Phuket Plants & Animals

After leaving Mae Hong Son in February 2002, Tanya and I headed for the gulf of Thailand. Ultimately, our final destination in the country was a small island resort off the coast of Krabi, a place which Tanya knew little about as I had been keeping it a closely guarded secret. On the way, however, we had a few days to spare and had decided to spend them in Phuket so that I could show her the beauty of Phi Phi and the surrounding scenery that I had loved so much on my previous trip. This time, however, I had booked us into somewhere a little further from the nightlife of Patong. The Central Karon Village is a resort complex on the top of a hill halfway between Patong and the nearby village of Karon and, from the pictures in the brochure, the resort looked to be not only extremely romantic but also positioned just far enough away from Patong to afford us the peace we were looking for while still being within reach of the shops and restaurants (1). Almost as soon as our taxi turned off the road and drew up in front of the lavish looking reception building, I knew the Central Karon was going to be everything I'd hoped it would be. Built on the side of a steep hill overlooking Karon Beach and the bay, a narrow private road zig-zags downward between rows of wooden villas supported on stilts. The road is truly private, only being just wide enough to allow two narrow golf carts to pass each other carrying guests up to reception at the top or down to the swimming pool by the beach at the bottom of the hill. Flights of steps wind between the villas, connecting each flat stretch of road and creating the effect of several levels as you make your way down to the beach. Telephones are positioned at intervals along the side of the road, so that anyone wishing to get anywhere without having to climb the hundreds of steps between the villas can simply ring for a golf cart to come and collect them. It felt a little like being on fantasy island. The room I had booked for Tanya and I was grandly titled a deluxe villa, and we were driven on our golf cart to the nearest telephone point from where the driver helped us carry our luggage up the remaining steps to our accommodation. Entry to the villa was through a small wooden patio which, due to the stilts holding it up against the edge of the hill and the steps leading away in both directions, also doubled as a balcony on which we could sit and watch the sunset or watch the almost non-existent waves on the sea through the trees. Our patio doors led into a small cosy bedroom, most of which was taken up with an eastern style four poster bed over and around which had been draped mosquito netting, and waiting for us on the pillow was a single red flower. Adjoining the bedroom was an en suite bathroom which, bizarrely, contained a large open window over the top of the shower which flooded the room with light during the day and showed us the stars at night. The amount of light in the bathroom also served another purpose because, even more bizarrely, the room also contained a small indoor garden in the form of a selection of plants planted in a bed of soil along the length of one wall. To me, the villa was perfect - and yet it was not the most expensive option. For the mere cost of one arm and two legs, we could've probably just about afforded to stay in a poolside villa or have our own spa in a private outdoor garden, but both of these options seemed to me to be rather missing the point - who wants to stay at home in their villa all day taking baths when you're in a place as beautiful as Thailand? For the same reason, the fact that our room also boasted satellite television, on demand movies and a well stocked mini-bar totally passed by me un-noticed. We were far too interested in having a great time around the resort and planning our visits to nearby islands to take any notice of trivial things like that! There were plenty of choices at the resort when it came to food. At the top of the hill, next to reception, the Cliff Bar and Restaurant allowed us to sit outside sipping cocktails at sunset or have dinner surrounded by panoramic views of the Andaman Sea. On the other hand, if all our energy had been sapped by spending all day taking part in strenuous activities such as laying by the pool or shopping in Patong, we could opt to walk down the hill rather than up it and have dinner at the Bayview Restaurant overlooking the pool. This was generally more of a buffet set-up and we found that we could usually just wander in, mention our villa number and load up our plates. The chef looked to be constantly busy behind the counter, steam and delicious local smells emanating from his general vicinity throughout our meal - every now and again, he would emerge from his hiding place with a giant platter of mouth-watering delicacies and set them down at somebody's table before disappearing back into the makeshift kitchen. The Bayview did exactly what it said on the tin, affording us particularly spectacular views of the Andaman sea and the bay beyond the pool, and was a delightful place to relax at the end of the day. Both restaurants, however, are pretty popular local destinations - so much so that you can even book a table on the internet before you've even booked your room. Getting from the resort to the shops and nightlife could be done in one of two ways. If we were feeling lazy, we could get reception to call us a taxi. These usually turned up pretty quickly, but we wouldn't have really cared even if they'd kept us waiting as it would've just been an excuse to sit at the bar next to reception and gaze out to sea for a while. Alternatively, we could decide to get some exercise and set off on the long downhill walk in either direction - one way would eventually lead us into the town of Karon, the other to Patong. Either way, the downward journey was very easy - it was the return up the hill which taught us a thing or two about fitness. As a general rule, we walked to town and then got a taxi back. Actually, the taxis in Karon and Patong were not at all what we had been expecting