Au Revoir Family

We left our family and Thailand today.
 We went for an early dinner at one of the fishermen's restaurants which overlook the beach and bay. Our reward for the last day of our holiday, and our parting hour with our family, was the best sunset of all the time we were in Thailand. The photos don't do it justice but I don't really care, as it is in our memories. 
Just before 7 pm, C and I left the restaurant and our family (who were still eating; their flight is on Monday). We climbed aboard our last tuktuk to take us to the hotel to collect our baggage. We had a quick shower and changed, and then the taxi arrived to take us to the airport on the island of Phuket.  We had the option of catching a ferry to Phuket, or using a taxi which would be about two hours, crossing to the island over a bridge. We took the taxi route as it gave us an extra 4 or 5 hours with our family. Bad move. 
There followed two hours of what was for me a real white knuckle drive in the dark, when we seemed to overtake everything regardless of bends or oncoming traffic. I was so relieved to see the signs telling us we were almost at the airport. 
Our flight to Dubai took off at 10 minutes to one. They call these overnight flights "red eyes". In my case my eyes were definitely red, but not necessarily because of tiredness (although I didn't manage any sleep).
A very sad day, however we have enjoyed the most fantastic holiday, did loads of things, saw incredible sights, but most of all, had a wonderful time with our family. We will be meeting up again in 6 months, so at least that's better than the one year that it was this time. 
My extra is a beautiful dragonfly that kept landing by the swimming pool at the hotel.