Thailand Part 4: Phuket

For the final leg of our trip Matt and I stayed at Sawasdee Village in Phuket from Sat. Nov. 22-Tues. Nov. 25. We stayed in the Kata Beach area, only about a 10 minute drive from the hustle and bustle of Phuket and we really enjoyed the location. Our hotel was a very traditional Thai feel and felt like an escape as soon as you were on the property. This was meant to be the most relaxing part of the whole trip where we just wound down before heading back to London. Matt was actually working remotely on Monday and Tuesday so in Phuket we mostly just saw the hotspots and caught up on some R&R.

On Saturday we drove from Krabi to Phuket and got in around lunch time.  We walked around Kata Beach and got some street food for lunch.  We relaxed at the pool for happy hour and ended our day with dinner and a footrub.

Sunday we rented a moped and went out to explore around Phuket.

Big Buddha

Wat Chalong Temple

Phuket Old Town

Weekend Market in Phuket Town

 

Matt tried some bugs...yuck!

We headed to the Patong area for dinner. This is the Vegas of Phuket where the nightlife is at its craziest on Bangla Rd. We ended the night at a few bars on Bangla Rd just to say we went and experienced it.

Monday we just relaxed around the resort. We went to lunch at a place with a great view called After Beach Bar. I explored and did some shopping around the Kata area and got a massage while Matt worked. We ended the night with an amazing dinner in Kata at Eightfold.

Tuesday it was time to fly back to Bangkok to spend one night before returning to the states. We did have time for one last quick footrub (at the airport!) and got to explore Chinatown in Bangkok.

To say Thailand was incredible would be such an understatement...Where we got to celebrate two 30th birthdays, 13 days, 2 cities, 4 islands, 5 temples, 8 massages, 4 markets, elephants, monkeys, tigers, jungles, ladyboys, ziplining, and beaches. Planes, trains, automobiles, taxi's, tuk tuks, longtail boats, mopeds, songthaews and bamboo rafts. New food, crazy nightlife and amazing adventures shared with family and friends! Thailand it was so amazing and I hope we meet again someday!

Thailand Part 3: Krabi!

After 6 days in the city and jungles of Thailand we were overdue for some beach time! We spent 3 nights (Weds. Nov 19- Sat. Nov. 22) in Krabi on the west coast of southern Thailand.  We stayed in AoNang Villa Resort in the Ao Nang Beach town.  I loved the location of the hotel and the Ao Nang location. 

Ao Nang Villa Resort

 

View from our balcony!

I thought this was funny, I mentioned when I booked the hotel we were celebrating Matt's birthday and got a cake for "Mr. Ashley Kern" haha

We arrived on Wednesday and unfortunately it was a rainy day so we went to a local tailor where the guys could have suits made. Thailand is a great place to have custom suits made very inexpensively, just make sure to do some research. We then went and got massages and relaxed for awhile at the hotel.

For dinner we actually went to a steak restaurant accurately called, Carnivore.  This was my idea as I am not the biggest Thai food fan (which is why you haven't heard me raving about it on this blog, I'm sure if Matt were writing it would mostly be about how amazing the food is).  I think everyone was fine with it after 6 days of Thai food.  I will say I had low expectations for steak in Thailand, but I was wrong because dinner was great! To top it off they had a huge menu of Belgium beers so all of my favorite things in one spot.  After dinner we went to a couple bars around Ao Nang and ended the night with a walk on the beach.

On the way to dinner

Any guitarist that also plays the kazoo is a winner in my book!

On Thursday we took a longtail boat to Hong Island and Railay Beach. We went down to the main beach pretty early in the morning and snagged our own longtail boat which we rented for the day (for an amazing price I might add) and headed to Hong Island which was about 45 min-1 hour away from Ao Nang. Our longtail boat driver took us around Hong Island and let us off there where we relaxed and snorkeled.

Our next stop is Railay Beach which is only about a 15 minute boat ride from our hotel, but is a hotspot in Krabi so we wanted to check it out. After being there, while it was a cool spot, it made me really glad we stayed where we did instead of Railay beach. We walked around for awhile, got some banana pancakes, some beers and played card games on the beach before heading back to our hotel.

low tide at Railay Beach

Delicious chocolate and banana pancakes

 

We got back to our hotel just in time for the daily happy hour and an amazing massage before dinner.  We had a Thai dinner followed by grabbing a drink at the "crazy street" in Ao Nang.

Friday was my favorite day because we rented a longtail boat for the day again and took it to my favorite island, Ko Phi Phi! Ko Phi Phi is a was a little over an hour and a half away from Ao Nang. Our first stop in Ko Phi Phi was Maya Bay where they filmed the movie The Beach. It was picture perfect stop and definitely what you think of when you remember any picture or screensaver of a Thailand beach you have ever seen. It was definitely very crowded though and with lots of tourists as it is such a popular stop.

A quick stop at Viking Cave

A stop in a beautiful lagoon for a swim.

Monkey Beach was my favorite stop with tons of monkeys running around everywhere! They were pretty aggressive though, but still so cute!

The monkeys were all too eager when the tourists would feed them snacks and soda, haha!

Mamma and baby!

We headed towards Phi Phi Don (the main part of the island) for lunch and were greeted with a small rainstorm. We ducked in the first restaurant we could get to had lunch and hung out there until the rain passed. After having seen all the major hotspots in Ko Phi Phi we started to head back to Ao Nang but made a stop at Bamboo Island to explore and grab some beers for the trip home.  We got home just in time for a beautiful sunset and happy hour at the hotel before dinner.

 

 

For dinner on our last night we took a songthaew bus to a local seafood restaurant.

 

This night sadly ended our group trip. On Saturday the next day everyone went home except Matt and I, we stayed an extra 3 days to see Phuket which I will write about in my next post. Krabi was an incredible place to end such a great trip where we made so many amazing memories with family and friends!