climbing at Railay Beach

Here are Railay East (far bay) and Railay West (near shore) taken from one of the nearby cliffs that I scrambled up on. Rockclimbers from all over the world bring their heavy ropes and gear to climb the vertical limstone faces and funky rock formations that rise directly out of crystal clear turquoise water.

Here is the view of the beach as I was arriving by longtail boat - which I hopped onto from the larger ferry bound for another island.

Railay West has trememdous tides that expose the rock face at the right called "One Two Three" wall and is popular with climbers of all experience levels. At low tide they bring tourists in from the boats with a tractor and trailer.

In the middle of the small peninsula is a deep lagoon with sheer walls rising up 50meters on all sides. At low tide, the lagoon is drained leaving a ring of caves that can be explored (and a huge mud-pit!)

My hike to the lagoon turned out to be so vertical that many people turned back once they saw the bouldering required, something not revealed by the little dotted line on my free map.

On my way up I also had a monkey experience I had never had before. There was a group of about 20 monkeys on the small (steep) clay path. To move up the path I had to move very close to them. For a while I took some pictures - the one above came right up to the camera and gave me this dramatic pose. When I had all the monkey pictures I needed I intended to continue on, however one of the larger monkeys I had to pass grabbed me by the wrist. I stopped and he climbed up on to my shoulders and sat behind my head. After getting him off I laughed at literally having a monkey on my back....hehe

Here is the climbing map of 1-2-3 wall, that I climbed a number of routes on. The climbing was tremendously fun with such a varied set of rock formations to explore on one face. Of course, hanging out with all the resting climbers at the base of the wall was lovely too and I am very much looking forward to some more climbing later in my trip. Here are a couple pictures from the climbs...

There were a number of climbers that were a joy to watch. I can't even tell what this guy is resting his feet on.