Ph-Ph-Phuket

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Man, If I thought it was hot in Bangkok, its even more so in Phuket. One thing for sure is that its one of the coolest landings into an airport I've ever seen. Felt like I was landing into somewhere in Hawaii, beaches all around the airport. The airport is on the north part of Phuket island and my hostel was in the south so I took a mini bus taxi to get there. It was a nice ride in with a bunch of other tourists who happened to be staying at the same place. I arrived late at night so I just walked around Old Phuket city (where hostel was located) and called it a night.

Outside of hostel

The next day I decided to rent a vespa (motor bike) to go around Phuket Island. For reference, here's a map of Phuket

The whip for the day

I started the ride from Phuket town, where my hostel is, to Surin beach and made my way down. There's quite a few beaches as you can see and I tried to spend a little time in each. Around sunset time (corny I know), I was at the very southern part of the island. Here are pics from the ride.

Surin Beach

Patong Beach. Huge tourist place/party place for Phuket. You see a lot of bars/clubs and the ever so famous Bang La Road.

had to

Rawai Beach

Rawai Beach

Nai Harn Beach

Nai Harn Beach

Since it was Sunday, it was the famed weekend market in Phuket. This place is huge...basically a huge flee market, but heaven for anyone who has an appetite. I was starving because I didn't really eat much during the date, so I was set out to eat anything. I did. probably spent about $10 (about 320 baht) on everything from sausage kebab's, chicken/lamb kebab's, phad thai, cream cheese waffles (these are good), fruit juice, more, I dont even remember all I ate. The girl I met that day out while riding around came with me and she definately had way more than I did...

Night market

Night market vid

So, my plans after a couple days in Phuket were to actually go to Laos with some guys I met in Bangkok. They were going to come down to Phuket anyway and we were all thinking of leaving together. I made a last minute change in Phuket and instead decided to opt out of the trip with them for a couple reasons. One of the main reasons is that I'd probably spend a week there and that would delay the rest of my trip. These guys have 3 months to do just SE Asia, so they're lucky. Instead, I decided to hop on a ferry to an Island called Ko Phi Phi, located just SE of Thailand (still part of Thailand). This is where I am right now, and I've been in this coffee shop for about 4 hours doing some well needed updating. This place is fun.