Phuket Tours 1 and 2

Well 3 days have come and gone as have 3 great Tours. Phuket is a wonderful place… it’s a pity about the weather but I expected it could happen… but more about that later…

My First tour on Saturday morning was a half day tour of lower Phuket and Phuket town itself. Our tour guide was called "Woody" and as we only had three in total on our tour I had a good chance to chat with him during the tour… like most Thai’s he was very pleasant to talk to and very helpful (and funny… you tend to get the same jokes recycled but that happens everywhere!)

The other 2 people on the tour were older ladies Julie and Lyn, both from Adelaide and both from the Suburb I live, Happy Valley. If that wasn't scary enough we knew some of the same people including a neighbor (current for one, and former for another), Laurie and Helen. The weather for the whole morning was drizzly which didn’t spoil the trip… but perhaps a few pictures. After a tour of some of the main beaches we headed off to on of the many temples in Phuket, although we went to the main "Touristy" one. After 30min there went to a cashew factory… Cashews are so cheap over here and I stocked up. Because there was only a few of us on the tour Woody took us to a local fruit market where I bought a dragon fruit and wait for it… a kilo of bananas… 1 kilo only cost me 15baht… 52cents Australian. You can tell the Australians as they tend to be eating bananas as though they are gold!

During the tour I was able to see some of the Tsunami Damage however these parts weren’t as affected as other parts, particularly Northern Patong beach were the damage is still obvious.
The last stop for the tour was yet another Jewelry store… this time the largest in the world… and it wouldn’t surprise me if that was true… it was so big! I loved the pieces that they had displayed but had no need to buy any. I ended up going out into the foyer and having a drink and talked to Woody.

I'll try to find some pictures of the tour to post... I must have not put them on my usb stick to take to the internet cafe.

On Sunday I headed out to Phi Phi Island on a speed boat tour with Phuket Adventures. Our boat as full so it was a bit of a squeeze but it was bearable. Our first stop was for snorkeling and I got to test our my camera underwater for the first time and got some good pictures. After some fresh fruit we then headed off to Phi Phi and looked around the harbour. While there had been a lot of work done to the island after the damage it sustained in the tsunami damage was still obvious. It was chilling to be in the same spot as where boats were only a few years earlier that smashed into the island.

Some pictures from our first snorkling stop

On the way out of the bay we were shown where "Birds Nest" come from, for those that watch the Iron Chief on SBS in Australia it was the theme ingredient a few months back. I can’t remember the Japanese saying (Mel if you remember put it in the comments) but Birds Nest is reserved for only the best people. The locals get 100 000 baht per kilo, that’s around $3500 Australian.

Searching for Birdsnest

Not long after that stop were able to get up close to some monkeys in a tree and feed them… they were so cute and just took the food out of peoples hands. There was one mum that had what looked like a newborn baby monkey hanging on for the ride.

Feeding the monkeys

Next stop was to see the beach where "The Beach" was filmed. I must admit I was disappointed with the beach itself from the view I got as it didn’t look anything special… either that or it has been damaged since the filming.

Unfortunately the weather got really rough so we had to skip some other stops so we headed straight to were we were going to have lunch… and the only thing I could say is that it felt like paradise… a sandy island in the middle of no-where with a buffet lunch… and sunshine too!

Some pictures of our lunch location and the incoming storm

We were there for just under 3 hours and except for the last 10 minutes we had amazing sunshine. We could see the rain front coming and it made for some amazing views and pictures. It was good to get home after a short ride back and have a much needed shower (and to see the end of the Port and Adelaide showdown and find that I had lost a tip!).