Ok having got through 9 days we ended up at Phuket International Hospital this morning with Connor who spent the night throwing up! Joy of joys. Very efficient hospital system! Now onto the travel insurance and travel agent - thank goodness for insurance and mobile phones. All part of travel they say. Sadly another night but without our BFFs and only seeing the inside of a hotel room.
Our last night in Thailand after an afternoon of swimming and massages. We headed out for dinner and then found a whole part of Karon Beach we hadn't discovered including a night market. We had promised the boys a ride in a pimped up tuk tuk so had a round trip from the market along the beach front in a beat box with disco lights. Right back into the resort! The boys were on a mega high - loved it. Final swim in the cabana pool while olds finished off the drinks! A great holiday. The beach here at Karon is rough at the moment. It's surfing season and not good for swimming. So we haven't managed a swim at the beach yet. Yesterday we went to Kata Beach for a swim. The water was lovely and warm but really dirty with lots of rubbish in it. We are so lucky in NZ to have such clean natural spaces. We had our first tuk tuk rides. It was easy and cheap. There are some pimped up ones that C wants to try out. The tuk tuks here are different to the 3 wheel ones in Bangkok. Today we hired a driver and van for a bit more of a look around. It was great. We went to the Big Buddha. It was huge. 45m tall and 24m wide. Lots of replicas and ceremony. A construction site as they are fundraising to build gold and silver staircase up to the Big Buddha. He's visible from 500km away they reckon. Following that we checked out Old Phuket town and saw the old architecture. Interesting combination of Chinese and Western. On our way back we drove through Patong Beach - like our Karon Beach on super size me steroids! Happy not to be in that environment. When you are travelling there are often things that tickle your fancy. Here in Phuket there have been some funny interpretations of that most challenging of all languages - English!! This sign we spotted on our way home from dinner last night got us giggling! Pool day today after our busy adventure yesterday. Had a late breakfast at the buffet that covers all the foods of the world. There are 3 pools to choose from here. We've found our favourite and have spent hours playing piggy in the middle - some bruising evident of the competition! C and L have both spent ages jumping in to catch balls we throw in. Generally the water is a haven of relaxation and fun. Loving the temperature here. More so when we read of 3 deg and ice in Wellington. . ... When it rains here it's short, sharp and very heavy. Usually preceded by the cracking of thunder and a sky that darkens rapidly it's hard to get to a dry spot before it's splashing you from the ground up. The temperature stays high and the humidity hits 100% for the half hr or so afterwards. An umbrella is an essential accessory here. Today we went to Siam Safari here in Phuket to do an elephant ride. It was a fabulous experience. We were all excited and a bit nervous about it. The clouds opened and dumped down on our way and we dragged out our rain ponchos! The tour was so good. We got to meet our elephants and marhout (trainer). Got on and had 30mins trekking through the forest. Very unusual gait and it took a bit to get used to and both Connor and I held on quite tightly as we went down hill. After the trek we got to feed the elephant we rode on. Then we visited the baby elephants and fed them too. All chose an elephant souvenir to remember this special event. On Saturday we had a 7:30 pick up from our hotel in Bangkok and took a Bangkok Airways flight to Phuket. Another airline of the world ticked off for Connor he was very impressed with the flight and had his first trip on an A320 so all good except no merchandise in his price range! A van to our resort at Karon Beach and we arrived about 1pm. Checked in and straight to the pool. V hot and steamy. Lovely to get in the pool and cool off. Had our first pool snacks of the holiday and then the thunder and rain came. Lasted 10mins while we huddled under umbrellas and waited it out. Steamier after the rain. Early drinks and dinner with the only planning being to suss out which massages we would each have to kick off our holiday here. Well it's all here in Bangkok. A v hot day up to 36deg. We managed to swim at both ends of the day. Much needed in the afternoon after our visit to the Grand Palace. Intricate and ornate and lots of gold the Grand Palace was bustling with all sorts of visitors. The jade Buddha was a tiny speck at the top of a lot of gold and he was dressed in gold robes. The sky train and river boat rides there have us an intetesting look around the city. The river was full of amazing colour between the grey water and sky. It was an adventure requiring it's own story getting a taxi back to the hotel. A taste of Bangkok that's got us tempted to be back for more. |