Lets Get This Party Started...

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Well I have finally managed to find some time to sit down and get this blog (party) started... though not for the best reasons.. As I type, Benny is laying in bed next to me (and has been for the past 3 hours) sick with 'Thai Belly'. I am devastated, that after building up Thailand as the 'other love of my life' to him for so long, that day 2 of only 7 he winds up 'pooing through the eye of a needle' as he politely put it! I am not sure I have convinced him that Thailand is as amazing as I say it is! LOL

By halfway through this blog, Benny graduated to vomiting as well as the pooing.. it could be a long night! Anyway, that is skipping ahead of myself.. we have had an action packed few days which started at 7am Saturday in Adelaide....

Road Trip Time

We set off for Melbourne just after 8am after stopping in at Hahndorf to pick up Ben's DJ equipment... having to go via Mount Gambier to drop it all off and pack Ben's bag. Nothing too exciting happened along the way (apart from me having a dummy spit as females do!) ... We shared the driving along the way... and ended up hitting Melbourne 12 hours later. We collapsed in bed at our great little find near the airport - Hume Villa Motor Inn, ordered delivery pizza and ate dinner in bed before crashing...

Up bright and early on Sunday we knew we were in for a long day with a flight to KL, followed by a 4 hour wait for a flight to Phuket... Upon arriving at the airport, I started to panic re flying and acting all weird... Ben was like 'ummmm what are you doing?! harden the **** up princess' ... Hmmmm not the sympathy I was hoping for, but probably what I needed! LOL. We had a yummy champagne breakfast in the departure lounge before boarding... On board I was feeling pretty nervous looking out the window at the black skies.. but with my hand in Benny's upon taking off, I was surprisingly calm... We both settled in for a long flight with books, magazines and a pack of UNO cards... Seriously... When is he going to learn that I am the UNO Queen?! After kicking his butt by about 700 points, he decided it was sulking time so buried his head in his book and didn't speak to me for the next hour! Pffft MEN!

We arrived in KL on schedule and were dismayed to see an immigration line that almost filled the whole immigration hall.. it was seriously huge.. I have never waited more than 5 minutes going through and it took us about an hour! I exchanged some money and we decided to get some food from Old Town Coffee. We pigged out on main meals, drinks and kaya toast washed down with coffees and it set us back about $15. So cheap!

After that we wandered the airport, had Macca's soft-serve icecream's (like we hadn't eaten enough already!) and then after checking our bags in, we headed to the departure lounge for a beer. We finally made it to Phuket, landing 25 minutes early, grabbed some currency and went to catch a meter taxi...

Now I think the meter taxi rank in Phuket are onto a scam.. cause technically they are just that... a meter taxi.. however we were quoted 500 baht once there... no meter in sight... but it was still a bargain anyway so no argument.. we just wanted to get to our hotel....

Pleasant and Not So Pleasant Surprise in Our Hotel

Arriving at the hotel, I was running on adrenaline and Benny on grumpy... After checking in, we started to walk to the room when the receptionist called me back. When I reached her, she handed me a phone... I was thinking 'What the... who is trying to phone me now?!' ... On the other end was a Thai speaking very bad English.. All I got was something about being at the airport... I handed the phone to the receptionist and asked her what was happening... Turns out the hotel had sent a driver to the airport (at a charge of course!)... I kindly pointed out that my email said that 'if' we needed to be picked up we would let them know but that I would probably just organise my own way to the hotel.... I kind of felt bad that someone went all that way.. but I wasnt going to pay for it considering it was their fault!

Upon walking into our room, we were both very happy. We got our room (pool access) for a bargain price of $35AUD a night including buffet breakfast (more about the breakfast later!) and it was a cracker! This room is advertised for almost $200 a night in high season so the quality is pretty damn good!

As tired and grumpy that Ben was, I convinced him to go for a quick walk, but 10 minutes into it, I could see he just wanted to go to bed, so we headed home to bed!

Lets get this party started!

We were up bright and early (6.30am) the following day so headed to our buffet breakfast spread.. we were both pretty impressed.. it would be one of the better ones I have seen in SE Asia! After stuffing our faces, we decided to just start walking.. we headed down to Kata Beach and walked the length then we went for a walk down one of the little soi's (alleys) and found a massage place... before Benny had a chance to say no I whisked him inside and ordered two Thai massages....

