Jan 16 2014

Thailand Day 5: Beach relaxation and massages

Welcome to the first full day in Ao Nang! I couldn’t take it any longer, so I woke up early and decided to go for a short run. I ran 10km, and it felt good to work off a little excess energy. Hopefully it will help with the crazy amounts of food that I’ve been eating lately too!

After going for a run and taking a quick shower, we packed up our things and headed for the beach. The hotel (the Mercure Krabi Deevana)provided a basket with beach towels for us, which was really a nice touch! With sun cream in hand, we walked down to Ao Nang beach. It felt REALLY nice to just lie in the sun for a couple hours, and then cool off by swimming out in the Andaman Sea (really the Andaman Cove, since we were in the body of water that separates Phuket and Krabi). Before heading back to the hotel briefly, we walked up and down the entire beach. It was really interesting to see how different each end was. The end away from the main Ao Nang strip has powdery sand and very few people, whilst the other end (near the strip) has more shells and a LOT more people.


The beautiful coastline of Ao Nang Beach (really Nopparattara Beach)
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Some long boats out in the Andaman Sea near Ao Nang Beach
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We quickly showered, and headed back to the Ao Nang strip. I was a bit hungry, but didn’t want to ruin dinner, so we decided to just grab a quick snack. Since Ao Nang Boat Noodle was so good last night, we went back there and ordered a couple appetisers. I decided to try the other Thai beer (Singha), since I had already tried Chang when we were at Siam Niramit. I didn’t like Singha nearly as much, and truthfully, beer isn’t my thing at all. However, I did want to try them during our trip.

After our small snack, we went for our massages at Ao Nang Haven. Interestingly, the beds are on the floor, and not elevated like Swedish massages in the United States. My massage was okay, but not fantastic. However, that wasn’t the fault of the masseuse. Rather, I chose poorly; the Adventurer’s Massage was more of a trigger-point massage. As such, it wasn’t really relaxing, but it did help my muscles feel better. Deb said that she really enjoyed her massage, and that it really took it out of her.


Ao Nang Haven – best massages in Ao Nang
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We left Ao Nang Haven, and decided to see just how far the next hotel was from the strip. We walked up to Aonang Phu Petra, and it really wasn’t all that bad of a walk (but there were a few substantial hills). I chose that particular hotel because of its distance away from the strip—away from the hustle and bustle, but still close enough to walk. Also, it was known because of the luxury bungalows that it offered guests.

We left there and decided to go to the Russian restaurant in town, Nasha (written Наша in Cyrillics). The waitress seemed a bit surprised when I thanked her in Russian, and ordered various menu items in Russian. The food was very good, and I especially loved the Pelmeni, which are little dumplings filled with pork and sautéed in butter. Overall, it’s a must-try restaurant when you’re in Ao Nang.


Excellent Russian food in Ao Nang – Nasha Russia (Наша Россия)
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After dinner, when we were on our way back to the hotel, we stopped at this street vendor making pancakes. I had one with sweetened condensed milk and raisins, and Deb got one with–what else–chocolate. :p They were both delicious, and certainly worth the 80 baht for both!

Back at the hotel, we decided to try the Starlight Bar again, but alas, were disappointed. The bar tenders were just not very good at making drinks. Fortunately, they were cheap, so it wasn’t all that bad.

Tomorrow we’re off for a three-day excursion about two-and-a-half hours away at the Elephant Hills luxury tented camp in Khao Sok National Park!

Jan 15 2014

Thailand Day 4: Heading to Krabi & Ao Nang

We woke up early again this morning, and packed up the last of our things to get ready to depart for Krabi. We headed down for the breakfast buffet, looked at the pool one last time, and then hailed a taxi for the airport. At the hotel’s recommendation, we paid the taxi a flat-fare instead of using the meter. It was 400 baht, and only took us about 25 minutes to get there.

We were a bit worried that our luggage was over the allotment for Bangkok Airways (which was only 20kg [44 lbs], as opposed to the international flights which were 50 lbs). Luckily, though, the representative didn’t charge us for the extra weight, and just let us board the flight with the carry-ons as well! Though the flight was delayed by about 45 minutes, it went very smoothly, and we landed at Krabi Airport. We took this shuttle to the terminal building, but it seemed silly since it was only about one minute away from the aeroplane. We gathered our bags, and paid the 600 baht for the taxi to Ao Nang.

We checked in to the Mercure Krabi Deevana hotel, and it was fairly nice. I don’t know that it is really a five-star hotel, but it was great nonetheless. The only problem that I saw was that our room was fairly far from the rest of the hotel. The rooms are in separate buildings, and we were in the farthest one from the lobby. The pools, however, were beautiful, and wrapped around all of the buildings.


The room at the Mercure Krabi Deevana hotel
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Beautiful cliff view from our room at the Mercure Krabi Deevana in Ao Nang
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We decided to just go see the surrounding areas, and walk to the main Ao Nang strip (with all the shops and restaurants, et cetera). The walk was quick, and enjoyable, especially with the nice breeze that was blowing most of the time. We stopped in at Ao Nang Haven in order to schedule our massages for the next day. I booked the Adventurer’s massage, and she booked the After-Beach massage.


The main strip of shops in Ao Nang
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With that task out of the way, we were both getting a bit hungry, so we went just up the road to Ao Nang Boat Noodle restaurant. I had heard good things about this little, unassuming eatery, and thought that it would be a good place to have our first meal in Krabi. We started with some spring rolls and fried tofu, which were both excellent. The fried tofu was especially good, as it was prepared differently than I had had before. This batter was really light and almost fluffy. For dinner, I ordered spicy basil with chicken (medium heat), and she got mixed vegetables with chicken in a medium brown sauce. Both of the meals were great, and we finished off with some interesting ice cream. I chose the Rua Mit flavour, which I had never even heard of before. It was basically a sweet cream ice cream with some candied fruits and vegetables in it.


