I just had to give the pronunciation of Phuket, since several people have asked! Anyway, end of April we took a trip to Thailand, the island of Phuket, to get away for a week and celebrate Jeff's birthday. We flew out of Singapore and were in the air only about 90 minutes. We arrived at the Banyan Tree Hotel and were greeted in an open-air lobby by hotel employees bearing Jasmine bracelets (yes very fresh, live flowers). They smelled WONDERFUL! In fact, the aroma was so strong our room held the smell for a couple of days. Loved it. Our villa was the one-bedroom pool spa. It had an entry area with a desk, coffee maker and refrigerator; a bedroom with a sitting area; then the bathroom area with separate shower and outdoor bathtub. (Yes, I HAD to try out the bathtub. Very odd bathing outside.) Directly out the bedroom doors was our private swimming pool, cabana (with a ceiling fan) and enclosed yard. It was pretty sporty! The Bang Tao beach was about a 5 minute walk from our villa. The whole resort complex is large, and it was about a 15 minute walk in the VERY hot weather to reach the front lobby, so you could just call for a buggy and they would pick you up. We did this so that I didn't whine about walking.
Sunday afternoon we took a car to Patong Beach, about a 20 minute drive from our hotel. This is the most famous beach on Phuket and it is heavily populated with tourists and thus really caters to them. There were great restaurants along the strip in front of the beach, along with MANY hawkers of t-shirts, DVDs, watches, etc. It kind of reminded us of Mexico! We found a Starbucks, of course. The evening brought storm clouds just as the sun was setting, and it made for some BEAUTIFUL pictures. We ran into a close "pub" when the rain came and just had dinner and waited it out. Like here in Malaysia, it only rained about an hour.
Our travel agent had included a half-day "Phuket Island" tour so we took that on Monday. A guide and driver picked us up and we went back to Patong Beach (just drove through), then headed to the southern tip of the island to a very high point for pictures of the Andaman Sea. Next they took us to the Wat Chalong Temple. Inside is the cast statue of Luang Por Cham who helped the people of Phuket put down the Chinese Coolie Rebellion in 1876. There were also other statues of other famous men and various other religious articles. It was very ornate and beautiful and obviously a very sacred place to the people of Thailand. After this we drove up the east coast of the island and visited old "Phuket City". It reminded us a lot of Malaysia and is less touristy and more where the locals live and shop. We passed signs for several "shows" and the tour guide explained that we could go to one of the "lady-boy shows"--transvestites in a cabaret type arena. We did NOT do this!
On Tuesday we went on a Sea Canoe outing in Phangnga Bay to go sea kayaking. I had a friend that had done this and highly recommended the trip. There were about 2 dozen people and they took us in a large boat out to the bay where there were several hollow limestone caves that looked like they just thrust up from the sea. The caves are cut through the middle by salt and water, and you can only access the INSIDE of the caves at certain times of the tide. Around the outside of the caves are stalactites that are just really cool looking. They dropped us off at the first cave and a guide took Jeff and I in a canoe around and inside the cave. We repeated this at two more caves. The tide was low enough that in one of the caves you could sit up and just kind of bend your head down to get "inside". The other two caves you had to literally lay down in the bottom of the kayak and the guide would push you into it using his hands on the top of the cave.
Now I am a wee bit claustrophobic, so this part wasn't quite as fun for me! One cave we entered this way, we had about 6 other kayaks in the "dark" part of the cave with us and one of the kayaks was having difficulty getting underneath the limestone, so we were stuck in the dark, smelly cave for about 10 minutes. Our guide, Ben, handed Jeff a flashlight (or torch, as they say) and he told Jeff to aim it at the ceiling inside this dark cave. You can see where this is going. Yes, there were BATS hanging all over the ceiling. One of my OTHER fears is bats, so this was just a fun little adventure with all my fears being realized at once. The good news is when you finally passed under the limestone and made it to the "inside" of the cave, it was like another world! You saw monkeys, birds, all kinds of sea life and it was so cool to be "outside" but look around you in a circle and only see land! Very fun. They fed us a wonderful meal prepared there on the boat and gave us time to swim in the area before heading back to land. I would highly recommend this trip, also.