as westerners. Rather than being comfortable enclosed vehicles as we are used to back home, a local taxi in Phuket usually consists of a guy driving a fairly old small truck with a cab up front and a rickety carriage on the back with a single long hard wooden seat on each side. The back of the carriage is completely open for climbing in and out, and the two sides consist of two long glassless windows through which you are more than welcome to fall whenever the taxi goes over a bump in the road. If you're lucky, the driver might even notice and come back for you. The small seafront town of Karon is a world away from neighbouring Patong, if you'll excuse my strange bending of the English language for a moment. Rather than being a loud vibrant place, Karon attracts people looking for a simpler holiday and provides only the amenities to get from one day to the next. It is, however, Phuket's second most popular tourist resort for precisely this reason. There are no streets of nightclubs or rows of packed restaurants, a refreshing fact which proves that the popularity of a resort doesn't have to rely solely on how much there is to do - on our first trip into Karon, it took me a while to even find a cash machine - and afterwards I rather wished I hadn't as it told me it was out of cash and then took the money out of my account anyway.There are a couple of low-key restaurants and bars as you enter the town from the direction of Patong, but very little beyond. Karon does have a street which runs along the beach, but it is lined with hotels and spa resorts rather than attractions. The sand is of the pure white variety you would expect to see on the outlying islands rather than the tourist destinations, and according to the website for the Central Karon Village it is known for squeaking loudly when stepped on. Personally, I cannot vouch for this as I have never encountered squeaking sand in my life and would probably run quickly in the opposite direction if I ever did, but I can certainly recommend Karon Beach as an alternative to the junk food wrapper covered seafront that is Patong - especially since the larger fast food chains have begun to descend on the area. This is very much the place to stay if you don't want to be woken up in the middle of the night by a drunken bar crawl staggering past your front door, and Patong is very much the place to stay if you want to be on a drunken bar crawl that gets to stagger past somebody else's front door! In contrast to Karon, Patong has become the favourite destination for young people looking for a wild, drunken orgy of parties and bars. There are even distinct heterosexual and gay areas of the resort. Back in the 80s, Patong was a quiet seaside resort just like its neighbour until westerners suddenly decided that it was surrounded by such beautiful scenery that it really was the place to go to get drunk and not appreciate any of it. This seems to be quite a popular theme with Europeans - find somewhere really stunning and cover it in fast food wrappers as quickly as possible. These days, Patong is very much the hub of activity on Phuket and contains the vast majority of its nightlife and restaurants. To be fair, if you're looking for somewhere to eat or shop on Phuket or you want to go out for the evening to a reasonably sized club, then Patong is the only real choice - but personally I would always stay elsewhere and go in for the evening. There is a large shopping centre in Patong, spread over several floors and selling everything from cheap clothes thru wines and spirits to souvenirs. Due to the large communities of new age holiday travellers and old style hippies heading out to Thailand for the full moon parties and island life,the clothing here tends to frown in the face of traditional style and you'll see many people wearing more gypsy style clothing, and this is openly available in the clothes shops throughout the island - although bargains can be picked up quite easily on clothing in general, especially if you're willing to take the risk that what you're buying might not be exactly one hundred percent authentic. In fact, this is very much something to be aware of when stopping in resorts such as Patong. We're all familiar with the concept of roadside vendors selling fake rolex watches, but in Thailand it is not unknown for an unsuspecting tourist to go into a large reputable looking department store, wander into the music section and pick up an apparent bargain such as a chart album for the equivalent of a few pennies, only to discover upon listening to it that they've actually got a recording of a talented impressionist covering the original songs - not something it will tell you on the CD case. One really obvious thing about the ridiculous exchange rate between the Thai Baht and the UK Pound is that nobody really knows what their money is worth from one day to the next. At the time of writing, one pound would buy me sixty-four Baht. This is never really a problem as you know that everything in Thailand is costing you next to nothing, but the confusion did prove useful to Tanya and I when we arrived in Patong and decided in a moment of madness to head for McDonalds for something to eat. While Tanya found a table among the throngs of tourists stuffing their faces, I went up to the counter and ordered - coming away with a tray laden down with food and drink which had probably cost me not much more than a pound or two. On the way back to the table, a drunken English guy came bursting through the door with his mates and knocked me flying, sending my tray clattering to the ground and spreading my food all over the floor. Stopping in his tracks, he looked momentarily horrified at what he had done before putting his hand on my shoulder, apologising profusely in a drunken slur and handing me a wad of Thai banknotes with which to replace our meals. I worked out later that he had given me enough money to pay for our first couple of days spending in resort, probably enough to have replaced our meals fifty times over - but by that time the group had moved on and we were forced to