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Published: December 7th 2014
Elephants, Cashews and Buddahs- Phuket, Thailand We arrived in Phuket just as dawn was breaking and we surprised to see another cruise ship in the beautifully crescent shaped harbor. As we looked over, we recognized it as the Celebrity Millennium which we sailed on 4-5 years ago from Auckland New Zealand to Sydney Australia and also in the Caribbean. Kind of cool to see that and have some good memories.
Today, for the first time on our trip, we are “tendering” (taking a small boat from the ship to shore) into the dock at the resort town of Phuket, Thailand. We are kind of thrilled because our granddaughter, Madison, is teaching English to Thailand kindergarteners here and Phuket was one of her first stops
When we got to the beach it was crowded with people from our ship as well as tour guides and tourists ;-) We made our way down the pretty, beach and I stopped to collect sand. Our tour guide met us on the beach and we walked to our minivan equipped to carry 12 passengers. Again, as you would expect, it was hot and humid and this only
got worse as we toured into the afternoon.
On our long drive to the first stop, the big Buddha (constructed of white jade), we climbed a mountain road with lots of lush greenery, and saw elephants working and trekking with tourist passengers. The elephants were not the giant African elephants, but relatively small ones. We passed by them quickly in our minivan as our “number 1 driver” kept up a frantic pace most of the day. There were also working elephants walking up a road with their handlers alongside. We saw signs saying to not bother the monkeys, but never saw any.
As always… many steps up to the Buddah. On our way up we passed through a “market” area where the resident monks were having a buffet breakfast and meeting for morning prayers. This area was like a big open shed and the monks were sitting on the ground eating.
This big Buddha is still under construction, so, it was a little messy, but we got to go inside the unfinished Buddha and see where the monks pray.
The view from the top of the hill where
Monks Praying
At the big Buddhathe Buddha sits incorporates fantastic views of all sides of this lush, green island, from the bays to the mountains-very striking. There were several little gardens and prayer spots in the trees around the site with small bells dedicating prayers to the Buddha. On our way down the steps to the parking area, I found the cutest little puppy that was so friendly and well cared for-we love to see this!
Next stop a Buddhist Temple with some of the best kept gardens we have seen. Since this is Cope’s birthday, he was very interested in bowing to Buddha whenever he could for good luck and for many more birthdays to come. The Temple itself was very ornate and decorated in gold-very lavish looking from the outside-and everyone entering the Temple were taking off their shoes as a sign of respect. There was a booth passing out (for a small donation) pareos/sarongs to any women or men wearing sleeveless blouses or shorts, so they could show respect when entering the Temple. At the small market across the street, we found a cold bottle of Coke light-YES-in the heat and humidity, it tasted so good!
A cashew factory was next and we had really been looking forward to this stop! There is a large cashew tree next to the building that had fake fruit (cashew nuts) hanging from the tree so everyone could see what the actual nut looked like. Inside the plant/store, we saw three women using a machine that looked like a drill press, harvesting the nut from the fruit-it was so very interesting because the actual nut hangs from the bottom of the fruit, which looks about like a pear. The machine kind of split the nut open and, by hand, the women separated the nuts from the fruit, and discarded the larger fruit. We did learn later that the local Thai people actually use the discarded fruit for cooking and other things. The store was jammed, and I mean jammed, with people (tourists) shopping for cashew nuts packaged in every kind of flavor one can think of…..from just salted cashews to garlic flavored to cheese flavored, cinnamon, sesame, and on and on. Quite interesting. There were samples of all of the different flavors of nuts…I restrained myself and only bought one package of honey roasted cashews. I bought some for everyone
to taste but they will never make it home ;-)
A brief stop for lunch on our own. Cope and I shared a shrimp fried rice plate and some water…..just 50 baht ($2.00)….and sat in the shade with some fans, which certainly feet good! We were ready to go back to the ship but alas, one more stop ;-) A very ornate former school, later a home, with another open courtyard with an open roof so that the floor under the roof was an open water pond. The exhibits were first class, in four different languages, including English, but it was so hot and no fans in most rooms in the house that we really just wanted to sit down and rest.
Okay, so our guides throughout this trip have been uniformly excellent. Some we could understand better than others and some knew more than others but all in all great guides. Except for Busan, South Korea. I had allocated an F to this tour guide. The worst… I thought (LOL) until Phuket. Now the Busan Guide gets to move up to a D…and in her place is our Phuket Guide. Unfortunately Phuket now
takes over the F place. I actually felt sorry for us and even sorrier for her. A+++ is still Shu Fey from China!
Next Sailing Back to Singapore
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Russ Hamm
non-member comment
Howdy from central Oregon!
Hello you two! Winter here with snow, ice, and low temps. It is Sunday, Dec 7 - a salute to Pearl Harbor - and it looks to be a beautiful day. Fred and Linda are here for the weekend and you both would have enjoyed the chatter and laughter. Belated happy birthday to you Cope and many many more! I continue to look forward to your posts Jean and have read every one. Miss you two and continued safe travels. r