Phuket, Thailand
Phuket is a an island resort town off the south west coast of Thailand on the Andaman sea region of the Indian ocean. It is not pronounced, Pook-ette like a lot of people say, or Fuck-it like some of my twisted friends call it. The locals pronounce it, Poo-kit with no accent on either syllable. This area gets a lot of tourists from Austrialia, Malaysia, and the Middle East due to it's close proximity to those regions. Compared to the rest of Thailand, it's very expensive and also pretty crazy. -- Not the reserved, modest Thailand I liked so much in the north. The first day here was like a culture shock from where we came from and I was about ready to say, "Phuk-it" to Phuket, but we ended up having a good time overall.
Fanta-sea:
Thai dinner show at "Fanta-sea":
Fantasea is a Disney-esque theme park with many shops and attractions designed to extract money from your wallet. Walt Disney would be proud. Here, we had an enjoyable dinner while carousing with a group of hard partying Malaysians we met at our table. After a few beers, these guys acted like we were their best friends for years.
Phi-Phi Island:
It's actually pronounced Pee-Pee, not Fee-Fee. It's basically a big phuking limestone rock in the middle of the ocean. I did some snorkeling here which was actually a little disappointing. It was mostly just rocks with very few fish. The reefs in Florida are much better. They also offered dive trips here and I'm glad I didn't go on one. In true 3rd world fashion, they don't care if you were certified or not, but they would have a dive master escort the divers. I watched a bunch of yahoos from some Middle Eastern country fumble around for 20 minutes trying to figure out how the scuba gear worked before getting in the water. Suprisingly, they survived the experience.
Thai Fish:
This was one of our favorite meals in Phuket. It probably cost more than we spent on food the entire previous 2 weeks.
Irish Pub:
After 3 weeks of drinking the yarky Asian beers, we had had enough. We stumbled upon an Irish pub and went in for a Guinness, which ended up costing us $12 each. As I mentioned, Phuket is ridiculously expensive.
Just because.......
Although food, lodging, and activites are crazy expensive, the women seem to be very reasonably priced. --- So I've heard anyway...
Cashew Factory:
We did a brief stop at a cashew factory to see what that was all about. Cashews grow on trees in a pod that looks a bit like a pear. When broken open, the fruit is soft and mushy until roasted. The Thai make a tasty drink of Cashew Juice mixed with carbonated water.
Patong Bay Resort
We're enjoying our breakfast here at our hotel in Patong Bay. No, it's not pronounced Poontang Bay, although that might be a more appropriate name with all the wild stuff going on here.
Hot Chick:
A smoking hot chick I found in Poontang Bay.
Is it a girl or guy?
Kelly claims they both are male. I think they're chicks.
Random Thoughts:
I try to be tolerant of other cultures, but after a few days in Phuket I got pretty disgusted with some of the Middle Eastern people we saw. A lot of them treat their women almost like slaves. We saw a group of them in a big Toyota king cab. The men are riding in comfort in the air conditioned cab, while the women were sitting in the bed of the truck, in full length burkas. Keep in mind that it's about 95-degrees, and 95% humidity here this time of year. Same thing at the beach. The men are lounging in swim trunks and T-shirts, enjoying themselves. Their diligent woman beside them covered head to toe in a black burka. You wonder what they are thinking when they watch other women in thir comfortable bikinis. I kinda wanted to grab one of those goddamn camel fluffers and beat him into the 21st century.
Sea Canoe adventure at Phang Nga Bay
This was probably our most fun day in Phuket. We took a boat ride to this area with many limestone islands jutting out of the sea. Several of them had cave networks within them that we could explore by inflatable canoe.
We had to time our arrival near low tide in order to get into some of the caves that would be under water otherwise.
Keep your head way down:
In one cave, we went in about 100 yards until it narrowed so small we had to lay down in the canoe to continue. We went a bit further, and the guide jumped out and said, "I have to let some air out so we can continue". I'm thinking, "you gotta be phuking kidding me", but he did. At this point, he lets so much air out, it's like we're floating on one of those pool noodles. We're laying down, partially submerged with just our faces above water. He's forcing the canoe through this little hole. Kelly didn't think we could fit through. My knees scraped the top wall. Kelly is freaking out, but manages to hold it together. This goes on for about 50 feet. We've just about had it when we start to see some light. We push through to the center of the island where the top has collapsed and opened a "room" about 200 feet in diameter with shear walls about 300 feet tall. It's very lush in side with mangroves, trees, lichens everywhere. Now I see it was worth it.
We did 3 other caves in a similar fashion. In one, I snapped a photo with my flash and startled some bats which crapped all over me (Kelly didn't get any bat pooh on her, but one dropped a bouquet of cherry blossoms and peach nectar). Bat pooh is some of the worst smelling pooh on the planet for sure, but, it was worth it. It's funny how our best days on this trip involved getting covered in some type of animal excrement. Kelly enjoyed herself too, and is thinking of getting a Phuket tramp-stamp.
