Day 3 - Phi Phi Island

Today we did a day trip to phi phi (pronounced pee pee) island.

When we first arrived in patong and looked at the beach we were disppointed. But we certainly werent disappointed with phi phi - beaches with beautiful white sand and crystal clear water.



Snorkelling was heaps fun and we were able to do that at around 3 locations. Took quite a few photos with an underwater camera so I hope they turn out.

Nightlife

Whilst sitting at dinner, Daph and I looked at the map of Patong. She points and says "Let's go to the Hard Rock". I looked at the map and location and just said "err that's 'Rock Hard' and we DONT want to go there.



There's one main street and that's where most of the nightlife is. We wanted to jsut walk around and see why it's so popular.

Some outdoor bars are ok but there are 'go-go' bars jsut off to the side.



Apparently it's ok for us two girls to walk down the street but if we were guys we'd need to beware cos there are many scantily clad girls trying to lure them into the go-go bars.

We passed 'Soi' which is the main 'lady-boy' bar. We didnt go in but it was another curiosity. The lady-boys are really beautiful and it's really hard to tell.

We heard that many European men get a bit drunk in th bars and end up taking these absolutely gorgoeus lady-boys back to their hotel where they get a really, really nasty surprise... [serves them right!]

Pasa malam

Tips for bartering:

- work out what you're willing to pay first

- be prepared to walk away



The vendors actually have 2 colours of bags - when they make a sale they put your purchases in a bag. The colout you get shows whether you're a hard bargainer or a pushover - so when you walk to the next store they know how to handle you.

Tricky huh?

Hmm... I bought some shoes and got a red bag (there were red/green)... I wonder what that means?

Makan Makan #2

We found out where the seafood market is in Patong.

You can go and pick what you want and it's all fresh. Then they cook it for you to eat.

Daph and I werent that hungry tonight so we just had a dish of garlic prawns. Yummo!!

Phuket - Day 2

Today we decided to go to Phuket town which is around 30 mins drive from Patong beach where we're staying.

PT seemed like a good idea and was fine until we got to a big hill... putt putt... I thought the bus was gonna die but we made it!



The good thing about phuket town is things are cheaper and ppl dont harrass u every step of the way.



Shopping is good. We're not in Bangkok yet and I already bought 2 pairs of shoes - Daph really is gonna hate me in Bangkok cos i'm gonna drag her to all the shoe stores.

She's already sick of jewellery stalls cos I've been hunting for earrings.

Makan Makan

Food is sooo good here and so cheap. I can tell we're gonna come back 2 fat brown blobs. [Daph: dont know about the brown bit cos there's no sun] [Mel: errr it's like 6pm!]

Phuket - Day 1

Arrived in Phuket and just crashed at our hotel. Then we went for a walk. We're staying just across the road from Patong beach and there's a heap of street stalls along the road. We didnt buy anything but we did get a little annoyed because you cant walk 1 metre up the road without being harrassed by a tuk tuk driver or stall vendor. In the arvo we watched MTV in our room... which was actually in Bahasa not Thai which i thought was quite weird. The place where we're staying in has 2 pools and we also relaxed by the pool this arvo.

Mel and Daph's Thailand Diary

Our trip begins with a nice long plane trip to Phuket. We had to go via Melbourne. Had really bad seating going to Melb and Daph was complaining cos she was sitting next to some really stinky people. Whenever I have a stinky patient at clinic, I spray myself beforehand with perfume so that I cant smell them. So I told daph to do that but she threatened to spray them instead. I always admire the people who can sleep anytime and anywhere. 2 mins in to the flight and Daph was sound asleep. I had to wake her up when the drinks cart came around. "How long have we been in the air for?" was her groggy reply... Ummm about 10 mins!! On the flight from Melb to Phuket, the lady allocated us seats at the two opposite ends of the middle section - which we thoguht was a bit strange cos we are travelling together. We found out this was a smart move - it stopped them allocating people in the middle so we had the whole middle section (4seats) to stretch out and sleep. The inflight movie was Shrek 2 so I conveniently annoyed Daph by copying donkey in the appropriate part of the movie with the line "Are we there yet?"

People who cant read

Outside our front window at work there's a sign that says "No smoking in this area". But everytime I look outside there's a bunch of people smoking.

Their little trick is to stand behind the sign... I suppose it's ok to smoke in a "no smoking" area then... as long as you cant see the sign!