In Lieu of Wit and Wisdom: Thailand

200+ photos of Thailand at the photo link above ^^

GP and I decided long ago to have a nice, relaxing, warm beach vacation. Last April we tried Sydney and it was too cold. We replanned for Thailand and January was just right.

I'm too lazy to write a full report like I used to, so here's the summary.

Saturday 19th
Woke at 4:30am to get to the airport for our 7:30am flight. That get's us to the Holiday Inn Silom (Bangkok) just after lunch. The flight is good and we check into a very nice hotel. Next door is a restaurant with a good selection and we have a late lunch. A short walk, then a "nap". After our nap, it was 6:30am and we decide that is a good way to start a vacation :)

Bangkok was interesting, though not stupendous for those of us not looking to visit a lot of wats or historical sites. We did a little shopping, tried various food and bought some nicer rings (matching white gold with saphires and small diamonds) to replace our Australian silver rings. We're hoping it was as good of a bargain as the jewelry people said.

Tuesday 22nd
Our afternoon flight to Phuket was also uneventful and pretty quick, though delayed 1.5 hours. We taxied to the Holiday Inn Resort (Patong Beach) and found another fabulous hotel. I suppose it should be that nice for the price, but we were glad to have a fairly quiet, comfortable room for four nights.

To get all the details, you'll have to sit with us for all the photos over a beer :) Every morning, we had breakfast near the pool, rested by the pool and watched the Germans, Australians and Japanese play. One day on the beach (and some sunburn), one night to see the lady-boy show, one night to Phuket FantaSea for another great show. Lots of good food and, of course, one night to the seedier end of Patong Beach to see why all the single men travel there.

The food was great, the t-shirt and other souvenir shopping was cheap and the people were pretty friendly. We found a great tour operator named Honey and she proved to be helpful and honest. Look her up if you go to Patong Beach, Phuket.