"Khao Lak 4 days after t ..." a Ban Khao Lak Travel Page by Tina-Perth

We were in Phuket from the 17th December - 29th January. We have a boat up there and went cruising around Phuket and the islands. We (Steve and I) invited his mother, aunty and my mother to join us on the boat for 4 days, then we were sending them to Baan Yin Dee Resort for a further 4 days. The tsunami happened on the day they were to go to the resort via Patong Beach. However, I drove with them to the resort at 6.30pm that night. When we arrived, however, the place was teeming with displaced tourists. There was no water or electricity and it was total chaos so we decided to return to the boat. The ladies then stayed with us until the 29th December.

On the 30th December after our mothers had left us, our friends Nuch and Mai took us up to Khao Lak to take donations we'd bought to the victims of the tsunami.

This entire album will be pictures I took at Khao Lak Beach . If you would like to get some insight into how it felt to be a victim, please read this story; A survivor's story. The rest of this website is fantastic. Thanks to Waree and Peter Warsop for their work.

It was just near this point that I found a photograph of a tourist. When I returned home I posted it on Thailand Missing Persons. I have since located his family. His name is Thomas and he is from Germany. He, his partner, his brother-in-law and another friend all perished in the tsunami.

His sister and I stay in touch.

See how far back the beach is?

All of these pictures are of the place where the resort was.

Thomas' sister and her daughter were on the beach when the wave came. They ran up the beach, through the resort and up to the road. They lost everyone they were with.

What else can be said for such devastation?

It was such an eerie sensation to see these strong people emerging from the wreckage knowing that there were bodies in there.

We saw a great number of bodies that day. Thankfully they were all wrapped.

Some residual water from the wave.

These shops are across the road from where the resort was. If you look at the first picture you will see how high up these shops were and how far back from the beach they were, but they were still affected.

This is the area that Thomas' sister and daughter escaped to.

I have so many more pictures, but I think people can get the message from what's here.

We arrived to this scene far up the mountain as the people were so scared. As we were driving...and driving...and driving I thought no one would have come all this way up, but here you are. This building is a hall. Most of the people weren't sleeping in here, but making beds in the grass across the road. They were just gathering at this spot where all the vehicles were dropping off supplies.

...Aagghhhh! I can't fit my last picture of the camp in! After this my camera batteries went flat.