In fact, two distinctively different geologies landscape Phuket's Andaman region, each dramatically different from the other in appearance and origin. The sculptured and polished granite boulders are the direct result of instability in the earth's crust, while their more famous rocky relations, the karst towers of Phang Nga Bay, Krabi and Koh Phi Phi, were originally formed over a near eternity of stability during which a vast tropical sea washed over much of what is today Southeast Asia. The lime-rich sediment of coral, shells and sand were deposited in sedimentary layers that, over hundreds of millions of years, grew to be 300m thick. Time and pressure eventually transformed these into limestone.

And time wrought unimaginable further changes, the tranquility of this tropical sea being shattered by the titanic crash of the Indian tectonic plate into the belly of Asia proper. The Himalayas were thrust up by the force of this collision (they are still growing), while the entire Southeast Asian peninsula was twisted and buckled, spun clockwise and thrust skywards. In much the same way as the muddy bottom of a pond dries during drought, cracking into a million segments, the layered floor of this uplifted coral sea was baked, cracked and exposed to the elements for the onset of erosion.

Leap forward 100 million years, and along come humans with our cameras. "Created by volcanoes" is the ill-conceived verdict one often hears in a boatload of tourists passing beneath the towering cliffs of Phang Nga or Phi Phi. Little do they know. Close inspection of the sheer rock walls sometimes reveals the fossil shells of ancient marine creatures.

But our rocks, the ones pretty girls love to bounce around on for the camera, were not built by unfathomable billions of prehistoric coral sea creatures. These are the direct result of geotectonic turmoil, the grinding of earth plate against plate. Long ago, when the outer crust of the planet to which we trust our lives was hotter and more fluid, the fissures between these moving plates allowed gushes of hot magma to spurt up into the atmosphere. These cooled quickly, cracking in the process. Those cracks are visible today, often rendering entire island-walls of granite into neat portions not dissimilar to sliced bread.

The beautifully formed rocks here were the outer-most layer of this granitic magma, that most exposed to the elements and thus to maximum cracking and erosion. The sculpting power of sun, wind and rain on one of the hardest of rocks, over millions of years, is evidenced here in the fantastic shapes we play amongst today.

Here in the Andaman, the granite belt runs down the west coast of Phuket and through most islands to its west and south. Some of the largest and most interesting formations are found in the Similan and Racha islands, the latter lying only a short boat-ride off Phuket's southernmost beach of Rawai. Longtail boats are always on standby, eager to take visitors on a daytrip to these two islands. But we're not sure you'll find, as did our photographer, pretty nymphs frolicking through the crevices.