PHUKET 2008

Tuesday 12.2.2008
Having sold our house in Perth, Western Australia, we decided to celebrate by having a two week diving holiday in Thailand. We needed a break before returning to pack up the belongings of 27 years and move across Australia to Queensland.

I booked everything online. We flew Tiger Air, a subsidiary of Singapore Airlines and I'm afraid I was not impressed. I have always been a huge fan of Singapore Air but the cheapie Tiger Air is not worth it, believe me!! Yes, they were cheap but there were a lot of things they didn't tell you.

The first complaint was that you had to pay extra to reserve your seat. So even if you were first at the airport to check in, if you had't paid the extra $8 per person, you might find yourself sitting a long way from your nearest and dearest. (We were lucky in this respect but no - on principle, I did't pay the extra money). The next problem was that we expected our luggage allowance to be 20kg, as with most airlines. The website didn't mention anything but when we got to the check-in counter, it turned out that the weight allowance was only 15kg. Another black mark!!! It didn't bother us as we were travelling light but many passengers were grumbling about having to pay excess baggage.

But the final straw was when we got to Singapore. The flight had been advertised as a single fight Perth-Phuket with a stop in Singapore. Wrong! It was a flight to Singapore, then we had to deplane, go through Customs and Immigration, collect our baggage and take it to the next airport building where, after five hours, we had to check in again, go through Customs and Immigration before getting on a totally different flight to Phuket. In my mind, that's two separate flights!
I won't be flying Tiger Air again.

Wednesday 13.2.08
Arriving in Phuket in the morning, after a 12 hour "flight" (half of it spent in transit in Singapore), we were pleased that we had pre-booked a taxi to take us to our hotel. It meant avoiding the usual crush as we came off the plane and we simply stepped into the airconditioned taxi and were driven down the island to Patong Beach. This cost Thai Baht THB11.00 (A$38.20). It is possible to catch a bus from the airport at an economical rate but it takes some time and we only had two days. In other words, we wanted to make the most of the time we had in Phuket.

Phuket is quite a large island and it took about forty-five minutes in the taxi from the airport in the north to Patong Beach in the south. There was not a great deal to see during the trip, travelling through countryside for most of the journey before we hit Phuket Town and then headed across the island to Patong Beach. This seems to be the most popular beach in Phuket and there are a great many hotels, restaurants, bars and night clubs on offer.

We were only staying two nights and had booked into Quality Resort. As it was a celebration of sorts, we had gone upmarket from our usual choice of room and booked an ocean view room with balcony. Cost? THB4000 or A$122.76 a night. We were too early to get into our room but left our bags at reception and went for a walk along the beach.

The photo to the right shows Quality Resort. It's the white building and our ocean view terrace room was on the third floor. We found the hotel rather expensive for South-East Asia. It claimed to be 4 star but didn't have a swimming pool or proper restaurant. It was, however, very clean and the staff very friendly.

There was free internet access in the main lobby of the hotel. Unfortunately, as there was only one computer, it was usually taken when we wanted to use it. That's the problem with anything free, isn't it?

Our room wasn't ready when we arrived. This was totally understandable, as we weren't really supposed to check in until after lunch and it was still mid-morning. So we left our bags at reception and took a walk up the esplanade to get our bearings. Very like Kuta in Bali, there were the usual shops selling bargain copies of designer handbags, tailors ready to make you a suit or a ballgown in 24 hours, and the usual tourist claptrap. We found a cafe for a capuccino and sat back for half an hour to people-watch. Always good fun.
Back at our hotel, we spent the afternoon sleeping - legacy of our cramped flight with Tiger Air - but went out in the evening to walk up the beach again. Halfway along the esplanade we discovered the Margarita Bar. 75 varieties of Margarita on the menu and we happened to arrive during Happy Hour when you got two Margaritas for the price of one. Yay! We chose a Highland Margarita (made with the additiion of Drambuie) and an Island Margarita (with added Blue Curacao and Malibu). We lined them up and ordered crab taquitos as an entree. The M Bar was upstairs overlooking the next cafe with an African band performing who were called Tanzania. Ah! Memories of Zanzibar!
Then it was a little time spent window shopping before we found a little backstreet cafe where we enjoyed Thai green curry and pork with Thai sauce for a late dinner. Very economical and very, very tasty.

Guy enjoys breakfast overlooking Patong Beach

Thursday 14.2.08
And a happy birthday to me!

The rooftop "restaurant" of the hotel offered breakfast only. But it was a lovely place to start each day and the buffet breakfast was included in the tariff. Fruit, eggs of choice and coffee. And fresh orange or pineapple juice. Lovely!!

After breakfast, we did a little shopping. Phuket is famous for its bargains but I wasn't really in the bargaining mood. Far too chilled.

A p ineapple shrimp boat for lunch
So we spent the rest of the morning swimming at the beach in front of the hotel.

We returned to the Margarita Bar in the evening for more margaritas, crab taquitos and a friendly call on the band Tanzania. We then splurged on a fancy restaurant, with lobster thermidor for me and steak for Guy.

As we walked back along the beach, we noticed a lot of lights floating in the sky. Always looking for a way to earn a few tourist dollars, somebody had come up with the idea of putting a small candle into a plastic bag, lighting it and the hot air lifted it off the ground and floated it in the night air out to sea. "Make a wish" pleaded the young man and who were we to resist? After all, it was my birthday. So we added to the air pollution and danger to passing planes and paid for a fairy light to float up into the black velvet of the Phuket night. Happy birthday indeed!