Phuket Thailand

Oh, what a trip it was!  Steve and I booked reservations because we always say we need to travel more while here in Asia - heck, it is so easy!  There are so many countries within spitting distance, you just wouldn't believe it.  Since a holiday was coming up, I asked him if he wanted to go somewhere.  Reluctantly, he said he guessed.  I asked him about Phuket  (pronounced poo-KET) and he again reluctantly agreed.  He tells me now, he knew Phuket was a beach (he is not fond of beaches at all) and visioned the whole beach scene/teens/drinking.  

Was he in for a shock.  :-)   We flew 1.5 hours to the island and had an hour ride to our hotel.  It is always difficult to make decisions on where you want to stay; it seems like you are blindfolded and have no clue if you are going to a good place or a bad place, good area or bad area and how long it will take to get to the good stuff.  All in all our choice was good. 

The staff welcomed us with grape juice and a frozen towel that had been soaked in tea tree oil - a welcome treat since it was so incredibly hot.  

The reception areas of the hotels we have been at here in Asia have an open floor plan - as in there is a fancy roof over our heads and it is open all the way around:

The bedroom was comfortable and nicely furnished:

The only complaint we had at the hotel was that we had to hike up a steep hill - and I do mean a STEEP hill.  I am not in shape, but even Steve was huffing and puffing when we got to the top.  Do you see the bull's eye on this map?  That was our building.  Yeah, that was the meeting spot for a Tsunami evacuation - you have to be on HIGH ground to avoid a tsunami, right?  Now look at it in relation to the beach - not far huh?   I TOLD you it was a high hill  :-)

So are you wondering about the Tsunami dangers?  Do you remember a few years back (2004) when a huge earthquake hit in Indonesia and hundreds of thousands of people were killed?  Thailand was hit hard by the tsunami that followed.  Just Phuket alone had over 250 deaths and 1100 injuries - and 700+ are still missing.  If you look at the map below (thank you Wikipedia) you can see Phuket on the mid left-hand side.  That is where we went - the island off of the coast of the mainland.

Sadly, there are many destroyed buildings and vacant ones still as well.  However, the country seems to be bouncing back rather well and its people finding some sense of normalcy.  Thais are very humble and quiet people.  They appear to work very hard and are proud of Thailand - and rightly so.  It is amazing!  

So, back to the tsunami, was a little unnerving to see the tsunami evacuation route, but on the good side of that - we were at the highest point around - as long as we were in the hotel room.  Thankfully, no Tsunami, earthquake or anything else of the sort this weekend. 

After we settled in and looked at some brochures, we decided what looked like fun to go see and rested on our decisions.  The next day, we went down to the tour desk, they lined us up and off we went.

The first day we went island hopping:

We saw the rock formations off the main coast of Thailand:

When we got out into the waters out in the bay, this is the color:

Yes.  It was really that color.  The water was different colors depending on where we were.  Green in some places and a beautiful turquoise in others.

We went snorkeling for the first time ever and I fell in love with it.  I will be doing this again  :-)

Do you see the fish next to me?  The entire sea looked like that - brazillions of fish!  And not afraid of us one little bit.  It looked like a giant aquarium you would see at the pet store.  I found Nemo and Steve and I both found Dory.  What fun!

One of the places we went to was Phi Phi (Pee-Pee) Island.  On the way, there were some great rock formations on the rocky knobs:

Some were really interesting:

We went out on a nice big boat.  It was an awfully bumpy ride even though the boat was big.  I was sure glad we didn't go in these - but they were great to look at!

While we were on our boat in route, our guide had made roses with some palm leaf stems.  Several of the girls wanted them, and he made them each one.  He realized that I didn't have one, but he was all out of stems, so he picked up some drinking straws and made me a rose!

Out.  Of.  Drinking.  Straws.  Pretty darned talented if you ask me.

I hesitate to say this, but I am going to anyway.  We went elephant trekking in the Asian jungle.  Yes, I said it before, but I did not elaborate.  I have since found out that many elephants in Asia are abused.  I felt awful for going on one of the tours, but we had already done it. Talk about taking the air out of my sails - my excitement was turned into pain.  Anyway, we did learn about elephants and enjoyed the ride.  These elephants looked well cared for, well fed and content. I can only hope they are indeed cared for as well as they appeared to be.  I am sorry I did it now, but I did enjoy it - if only for a moment. 

I would like you to meet Rumron.  He loved bamboo and stopped along the way to eat it.  It was great the way he stripped the shoots and ate the leaves with his trunk.  He showered us with water from a clear water stream (thank goodness!) and took good care of getting us back safely.  He listened to his master and minded his toe cues - his master steered him by wiggling his toes on his ears on the side he wanted him to go.  We loved him!  He was HUGE!

And that is all I have to say about that.  

We did manage to walk on the VERY HOT beach too!  The bottoms of my feet show it by having blisters on them.  However, the beaches were beautiful.

And finally, I know this is as silly as it can be, but do you know how you see the back of something and it says "Made in Thailand" or "Made in China"?  I found something that said that, and I thought it was neat that I was standing in the same country it was made:

Come to think of it, I have never seen anything that says "Made in the USA" - specifically saying that.  I have heard it said on TV, but I cannot recall anything saying that - but I am sure there is, but I don't recall seeing it.  Now, don't go getting all patriotic on me - I am just sayin'... can you name something off of the top of your head?  Funny I never thought about that before.

 

So as you can see, we had a great time.  I am sure I will share more, but that is the jist of it.  I hope God forgives me for riding that elephant.  I feel so guilty now  :-(  That creature is incredible.  Steve and I both were both impressed with him and am awed at how agile and sweet they are.  Does that count?  We learned about elephants.  Gotta take that into consideration when judging me, right?

Off to bed now.  This has taken me two days to post.  Later gator.