Thailand – Phuket Island

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Sorry for the delayed and long post.  Our internet went down for a few days (again), so I wasn't able to post it to the internet and I just kept writing, not realizing how crazy long it got.
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We left for Thailand on Valentine’s Day.  We had a wonderfully romantic evening with 100 of our newest friends as we watched movies, had dinner, and slept.

                                   Ready to go!                                                 Well, maybe we'll nap just a little before the flight takes off.

DAY 1
The Thailand airport was really pretty—there were orchids EVERYWHERE!  Which, clearly, I loved.

One of the many orchid displays in the Bangkok airport

We got in to Bangkok pretty early in the morning and flew straight to Phuket Island where we checked in to our hotel on Patong Beach.  We checked out the Patong market that was within walking distance from our hotel.  Diane got our first delicious servings of pineapple & mango from one of the Thais that was wheeling around a fruit stand.  I bought a set of wooden/wicker coasters where I got to brush up on my bartering skills which I used quite a bit while we were there.

Avatar like tree in the hotel courtyard

Patong beach market

Fresh mango & pineapple!

After walking around the market and getting all sweaty, we headed back to the hotel to shower up and get ready for dinner.  Before dinner, we went back to the market area to see if we could rent a pair of motorbikes.  We made friends with the crepe-maker who was trying to help us out and bought a few nutella-banana crepes while we were waiting for the bike gal’s brother to arrive with the contracts and keys to the bikes.

Bike rentals & crepe stand

Our crepe-man friend

Banana-nutella crepe--one of my staples when I lived in Paris

Paul and our bike renter

Notice that Diane is smiling in this photo--we haven't started riding yet :)

Then we hopped on the bikes and we were off…well, we had to make an immediate pit-stop for gas first.  The gas is sold in old/used scotch & whiskey bottles.  So you buy your gas by the bottle and they pour it in.

                         Fueling up!                                                                                          "Fuel" bottle

This is the gas stop at the Surin beach we went to later in the trip

We rode the bikes down to the main Patong Beach road that was along the sea.  We went to the Patong Seafood restaurant which was recommended to us by our airport transfer driver.  I had a delicious green chicken chili which included these tiny (think blueberries) green tomatoes.  Everyone else seemed pretty happy with their seafood options.

Patong Seafood restaurant fish display

My green chili chicken

Heading over to the beach to check out the food vendors

 After dinner we meandered around the beach and scouted out all of the food stands which we came back for the next night.

Food Vendor - of course there was plenty of seafood to pick from

And how could we forget the grub & critters? (I have to admit that none of us tried them)

DAY 2
The next morning we got up early and headed out for a Phi Phi Island tour.  We rode a speedboat about 45mins out to the first island.  It was a super bumpy ride.  There was quite a mix of people on the boat.  We sat up front with a group of asians and some europeans (scandanavian maybe?).

Pineapples!

Marina where our tour left from

Other side of the marina--quite a contrast

Getting ready to hop on the boat

R & D representing the asians!

One of the many islands on the way out to Phi Phi

 Our first stop was Maya Beach which is where the movie The Beach was filmed.  It was definitely a beautiful beach, especially with the way the island-cliffs rose so sharply out of the azure water.  I imagine our experience was a little different than the scenes in the movie (which I’ve never seen) since we just so happened to arrive at this “remote” island about the same time as a few hundred other people on tours.  We took a 5 minute hike to the other side of the island where a few boats were scuba diving.

Maya Bay

Hike from Maya bay to the other side of the island

Other side of the island

Back to the beach

It was so calm and serene---not!

Then we set off around the island and saw an old Viking dock area.

Old Viking dock area

Next stop was “Monkey Beach” clearly named after the many furry creatures there (reminded me of the “Monkey Temple” in Kathmandu).  Our guide on the boat tossed bananas up to the monkeys on the cliffs—it was pretty funny to watch the monkeys scramble around and try to catch them.

Monkeys eating bananas!

Our next stop was lunch.  A beautiful beach with a lovely Thai buffet.  I could eat like this more often.