AMAZING dinner of spicy basil chicken, some fried tofu, and spring rolls at Ao Nang Boat Noodle restaurant
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After dinner, we walked along the beach back to the hotel. We started off in the Kingfisher Restaurant by ordering a couple drinks. After realising that they were just going upstairs to the bar to get the drinks, we cut out the middle man and went up there ourselves. They had half-priced drinks for happy hour, so we ordered some of them. They weren’t very good at all, but it was the nice end to the evening.

Jan 14 2014

Thailand Day 3: Dusit Zoo and the Museum of Floral Culture

For today, I had scheduled only a couple activities as I wanted it to be a slightly more relaxing day than the past few. To start off, we went down to the breakfast buffet and had some great food. My personal favourite was the assortment of dim sum that they had to offer (including amazing dessert custard buns).

After breakfast, we hailed a taxi outside the hotel and departed for what we thought would be the Dusit Zoo. However, this was the first truly awful cab experience that we had in Bangkok. This driver started heading in the wrong direction, which I could tell since I was using the GPS and maps that I had on my phone. At first, I thought that he was just taking a longer route in order to increase the fare. I then realised, though, that he was taking us in the completely wrong direction. We were about 60km outside of Bangkok (to the southeast) before I could get him to pull over and let us out. He just kept saying that we were going in the right direction, and wouldn’t pull over. He dropped us on the outskirts of Bang Na in the slums of the city, and we had to walk to the nearest BTS station (Bearing), which was about 6km away. I wasn’t all that nervous about it, but it was really aggravating!

Once we got to the BTS station, we took it to National Stadium, which was as close as we could get to the Dusit Zoo. There were still many protesters outside of the Stadium, which made hailing a taxi nearly impossible. As such, we started walking in the direction of Dusit Zoo, and eventually got a cab for the remaining leg of the journey.

The Dusit Zoo was shockingly barren and underwhelming. They advertised that they had pandas, koalas, and elephants… of which, they had none. They did have a penguin exhibit, and by “exhibit,” I mean that there were about seven Humboldts hopping around. The only two parts of the zoo that were actually worth the visit were the incredibly rare White Bengal Tigers and a Caracal. The White Bengal Tigers were sleeping, and were a bit difficult to see, but still worth it. The Carracal was pacing around looking as fierce as ever. We don’t have either of those animals at our zoo, so it was fantastic to get to see them, even if it was only briefly.


Koala statue at one of the entrances to the Dusit Zoo in Bangkok
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Sleeping White Bengal Tiger at the Dusit Zoo in Bangkok
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Caracal at the Dusit Zoo
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After the zoo, we took a tuk-tuk for a short lift to the Museum of Floral Culture. This was a museum that wasn’t really mentioned in many places online, but it seemed interesting to me (seeing as floral macro photography is my big hobby). The museum was only firstly recognised by the Thai government about a year ago (in 2012), and it was a little small, but the tour guide that we had was great at explaining the use of flowers in different ceremonies and within different cultures. At the end of the tour, we were presented with some lovely herbal and floral teas and some traditional Thai sweets. The sweets were all very similar, but had some subtleties that set each of them apart from one another. After tea, we walked around the garden and took some photos of the area.


An example of the beautifully ornate pieces made from flowers
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We hopped in a cab to head back to the hotel, and I thought that we were going to have another experience like the one that we had this morning. Fortunately, though, the driver was just taking a different route in order to avoid the protests. He dropped us off right where I had asked (the Surasak BTS station, directly across Sathorn Road from our hotel).

We were debating either staying close to the hotel and going next door to the Blue Elephant, or going down to midtown Asok for dinner. We had eaten at the Blue Elephant in Swords, Ireland, so it would have been neat to eat at the original in Bangkok, but instead, we went to Asok to eat at Nobita Yakinku, which is a Japanese-style BBQ place. We ordered a bunch of different meats (chicken, pork, bacon, brisket, et cetera), and cooked them on the open firepit at our table. For dessert, they brought out this very interesting mix of sno-cone ice with mixed-berry syrup, pieces of sweet bread, and chocolate chips. I hadn’t ever had anything like it. The meal was fun, but I personally didn’t like the food all that much.

Sifting through the sea of protesters, we stopped by Soi Cowboy (which is a one-block red light district) on our way back to the BTS station. I really didn’t have any interest in going into the highly-overpriced bars in the area, but wanted to see what Bangkok’s RLD was actually like. A couple scantily-clad young girls asked me what I would like, and I politely declined. Actually, some of them looked so young that it was a bit unnerving.


Soi Cowboy – Bangkok’s one-block red light district
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If you don’t fancy the ladies, though, there’s actually a lesser-known gay men’s area in Bangkok as well. It is on Surawong Road right before you get to Rama IV Road (right near Dukes Tower. We didn’t see this area at night since it was rather far from our hotel, but it was rather dead during the day (which is to be expected):


The gay district in Bangkok – Surawong Road near Dukes Tower
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Anyway, I snapped a few photos and we were on our way back to Asok BTS station. We hopped the train back to Surasak, had a couple cocktails at Swizzles lounge in the lobby of the Eastin Grand Hotel Sathorn, and retired for the night. I don’t think that my head had even fully hit the pillow before I was asleep. For some reason, the day really took it out of me.

Tomorrow we leave for Krabi (Ao Nang Beach, really), which should start a whole new set of adventures!