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Hello Everyone
Well after a break of a couple of years we are back on the road again - this trip around SE Asia and China again (yes it’s cheap!) especially the AirAsia flights and Tune Hotels accommodation.
We had a comfortable flight to Kuala Lumpur with Air Asia X in their new A330 Airbus. We had heard some mixed reports about them but we had no complaints. Plenty of leg room, we left on time and actually arrived half an hour early. The meal (smoked chicken and veggies) was saved by the fantastic curry sauce and we passed on the $5AUD beers. Eight and a half hours went fairly quickly even though no one offered us an entertainment unit at $11AUD - we had our own! Well for a total cost including baggage charges, taxes and meal costs of $252AUD for the two of us - $126 each - thank you AirAsia.
We got all our AA bookings in a sale AA conducted last year including 3 flights to Borneo (Kota Kinabalu and Kutching) and return and a weeks accommodation at Tune hotels in both locations for $66AUD for two or $33 each.
Kaula Lumpur was
hot and sticky as usual. We arrived at 2.45pm and cleared immigration in record time with our Business Travel APEC cards. Jumped on the AirAsia shuttle bus for the 3 minute ride to Tune Airport Hotel. The upgraded Low Cost Terminal works well despite the ever increasing traffic volumes.
At Tune the hotel registration was quick - including paying 20 MYR ($3.50) deposit for towels. We had a room at the rear of the hotel on the 4th floor - nice and quiet. The rooms at all Tune Hotels are minimal - that is just enough room for a double bed and not much else! But they are OK for short stays with good showers - one person at a time in the bathroom. They certainly put those French hotel rooms to shame! We also paid 12RYM ($4) for internet access that did not work - won’t do that one again.
Staying at the airport gave us a chance to sample the array of food stalls at the new LCT Food Court - well all I can say is that we ended up eating at KFC. Next time we will get the shuttle to the main KULA Terminal
which has a better selection.
After dinner we had a few beers at the restaurant in the front on Tune, they had a special promotion - paid 40MYR ($13.33 for 6 small bottles of Tiger beer - yes that’s $2.22 a bottle, don’t you just love that high taxing Malaysian government! The cold beer was a welcome relief from the humidity.
We had an early night as we had an early morning flight to Phuket, Thailand - the AA flight left at 7.25am and arrived at 7.50 Thai time - again the AA flight was early. This flight cost $30 each.
Went through immigration at the air crew lane before everyone else and luckily got our bags at the head of the queue. The upgraded Phuket terminal now has plenty of room and a lot more airport concessions including the many minibus, hire car and taxi touts. We managed to bypass them all and headed outside to the airport meter taxi counter. The cost to go to Patong Beach was 450Baht ($15 including 100Bt airport tax) and the driver actually used the meter without prompting! This included the driver initially taking us to the wrong hotel a
significant distance from the Patong Beach Lodge where we were booked at $21AUD including buffet breakfast (Green season price).
We haven’t been to Patong since the tsunami in 2004 - we stayed in Kata when here last in 2007. Patong has grown and the number of bars, stalls and restaurants has increased substantially over the years. A walk down the road means constant sales approaches for DVDs, tailors, cloths, tours, massage treatments and the marauding time-share touts (more on that later). Patong really is the high life of Phuket - ladyboys, prostitutes, touts - and it goes on all day and night!
Talking of ladyboys, in the IT section of Jungceylon Rob was looking for a USB 2.0 adapter called a “gender changer” (ie an adaptor that changes a male USB plug to a female USB plug). Well didn’t he get heaps from a couple of ladyboys who offered medical advice and surgeons phone numbers. Sadly he left without the adaptor but a whole lot wiser on the question of sex change operations!
We had 4 nights at the Patong Beach Lodge which is back from the beach in a quiet soi (lane). We liked this hotel
and will go back there next trip to Phuket. It has a small but adequate pool and the rooms are clean and quiet.
Phuket now has a major shopping centre Jungceylon - Robinson’s and Carrefours department stores and a raft of specialty outlets and an excellent food court serving meals from all the areas in Thailand.
On our first day at Jungceylon we bumped into Wal Brown (retired Principal of Port Macquarie TAFE and Rob’s boss when he was teaching Marketing). Wal moved to Patong about 2 years ago and owns an excellent restaurant - Sweet Restaurant in the soi in front of the Patong Tower which we highly recommend- and a laundry and Tower Massage. Sweet has an extensive menu and the prices are very reasonable. Again the Sweet Massage prices are very reasonable and the service is very professional. Those that know Wal will remember that he started the Massage courses at Port Macquarie TAFE College many years ago.
Wal, thanks for a great time, look forward to seeing you next time we are in Patong.
During our second week in Patong we stayed at the Absolute Sea Pearl Hotel - the 7 night
stay cost nothing as it was given to us by Holiday Club for attending one of those sales presentations in Port Macquarie. All we had to do was attend another 90 minute presentation from the Customer Service Manager - reluctantly we had to decline the time share offer. The Sea Pearl is right on the beach and has a small pool which very few people seemed to use.
To keep costs down we bought Chang (elephant) Beer at the 7 Eleven for 43 Bt ($1.43) a large bottle and ate at Sweet, Ocean Plaza and Jungceylon - with prices ranging from 40 to 150Bt a meal. It’s been a great relaxing start to our holiday, and we are looking forward to a few more beach holiday breaks during our travels over the next few months.
On Saturday we caught a songthaew into Phuket town where we are staying at the Sinthavee Hotel for a few nights - it’s certainly seen better days but at 600Bt ($20) a night we have no complaints. We had hoped to catch up with our friend New, but he is currently working as a consultant on the construction of a new resort somewhere
near Koh Lak. His sister is running his restaurant and filled us in on New’s exploits. We will catch up with him on our next visit.
We will be heading up to Bangkok next Tuesday (AA flight $40 each) and expect it to be quiet after the Red Shirts rally which has lasted 2 months. The Red Shirts and the government have agreed to dissolve Parliament and call elections in November so it will be safe to move around Bangkok. We will be meeting Robyn and Gene from Apollo Bay Vic who we met in Vietnam a couple of years ago.
The political strife has taken a toll on tourism to Thailand with numbers considerably down on normal levels. This is good as it is not so crowded, but the onslaught of the touts hungry for commissions is furious. In Patong there must be 20 or so time share touts working the streets every day - sometimes they approach you several times not remembering that they have already tried to sell you their presentation.
The wifi connections have been patchy so far - at Sea Pearl it was on and off, but we managed to skype Col
and Audrey at home, Russell and Amie in Wilcannia, and Magenta who is somewhere in Nicaragua a couple of times. Hamish please turn on your skype connection we have tried several times.
Hello Tebby and Brian - sorry for not returning your email earlier but we just run out of time before we left Australia - hope this blog will keep you posted and that you are both well and enjoying Mexico.
Off to Bangkok tomorrow - looking forward to the dim sum at our favorite restaurant. Bye for now.
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