"The Postcard" a Thailand Travel Page by beaniezotzim

We have friends that went to Thailand and when they came back they tried to talk us into going, our reply was usually "yeah, maybe someday" but we never really put much thought into it because we had our hearts set on going to Spain for the Tomato Wars. Jon (hubby) was at work one day and our friend told him he wanted to show him something. That something was a postcard of PHI PHI... Jon was sold... I was still a little bit skeptical because I hadn't seen the postcard, but I am always up for a vacation, and since it's so cheap to vacation in Thailand, we decided to pack our bags.

sorry the quality of pic is bad... I have a cheap scanner.

we arrived in Bangkok and stayed on Khao Sarn Road at the D&D Inn. (600 baht / night.... a/c, hot/cold showers, cable tv) We had a room with a window that opened up right onto the street below. it was a little noisey but well worth it if you are a people-watcher. I didn't like Bangkok too much, but I don't really like big cities that much. If you like cities you will love the excitement and energy Bangkok has to offer. We went on a longtail boad ride along the river and through some of the waterways and that made my stay there very tolerable. I would like to do that again.

After Bangkok, we headed to Kanchanaburi were we saw the Bridge over the River Kwai and Erwan falls. We also got some activities in like bike riding, museums, Elephant rides (if you are an animal lover and worry about how the elephants are treated, I DO NOT recommend the Elephant rides... I found out after our vacation from a documentary show on TV about how these animals are trained and it is HORRIBLE.... I will NEVER get on another Elephant. They were not treated badly when I was riding them, it is the training that they must go through to get to that stage that is unacceptable to me) we also went on a bamboo river raft ride and visited Erwan Falls (7 tiered waterfall)... Erwan Falls is highly recommended.

After Kanchanaburi, we headed up to Chiang Mai... here we did not have much of a plan and I think we would have really enjoyed this city much more if we had one... We walked up the long staircase to Wat Doi Suthep and went to a night market here. Other than that we kind of just wandered around the city. There are a lot of tours provided by various groups for trekking etc. prices are pretty much the same anywhere you go. there is not much varience between tours and we just didn't find one that really fit what we were looking for. (knowing what we wanted to do would have been helpful, but we just didn't know what we wanted to do.)

After Chiang Mai, we headed down to the beaches. I will briefly describe my experience of each one.
1) Koh Chang... very charming Island. this island is on the quieter side and very relaxing... lots of construction going on. Hurry if you want to enjoy this lovely island.
2) Koh Wai. This is such a pretty little get away. We snorkelled a couple of times a day and every time it seemed the colors got even more vibrant than the time before... so pretty. electricity from 5pm until 11pm, salt water showers, and yucky, built-in mesquito nets were my only complaints. other than that, I loved it.
3) Phuket. I liked this island. It is a cool island with decent night life. The beaches seemed a little crowded with boats and unbrellas all over the sand.. it just had too much of a touristy feel for me. Its a beach that I could easily imagine in any other country.
4) Koh PHI PHI... While it is still beautiful, it has lost a lot of its charm. Its just overcrowded and hyped up too much. we went on a tour here that I wouldn't recommend. (I will try to find out the name of the operating company) they say that you will get to: swim with sharks, see the beach that the movie "The Beach" was filmed on, See the Bird nest soup nest collectors caves, snorkel at bamboo Island, and snorkel in a few more spots throughout the day. there was a little disclaimer saying that the tour could change... we thought " ah it can't change that much" ..we were wrong... we didn't get to see ANY of the above mentioned things, we only snorkeled in a couple of spots nothin' but snorkelin'... it was great snorkeling, but we signed up specifically for the sharks and Bamboo island.

5) Koh Lanta. Very Relaxing island.. I really enjoyed this island. We met some Irish girls at our bungalows that drank us under the table EVERY Night. they are champions.

6) Khao Sak National Park. We went here to see the Rafflesia flower, too late, it had already bloomed and died by the time we got there. we decided to take a little night "safari" ... it consisted of a man tromping us through the jungle in the middle of the night, with flashlights (not very good ones at that) looking for wildlife. we saw a frog and a spider and maybe a lemur, but it was so far up in a tree all you could see were eyes. We did get a little chuckle out of it because we could just picture the tour operaters calling us "suckers" behind our backs.. oh well,
7) Koh Phangan. This island is getting a bad rap. I've read a few times that this island is not good because they think that the only thing it has to offer is Hat Rin. Not so. We stayed on this island for 10 days on a beach called Thaan Nai Pan Yai. I loved it here. the bungalow operaters were great.. we stayed at Pingjun Resort. We had dinner with him and drank with him and had a good ol' time. There are a couple of bars on this beach that are well worth mentioning. first there is the Dolphin... this is a relaxed atmosphere bar and noise is NOT encouraged...very kick back place. second there is central, conveniently located in the center of the beach, they have bon fires and firedancers etc. very cool, you could sit and eat while watching the fire dancers and have a "small set" (a small bottle of sang som (rum) or Meakong (?) with a couple of cokes and some ice....
and third ther is the Game bar, this bar is located about a block inland and its usually where everyone winds up hanging out at the end of the night. here is a good place to order a couple of "buckets" (1 small bottle of liquor, 2 cokes, 2 red bulls, and a buch of straws.) you just pass these babies around the bar and make new friends.
We explored the island by renting motorbikes and just ambling along the roads. this is really a beautiful island... we saw waterfalls and met a monkey (a Gibbin, I think it is actually an ape, but monkey sounds so much better) and hiked up and saw some monitor lizards. This is a great place to spend some time...
The Full Moon party is not all it has to offer and I recommend staying here and exploring for a few days.