Our lunch stop

Lunch with a view

Next was a stop back by monkey beach where we did some snorkeling.  The guide warned us before jumping in that if we lost the snorkel we would have to pay extra for it—of course Paul jumped in with it on his head, it fell off, and immediately started sinking.  Instead of trying to dive for it, he yelled at me (after I just jumped in the water) to try to get it.  But by the time I got my bearings it was too late.  It was a little controversial as to whether or not it was recovered because we saw some scuba divers go down there and someone told us they got it, but our guide said they only found the goggles and not the tube…a little shady.


The last stop was on a relatively quiet beach where they served us fresh watermelon and pineapple.  I relaxed on the beach in a lounge chair while the rest of the group snorkeled some more.

Mmmmm...more fresh pineapple

You just can't keep them out of the water!  :)

We rode our bikes back down to the main beach road for dinner.  We had bbq pork ribs, spring rolls, and a bunch of seafood stuff that I honestly don’t remember (since I didn’t eat it).  It was delicious and cheap—what more could you want?

Dinner time!

Food vendor - Spring rolls, jumbo shrimp, etc.

Food vendor - all sorts of skewered chicken & seafood

More cheap, delicious food!

During the entire dinner we kept hearing/seeing bus/vans going down the street blaring a recording “Thai boxing.  Thai boxing.  Tomorrow night.  Tomorrow night.  Bam Bam Bam”  (The “bams” are supposed to be the sound of the guys standing on top of the van hitting their boxing gloves together).

A poster for the Thai Boxing at Surin beach (where we went later in the trip)

No, the van wasn't going that fast...I just couldn't hold my camera steady...oops

DAY 3
On Thursday we decided to ride the bikes down the coast and find a more secluded beach (Patong beach was almost like a spring break beach in Florida—except the average age was a bit higher).

Ready for a trip down the coast

On the way down we stopped in a little town to buy Russ a light cotton shirt to help keep the sun off his arms.  Also, after much haggling, debate, and eventually caving (it was only over $2) we bought a couple pairs of snorkel gear for the beach.

There were fresh fruit stands everywhere you turned

Bartering for our snorkel gear

Eventually we made it down to Kata Noi beach.  We parked the bikes, rented a few beach chairs, and hopped in the water.  It was a picturesque cove with nice rocks on one side.  One of the bizarre things was that there were these European couples (I guess) that were doing these photo shoots where the girl would be on the rocks or in the water doing model poses while the guy took photos—really bizarre.  But of course Paul wanted to join in the fun :)

Kata Noi Beach

Paul's looking for a modeling gig--let us know if you know anyone in the business

After a few hours at the beach, we decided to head further down the coast to the nearby “lookout point” which gave a nice panorama of the island.

View back towards Kata Noi & Patong

Group photo!

We passed an elephant “safari” place on the way back and decided to stop and possible ride the elephants.  We ended up not riding them because it was way too hot and they didn’t seem to take you very far, but we did stay and watch them eat for at least 30 mins.  It was really amazing.  The elephants would pick up the vegetation with their trunk, slap the root part against their legs to get rid of the dirt, and then eat it.  They had such a method down—we were definitely enthralled.

Hitting the greens against his leg to get the dirt off                                             Finally clean enough to eat                      

I love this!  He was just brought around and he's waiting for some people to get in his "saddle"--just waitin'

I think I need to start collecting bizzare crossing signs--I have camels, Emiratis, and now elephants!

My best friend, being so patient while I take some photos

 
We headed back down towards the beach and stopped in the nearby hotel to get a late lunch.  After some shuffling around because the first place didn’t have good airflow, and the second place didn’t serve food (it was under the same roof, apparently just a different section?) we found a table.  We ordered a delicious pizza with artichoke hearts and a calzone.  It was nice to have real sausage/pepperoni with pork in it compared to what we’ve been eating in the UAE.

Riding back down to the beach

R & D on their bike

Real sausage calzone!

 
Then it was back to the beach for more swimming, snorkeling, and watching the sunset.

Pulling back in to "The Shore" for a few more hours of beach time

Snorkeling until the sun went down

"Do I have to come in?"

