Because we did almost nothing for four days (and it was bliss), I’m condensing everything into one post. I’m doing this the same way I did the Wakatobi post, with a few comments/pics.
⅓ of Naka Island is owned by the resort. They have bikes that you can use to ride around and go to a nice-ish beach, or explore the nearby village. We didn’t do that. It was either hot & humid, or I was lazy. I just wanted to relax. Our villa was number 45, which had the best view, but out of 60-something villas was the 3rd furthest away from the restaurants. It was still under a 10 minute walk, with a couple small inclines. They had golf cart transfer service that we used at the beginning of the stay until I figured out we really weren’t that far away.
Our usual routine was to sit outside either under the sala for lunch, or in the pool, or reading on the outside couch. I took a break from blogging and generally internet-ing for the most part, except to check on things back home a couple of times. It felt wonderful. Traveling is great, but it can get a little tiring and doing the beach vacation ½ way through the trip was pure genius if I do say so myself. And I do.
How cute are these rocks? They use them instead of a DND sign.
We were really lucky with the weather; it only rained once while we were awake, and that was at dinner and didn’t last all that long. The food at Naka was quite good; the breakfast selection was large enough that if you were staying there for a week you wouldn’t be bored of the offerings. The infinity pool was huge. The staff all seemed nice and helpful. It was obvious they were trying their best.
Naka had a nice spa. No, we didn’t use it (except to change that first day). They also offered various day or ½ day trips. The only excursion we did was a sunset longtail boat ride. We were given a bottle of white wine, and put on a long tail boat with a man that could speak more English than we could Thai, but unfortunately six words isn’t really all that much better than two. We made do. His name was Man and the first thing he did was drop us off at a beach on the other side of the island. Now in the brochure/ad for the excursion they didn’t tell us to wear a bathing suit. I had no idea. I thought we were just going to be riding around in the boat until sunset. We got out of the boat and walked the length of the beach. It was a huge beach and there were several jet skis. We’d see someone jet skiing by Naka, too. Anyway, I started feeling like I had signed us up for something I wasn’t expecting (in a bad way) and it was disappointing. I felt like I had made a mistake. I jumped the gun, though; the next stop was the total opposite. It was a (mostly) secluded sandbar that only shows up on low tide. Man set out a mat and towels for us, and of course the wine, and he went back to the boat. I loved it!
A boat full of Italians showed up right before sunset. Sorta funny & annoying at the same time, as they were exactly in the way. It went from being romantic to being a bit awkward. Luckily they didn’t stay very long. A video of our island.
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One day when we were waiting for our villa to be cleaned we saw a stray cat at the sunset bar. She was a little banged up thing with a very loud mouth. She figured out how to come to our villa and visited us the last two days.
It may have had something to do with the food we shared with her.
We had afternoon tea on the sala and she got some delicious salmon.
And that is that. Short, but sweet.
Neeners Travels 