Benny is affectionately known to me as Mr Windy and so I placed a bet with him for 100 baht that he could not get through the Thai massage without letting 'fluffy off the chain' so to speak... I had him quite worried! LOL... For the next hour two little Thai girls twisted and beat us both... putting me in some positions I never knew I could reach.. and attempting to get Benny in those same positions too.... He might be a big strong gym boy, but he really needs to get into some Yoga too! Hehehe.... At the end he proudly turned to me and stated I owed him 100 baht.... No fluffy off the chain! Wow!

Back to the hotel, we decided to test out the pools and lazed around taking full use of the swim up bar (those things still amuse me!) ... Getting hungry, we decided it was time to get a feed and find a motorbike to rent for the rest of our stay... Unfortunately every place we tried wanted to keep our passport as 'security'. This often means that when you bring it back, they find some damage that you have done (or probably didnt do) and they hold your passport ransom until you pay large amounts of money.. Clued up on it, we kept asking around... but were quickly getting nowhere.. I then rang David, from Little Aussie Town bar and he rang me back within an hour with a bike for 200 baht a day (thats just under $7) with only leaving a photocopy of our passport! Its not what you know... its who you know...

By this stage we were starving.. it was 3pm and we hadn't had lunch yet... We decided to walk to find a restaurant I had heard about called Red Chair in Kata.. Halfway there up a long winding road we stopped at a little bar for a beer to quench the thirst before finally finding the restaurant.. I ordered up a stack of dishes and we completely pigged out... Ben was more interested in the amount of old Western men and their pretty young Thai 'girlfriends' coming and going! It has certainly opened up his eyes!

Once lunch/dinner was over, we decided to head back towards the hotel. We found a little Muay Thai gym along the way and decided to have a beer there while watching the boys train... They were slow to get going so we gave up after the end of the beer and left.....

We caught a 400 baht tuk-tuk to Patong to pick up the bike... On the way to Patong I saw a massive big ditch/potholes in the road leading back to Kata... I said to Ben to remember where it was so we could avoid hitting it on the way home (yes you know where this is going don't you!)

Upon being dropped in Patong we headed for David's bar. On the way I got a little disorientated.. a new hotel had sprung up on the edge of the Markets which confused me no end.. but finally I found my way and after saying hello to Johnny the DVD guy (who now doesnt sell them anymore) along the way, we found the bar.

We had a few drinks, and Ben got suckered in to playing bar games with the girls, Pear and Tong... and of course, they won, and of course, Ben (and I) had to shout them drinks! I gently reminded Ben that he had to drive the motorbike home so not to get carried away (gee I'm getting way too boring and sensible in my old age!)

When the motorbike arrived at the bar, we had to sign a contract which basically says we are not covered for ANYTHING and we are up for 58000 baht if it gets damaged or stolen! LOL fingers crossed that doesn't go pear-shaped! At least they don't have our passports!

With a pimp new ride in our possession it was time to do a few laps of Patong with Ben being way more daring than what I would like... but hey, he's a farm-boy so I am sure I am in safe hands! On the way home to Kata, we were overtaken by 3 bikes.. two had couples on them and the other, a single male, all Western tourists.. I made a comment to Ben about them driving like idiots...

Less than a minute later, one of the couples crashed on the side of the road in front of us! LOL... And as we swerved around them, their single mate almost cleaned us up in a head-on when he decided to turn around and rush to his friends on the wrong side of the road cutting us off in the process! All I could do was laugh and say to Ben "AND that's why they want our passports.. cause of idiots like that!"... I laughed the whole way home to the point of not being able to breathe!

Not long after seeing them crash, I saw a tuk-tuk in front of us swerve to the other side of the road.. it was at this point I realised that the tuk-tuk was swerving the big pothole/ditch I had seen earlier.. I barely had time to warn Ben, and he didn't have time to avoid it... we hit it at a good speed and wobbled/bounced around a bit.. but stayed upright! Almost karma for laughing at the other idiots! :-p

Arriving home, we stumbled into bed exhausted, at the raging time of 10pm! LOL... And that was our first day in the Land of Smiles done! I was going to continue about Day 2 but this blog is long enough and there are a few pages of photos... so I will leave it at that... and go back to looking after my boy...

Love to all, Reet and Benny xx

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