On Wednesday we went on a River Rafting/Waterfall/Elephant Trek adventure. Yes, this was MY idea:) They picked us up at the hotel and we had about a 90 minute drive onto the mainland of Thailand and up into the mountains. They fitted us with life jackets, helmets, two guides and we were off. In our raft was a young Australian couple and the other 5 rafts held Russians who had come with their own translator. It was a blast! We bumped and splashed and got very wet and almost thrown from the raft (or at least I did) but it was fun. The guides were playful with the tourists and one of ours grabbed a big frog from the bank and threw it into the raft of 2 of the Russian women. I thought they were going to jump overboard they were so scared and were screaming so loudly! Obviously the guides enjoyed this response.
Next we were driven about 10 minutes to a small, beautiful waterfall. The water was COLD and very different than the water we had just been in on the raft trip. We were lucky because it was just us and our Australian friends for about 15 minutes and we took lots of pictures and swam around. After that another tour group came and there must have been 20 people getting into the water. Then they took us to the elephants for our "elephant trek through the jungle". I had REALLY been looking forward to riding an elephant in Thailand--I mean, that is what they are KNOWN for, right? The couple we were with climbed into the carrier on their elephant, then we got in ours. Each elephant had a "guide" sitting (literally) on it's neck and holding a long stick with a sharp hook at the end. We were told this doesn't hurt the elephant's tough hide, just redirects him if needed. We set off through the jungle on "Mackie" (yes it's name was on it's carrier) and everything is OK until the elephant in front of us is going slower than Mackie liked. She started making really loud elephant noises (didn't know they could be that loud) and trying to go in circles instead of following the other elephant on the winding, muddy, slippery trail. Our guide kept yelling orders to her and hitting her on the head, but it would settle her for a minute then she would start bumping the other elephant again. I've never ridden on an elephant before so I don't know what "normal" is, but this just didn't seem normal and it started getting a little scary after awhile. At the worst point, our elephant was rubbing right up against the other couple's elephant and we were almost face-to-face with them when this 21 year old little girl looks at us and says in an Australian accent "we're going to die". At that particular moment I had to agree that it wasn't looking good! Eventually our guide got Mackie around the other elephant and she didn't hesitate to get back to the ole barn. It turned out to be the most exciting adventure of the entire day--who knew?
On Thursday Jeff went to Blue Canyon golf course and played 18 holes. It was hot but he started as soon as the sun came up and was finished before it got too hot. I just stayed at the hotel and spent the morning on the beach. The weather was really hot, even for those of us used to the heat in Malaysia, so water was very welcome. That night we ate at the Saffron restaurant at the hotel. It was delicious and we enjoyed ALL the food we ate in Thailand. (In fact, we have found a good Thai restaurant here in Malaysia and it has become our favorite.)
Tuesday was Jeff's birthday. We were out all day at our Sea Canoe trip and when the van dropped us at the hotel about 4pm, the lobby staff said, "happy birthday Mr. Durham"! We got in a buggy to get back to our villa, and about 4 of the men gathered around and sang happy birthday to him. On the way to the room he accused me of telling the staff it was his birthday, but I told him I DID NOT tell anyone. Not sure he believes me even now, but it's the truth:) Anyway, we get to the villa and there is a birthday card, a small gift and an invitation to let them know when/where to deliver his birthday cake. That night we went to the lobby restaurant about 7 and they sent the "band"--a little quartet--over to serenade him with "happy birthday" then brought him a delicious little cake with candles and all. It was very sweet!
Jeff really needed this vacation. Where I am on vacation pretty much every day, he doesn't even get a break when we come back to the states since he has meetings and goes to the office most days. It was relaxing and fun for both of us. We can now check Phuket off our list of places to visit while we are in SE Asia.