Beautiful sunset

 That night we ate at the Thai restaurant that was in our hotel.  It had a few set menus you could choose from for a reasonable price so we decided to give it a try.  When we got in there, it was completely empty so we were a little worried—which Paul made an extra special point to note “for the record.”  The food was fabulous.  I again had the green chicken chili and also tried a spicy green mango salad which was nice and refreshing.  The rest of the group enjoyed their fish.

Seafood galore

More green chili chicken                                                                        Spicy green mango salad        

DAY 4

 This time we decided to head up the island to look for a beach.  The concierge recommended Surin beach.  We noticed there weren’t any roads leading from the main road to the beach itself, but decided to try it out.  There weren’t any roads on the map because there aren’t any—you had to hike down a little path to get to the beach which was pretty and plays into my next point.

Path down to the beach

I started getting thirsty on the beach so I went to the little hut there to order a drink.  I got a pineapple-coconut smoothie (fresh juices) with crushed ice in a whole coconut for less than $3!  You know that in the US they would charge you $10 just to have it put in the coconut.  And this includes whatever shipping/handling charges they have for their food since they can’t just truck it in—they probably have to have it all brought in by boat.  It was so delicious and refreshing.  Totally worth the $3.  Also, it was amazing how cheap drinks were there, they were honestly about the same price of bottled water back home and significantly cheaper (and more prevalent) than back in the UAE.

Coconut-pineapple drinks

We also watched them cook up some food and ended up ordering some Pad Thai from the shack.  It was pretty good.  We spend a little more time on the beach before we decided it was time to head back to town.  We turned in the bikes and headed across the street to a spa to see if they would be free later after we had a chance to go shower off back in the hotel.  After much discussion they convinced us to stay and get the massage before heading back to the hotel.  D & I got the 1 hour of Foot Reflexology and 1 hr of the Neck, Back, & Shoulders while the boys opted for just the Neck, Back, & Shoulders.  Wow did we have some stories to tell after that!  After our feet were done D & I passed the boys as they were leaving.  We asked them how it was and all Paul said was “I feel like I just got abused.”  Hmmm.  We took turns showering off in this tiny bathroom with cold water and no shower curtain and then attempted to change into the fisherman pants they had laid out for us.  I definitely had to have my woman help me put mine on.  The first thing they did was rub “Tiger Balm” onto our backs which felt nice at first, but then I was just absolutely freezing!  I asked her to turn the air down that was blowing directly on me, and I think she did a little, but I was still cold.  I can’t remember all the different things they did, but D said that at one point she looked over and my lady was standing on my hamstrings with my feet in her hands.  It was really quite the experience.  Paul said he looked over at R once and he was on his stomach with the woman pulling his hands back behind him, arching his back.  With the tiger balm and the cold air, R’s nose started to run and his woman said “oh you crying?”—of course that didn’t cause her to back off on any of the pressure/intense moves that would defy even the best Twister player.

Wearing my newly purchased "Jasmine pants'--enjoying the foot reflexology before the beating

When D and I finished, we walked around the market a little looking for some treasures.  I don’t know if the weather cooled (the shop owners said it hadn’t) or if it was the tiger balm/body distortion, but we both felt so cool and relaxed while we did some shopping.  Then we headed back to the hotel where we shared war stories with P & R.  We went back to the market (yes, again—we were starting to be pros at this place) to pick up the two “Armani” suits that Paul had custom tailored.  R went “on the record” with a bet that Paul wouldn’t fit into that suit in 20 yrs.  At least now we have it written down so Paul can’t renege when the time comes.

Sharing the "war stories" after our massages

Paul trying on his tailored suit

We had dinner at one of the restaurants in the market area where one of my legs got completely destroyed by mosquitos—I still had large, red spots a week later!  I had some fried rice, and yes, you guessed it, the rest of the group has some sort of seafood.  Diane had a crazy spicy dish with whole peppers in it—my mouth was on fire just watching!  Then it was time to pack and head to bed since we had an early morning start to get to the airport to fly back to Bangkok.
 

Patong market at night--by this time we had this place down

Might have purchased a few things from here....