Firstly, A HUGE big thank you to all that share there knowledge with others.. I found that having an idea on some things before we left made it a little easier to adjust and found that we were a little bit more prepared. eg: having a driver, others on buses and things that we spoke to had no idea you could get a personal driver for a day at such a good price! My first suprise was how many ppl dont research the place there going too!
FLIGHTS:
We flew with Virgin to Sydney then Jetstar to Phuket. No delays and both the flights were great. We did get there early and ask for a ';crib'; seat.. had a little more leg room. Did the same coming home. Had a sleeping tablet on the way home, made the trip so much more enjoyable.. :) Flight from Phuket was delayed about 10 or so minutes but Jetstar had no problems letting us all know that it was the customers fault.. someone showed up without there passports!!
Transfers were through Tour East who we found to be well organized and gave us maps and told us about the local area and shopping, fakes and entertained us for our trip to Horizon Karon Beach Resort %26amp; Spa.
Check in was easy and as we didnt have any Baht, they changed our money for us at 27 B to 1aus for our $2000 deposit. Our 1st room had a funny smell and the air con didnt work that well and no honeymoon bonuses like was arranged. So next day hubby went down and asked how much to upgrade.. gggrrr.. anyway gave us a fairly good deal so we upgraded and got the flowers on the bed and stuff.. :)
Weather was ok, even when it was overcast and really dull looking it still didnt stop us from doing anything. The worse rain we had was when we were at Phuket town markets and it buckedted down.. the locals knew.. they started covering up all there wares and moving right in when it started to drizzle.. then down it came.. Water everywhere. As it wasnt cold we still walked around. The locals all had a giggle..
Tours:
Siam safari 4 in 1 half day tour; Inc elephant trek inc baby elephant show, Rubber tapping show, Buffalo and monkey inc coconut demonstation, and Jungle curry and Lunch. We found our guide ';Pooh'; had great english and a good sense of humour. All was run really smoothly and would recommend to anyone. Also they taught us how to say thank you in thai and hello. When we first looked at the thai language we thought that if you were speaking to a male you use Krup and a girl you would use Kaa, Mmm thats not the case.. For the first 3 days everyone thought Brett was a ';lady boy'; All Males say Krup and all girls use Kaa.
We did Phuket Siam Seacanoe to Phang-Nga and with the same company also did the Speed boat to Phi Phi Islands. Both included lunch and transfers. Both had Great english speaking and entertaining guides. We enjoyed both but if next time I went and I was only able to do one, I would definately choose The canoe one through Phang-Nga, the scenery I thought was so much more beautiful and I loved going into the caves. We didnt find it really full of tourists and as there were two boats with the same tour one boat stopped at the caves while the other went to James bond and then swapped.
We also did the ATV on Phuket, which was good but on the brochure it said that it gives basic training.. yep thats what it was.. Mam this is go this is stop!! that was it.. i had never done anything like this so going up and down hills wasnt really sure what i was supposed to be doing, but i survived. Once i relaxed and got the hang of it, It was fun!! It also said it supplied soft drink, which when we were at the track just playing around he went around and asked everyone what sort of drink they wanted which we then paid extra for! We were given one bottle of water when we returned!
Shopping:
I HATED the bartering system, I so much more enjoyed the fixed price markets or shops. I did buy a D%26amp;C handbag and thanks to Cathys price page i Knew that the most to pay was 1500 but I haggled and got it for 1350. I was happy with that. Shoes from Junceylon was good buying at there big sale. I found the best buys were Table clothes and runners, Cushion covers ect. I am a size 12/14 and there was a reasonable amount of clothing there in my size but im not really a t-shirt girl, Brett is an XXL here in Aus and found that he was still buying XXL over there. He has size 14 feet and NO ONE had shoes that big!!! hehee. I thought the best thing to walk around in all day was Crocs and copy ones were every where but you could get the original ones from dive shops.
Food: The best eating was those banana pancakes with condensed milk. We loved them! Out of restaurants we found ';red onion'; in Karon was the best restaruant that we ate at, followed by Tunka Cafe at Phuket town look out. Both had excellent service and great value for money not to mention the top quality food. In Patong we found that No 6 on Rat u thit rd was also very cheap and excellent, we didnt find that sweets was all that good in comparison to some others.
