Thailand 2.0: Our Weekend in Phuket

Howdy, everyone!

So this post comes a little late, but I thought it was still worth it to provide a quick rundown of Chris and my weekend in Phuket, a beach island off the southwestern coast of Thailand.

After arriving in Phuket and making our way through the VERY long line at immigration, Chris and I were picked up by a driver at the airport and brought to our hotel in Patong Beach, one of two main town/beach areas on the island.  Upon arrival, we were greeted by the owner of our hotel: a very tan, very eccentric Australian man named Lindsay who was super helpful throughout our stay.  After informing us of all the potential dangers befalling tourists in Phuket (including but not limited to reckless tuk-tuk driving, drink spiking, ATM hacking, and passport theft), he sent us on our merry way to grab some dinner and explore the town.

The main bar/entertainment area in Patong Beach was about a 10-15 minute walk from the hotel, and on the way we made lots of little pit stops, checking out fruit markets, juice vendors (who made their smoothies with condensed milk and tons of liquefied sugar, I was unhappy to learn later), and the one Thai boxing stadium in town.  When we finally got to the bar street, it was complete sensory overload - neon signs, music blaring from every club, and thousands of people jostling their way through the street.  After walking up and down the length of the street once, we stopped for a quick drink at one of the many bars, and a woman who worked there insisted on playing a few rounds of "Connect Four" with both of us!  It turns out that I am very bad at this game (especially when sleepy), but Chris actually held his own and won his best-of-three.

In Phuket, even the taxis are meant for parties!

After our excursion into town, Chris and I headed back to the hotel and stayed up to watch the opening ceremony of the London Olympics (well, as much as the opening ceremony as we could stay awake for, considering it started at 3 AM Phuket time).  I think my assessment was similar to everyone else's - long, a bit strange, but overall quite entertaining.  It was definitely cool to see a few Michigan athletes in the mix!

Saturday morning, we woke up fairly early to grab some breakfast and head down to the beach.  Strong currents are yet another peril of Phuket, and if you're not smart and don't follow what the lifeguards are saying, it can be really dangerous.  Chris and I only stayed a few hours, however, taking quick dips in the sea (I've now kind of swum in the Indian Ocean!) and reading under our umbrella, trying to keep our sunburns from Malaysia out of the line of fire.

Yet another beautiful day at the beach!

After finishing at the beach, we went back to our hotel to freshen up (and apply more aloe) before meeting another hired driver to take us to the Phuket Weekend Market.  Although definitely not as big as Bangkok's weekend market, we still had a really great time, and got a chance to shop at a leisurely pace and get some final souvenirs from the southeast Asia part of our trip.  Upon returning to Patong Beach, we dropped all our goodies off at the room, then went and got our final Thai massages of the trip (5 massages after 6 total days in Thailand this summer, folks).  After getting back to our hotel, Lindsay and his partner greeted us with some snacks they had picked up at the market, which was so nice of them and a really great way to end the evening.

Sunday morning, we were picked up at 8:00 for our day-long speedboat excursion to Phang Nga bay, an area between Phuket and the mainland of the Malay peninsula.  After about an hour in a minibus and a short transit to the ferry dock, we boarded our speedboat, which we shared for the rest of the day with about 30 other guests and two tour guides (one English-speaking and one Russian-speaking).

Excited to be on our speedboat!

After cruising past some cool islands with amazing limestone rock formations, we arrived at our first stop of the day: Khao Phing Kan, or "James Bond Island."  In 1974, this island was used as a location for The Man with the Golden Gun as the hideout of the movie's antagonist, Francisco Scaramanga, and ever since has been one of the largest tourist traps in the region.   Even if I don't have a particular appreciation for all things Bond, it was cool to see, and was a nice stop to get off the boat and walk around for a little bit.

In front of the infamous island...

After the James Bond stop, we moved on to a sea canoeing location, which was pretty cool (although we weren't allowed to paddle our own boats and our driver kept harassing us for extra cash).  For 40 minutes, we were canoed through caves and cool rock formations, so much so that at points we had to duck so we wouldn't hit our heads.  Perhaps the weirdest/most interesting part of the day were seeing "walking fish," which were little fish that scuttled around during low tide getting into fights and making weird noises at one another (it's worthwhile to note that we also saw schools of flying fish that day - a weird fish day, I guess!).

Aggressive walking fish yelling at one another!

After our canoeing stop, we got back on the speedboat and traveled to Ko Panyi, a village of 1,600 people built entirely on stilts in the middle of Phang Nga Bay.  This village was built by Muslim immigrants in the late 18th century because of restrictions on land ownership to only Thai nationals; today, most of the people living there are descendants of the two original fishing families from Indonesia.  It was a nice lunch stop and an interesting place to walk around - some highlights included Chris getting handed a monkey by a local woman and seeing the "floating stadium" where the youth team practices (for more info on the town and stadium, check out this cool YouTube video).

Chris makes friends so easily.  This was right before it grabbed his nose...

The floating stadium!

In front of the village.

After our lunch stop, we traveled to one final island - a small beach where we spent about two hours swimming and relaxing before heading back to Phuket on the speedboat.  After getting back to our hotel, we changed, went and grabbed some dinner, then wandered around a bit more before turning in early, as we had to leave our hotel at about 6:30 to get our flight back to Singapore.

During the flight, it was so surreal to write "London" as my next port on my arrival card - I can't believe that I'm almost done my time here in Singapore!  The summer has flown by overall, but I'm so SO excited to head back and see my family in the US and move back into my lovely apartment in Cambridge.  I'll probably provide one more update on Singapore before I leave, then it's off to a 9-day Turkish vacation extravaganza with Alice!

Hugs,

Dara