Destination: Phuket

The view of Kata Beach from Aspasia

Our next adventure would end up a 14-day journey to several islands and beaches.  Our first planned stop was Phuket.  It was such an amazing drive from Bangkok to Phuket.  The landscape was beautiful.  We stopped along the highway on several occasions to purchase fruit or roasted chicken from a stall on the side of the road.  We got a kick out of the response of the vendors each time we pulled over to make a purchase.  They would approach our vehicle.  I would roll down the window.  They would see that we were farangs.  They would giggle and then walk away.  Our take on this was that they didn’t know what to do because they didn’t speak English.  Luckily, David and I know enough Thai to get into trouble, so we were usually able to communicate what we wanted.  :0)

Halfway to Phuket, we happened across the amazing Pun Ya Ban Waterfall.  We have to say that it is the most spectacular waterfall we’ve come across so far in Thailand. It was located close to Ranong, where we ended up staying the night.   Ranong is known for its hot springs.  We checked into a local hotel.  We love finding establishments like this where there aren’t many westerners and generally the price is usually really good.   We ended up finding a great local restaurant for dinner and then had a good night’s sleep before resuming our journey to Phuket. 

Pun Ya Ban Waterfall near Ranong

The next day, we continued our drive.  All along the way, we saw signs to different beaches.  We decided to turn down one road and ended up at Pra Pat Beach.  It reminded us a lot of some of the beaches we have frequented near Newcastle in Australia.  It was a surf beach and there were small crab everywhere. The surf would come in and the little crabs would scurry as fast as they could across the sand.   

A couple of hours later, we arrived in Phuket.  We were surprised at the size of it.  There was the busy area of Patong, where tons of tourists explored.  We stayed up on a hill overlooking the ocean.   At the bottom of the hill was Kata Beach, a surf beach.  Our time in Phuket was wonderful, mostly because we stayed in a lovely place with a qualified and friendly staff.  We had several yummy meals, enjoyed a couple’s massage, took drives around the island and stopped at Karon Viewpoint.  Would we come back to Phuket?  Probably because we didn’t take the opportunity to sea kayak around James Bond Island this time around.  But that will be another adventure.