Also Mai stopped at one of the little side carts at Rawaii just past the seafood restaruant and bought us These palm leaves and inside had a coconut cake thing, He couldnt translate it into english for me but i think they were only 10 or 20 B and tasted fantastic. We then got some from Phuket town market and they were not so good!!
Overall We had a fantastic time and money allowing we would go back again. I think the only thing I would do different is go via Bangkok. You can make the holiday as cheap or as expensive as you like, all up exluding flights and accommodation it cost around $2500 that was with all our tours, eating, shopping, tuk tuks, driver for 2 days, ect.
We got around 28 to 29B for our dollar.
Sharon %26amp; Brett :)
Brettnshazz JBR 25th July - 3rd August 2007
Hi Sharon and Brett.
We are going on 20th August.Also staying at Horizon Karon Beach Resort %26amp; Spa. Will try the ';Red Onion';.Do they serve western Cuisine?Did you use the pool etc whist staying there,and have the breakfasts etc.What did you think.We are not that interested in going on tours etc,more interested in vegging out and having massages etc.Did you find the shopping around karon/Kata good?
Loved your report.Welcome home.
Jo-Anne
Brettnshazz JBR 25th July - 3rd August 2007
Thanks for a great report Sharon. We%26#39;re off tomorrow night and are so looking forward to it. The countdown is almost over!!
Not sure how I%26#39;ll go with the bartering either, but will follow some of the advice given here and see how we go.
Kerri
Hi Sharon %26amp; Brett,
Thanks for your report, We were still there while you were and your right about the weather, it doesnt stop anything does it, at least its still hot!! Glad you both had such a good time.
Cathy
Hi Sharon %26amp; Brett
Thanks for your report, glad you had a lovely honeymoon, hope you can get back there at some stage.
Lee
Thanks everyone :)
Jo-Anne,
We did have breakfast included everyday, good selection, omelettes were really good! I didnt think much of there dinners we only had one of 5 free dinners. We used the pool but very little. shouldve spent more time there. The beds are extremely hard, if you have a sun bed Brett used the mattress from that under the sheets to make it a bit more bareable. In front of the soccer stadium there is a row of massage places, the first one we used to get our washing done. They were pretty good and charged 60B kilo. But the massage place we used was down further i think it was called ';u 2';. Im not sure if Red onion served Western food but its right in Karon, 100B in a tuk tuk one way. We found the shopping not to bad in Karon/kata. In Karon in some of the streets away from the beach there was a market that i found to be of good prices and also there is a local market in Kata right down the other end..again we caught a tuk tuk there for 100B. At night in between the soccer stadium and the row of restaurants you will find the pancake man.. you must have at least one!! The only bad thing i could say about the horizon is the hill does get a bit much after walking all day and its up 3 flights of stairs to b%26#39;fast. Other than that it is beautiful, grounds well kept and the pool was clean. The spa didnt really look that clean though. And the pool closes at 8 or 9 pm :(
enjoy your holiday :)
You%26#39;ll have a great time Kerri!!
Cathy, there were times when i was shopping thinking wish i had cathys number she could tell me if its a fair price!! I did see a braclet that i really loved but in Aus dollars it still worked out to be $700. Nice but not that nice. It had all little elephants linked to each other.. never mind.
Lee, We are hoping to go back.. just hope jetstar have another really good sale like they did for there 3rd birthday!!
Hi Sharon %26amp; Brett,
Great report with lots of things in it for every one, It takes a couple of days to get used to the Krupp %26amp; Kaa doesn%26#39;t it but in the end most people get the hang of it.
A great site for some basics phrases is:
www.learningthai.com/useful_phrases.html
It has many useful phrases that you can hear spoken by Thai People.
It sounds like you both had an awesome time experiencing Thailand
and those Banana Pancakes are to die for aren%26#39;t they.
Thanks for sharing your hols with us.
Cheers, Pete.
Hi sharon and brett
thankyou for your report
sounds like you had a great holiday
we have tour east operater for our transfers as well, good to know they are reliable
Not sure what a crib seat is I have never heard of it
could you please advise me
Did you mean 2000 baht was your deposit for hotel
thankyou julie
Hello,
A crib seat is like a exit seat but mainly used for ppl with kids as they need a little more room If you can get a crib seat with a window there is heaps of room to stretch your legs out! But i think you need to get there early :)
Yep it was only 2000B for the deposit on the hotel and when we got drinks or something it was just taken out of the deposit. Cocktails at horizon were about 180b each.. so it doesnt really last long
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