spend the change on souvenirs instead. It isn't often you arrive in a foreign country on a budget and almost immediately have somebody pay for your stay! Our stay in Phuket coincided with our first Valentines Day together, and we had dinner in one of the nicer restaurants on Patong sea front. I had, of course, tried very hard to arrange the dates of our holiday so that Valentines Day would be during our stay at the Rayavadee, the island resort I had ended up booking for the following week - but as you can imagine, getting such a place for Valentines was a little like trying to book a ticket to Glastonbury music festival the day before it starts. I didn't even like to ask how far in advance we would've had to book a table at the Central Karon Village, but the people were already lining up to get in when we left. Nevertheless, we found a romantic place along the front and were able to forget for a moment that we were in Patong and be surrounded by other couples celebrating the day. As it turned out, our stay at the Rayavadee a few days later was pretty much like an extended Valentines Day anyway. On our return journeys to the Central Karon Village in the back of a taxi, Tanya would try very hard to get me to join in with a romantic rendition of Close to You by The Carpenters. This would usually end in embarrassment, partly because it's not that easy to sing well when you're being tossed around in the back of a truck, but mainly because I've always had an unfortunatetendency to muddle all the words up between the various choruses in such a way that the song changes rather dramatically from one of the most beautiful love songs ever written into a bit of a farce. "Why do birds fall down from the sky, every time you walk by" doesn't have quite the same ring to it, and probably puts across completely the wrong message... (1) Since our stay, the Central Karon Village has been renamed the Centara Villas. Looking through the website, however, it doesn't seem to me that much has changed other than the name. When I looked, there seemed to be a sudden lack of photos of the villa exteriors, however, and they seem to have repainted the interior walls red. Perhaps the management aren't as impressed with their own facilities as we were! However, Considering where we were and how beautiful the resort was, I found the cost of staying at the Central Karon Village entirely reasonable - at the time of writing, the deluxe villa we stayed in is showing on the resort website at an online rate of 88 UK pounds per night. Many basic hotels in London charge more than this, and I don't remember any of them having majestic views of the Andaman sea. For a more detailed description of Phuket and the amazing limestone stacks and islands surrounding it, you may like to read my previous book - still available at http://www.offexploring.com/globalwanderer

After leaving Mae Hong Son in February 2002, Tanya and I headed for the gulf of Thailand. Ultimately, our final destination in the country was a small island resort off the coast of Krabi, a place which Tanya knew little about as I had been keeping it a closely guarded secret. On the way, however, we had a few days to spare and had decided to spend them in Phuket so that I could show her the beauty of Phi Phi and the surrounding scenery that I had loved so much on my previous trip. This time, however, I had booked us into somewhere a little further from the nightlife of Patong. The Central Karon Village is a resort complex on the top of a hill halfway between Patong and the nearby village of Karon and, from the pictures in the brochure, the resort looked to be not only extremely romantic but also positioned just far enough away from Patong to afford us the peace we were looking for while still being within reach of the shops and restaurants (1). Almost as soon as our taxi turned off the road and drew up in front of the lavish looking reception building, I knew the Central Karon was going to be everything I'd hoped it would be. Built on the side of a steep hill overlooking Karon Beach and the bay, a narrow private road zig-zags downward between rows of wooden villas supported on stilts. The road is truly private, only being just wide enough to allow two narrow golf carts to pass each other carrying guests up to reception at the top or down to the swimming pool by the beach at the bottom of the hill. Flights of steps wind between the villas, connecting each flat stretch of road and creating the effect of several levels as you make your way down to the beach. Telephones are positioned at intervals along the side of the road, so that anyone wishing to get anywhere without having to climb the hundreds of steps between the villas can simply ring for a golf cart to come and collect them. It felt a little like being on fantasy island. The room I had booked for Tanya and I was grandly titled a deluxe villa, and we were driven on our golf cart to the nearest telephone point from where the driver helped us carry our luggage up the remaining steps to our accommodation. Entry to the villa was through a small wooden patio which, due to the stilts holding it up against the edge of the hill and the steps leading away in both directions, also doubled as a balcony on which we could sit and watch the sunset or watch the almost non-existent waves on the sea through the trees. Our patio doors led into a small cosy bedroom, most of which was taken up with an eastern style four poster bed over and around which had been draped mosquito netting, and waiting for us on the pillow was a single red flower. Adjoining the bedroom was an en suite bathroom which, bizarrely, contained a large open window over the top of the shower which flooded the room with light during the day and showed us the stars at night. The amount of light in the bathroom also served another purpose because, even more bizarrely, the room also contained a small indoor garden in the form of a selection of plants planted in a bed of soil along the length of one wall. To me, the villa was perfect - and yet it was not the most expensive option. For the mere cost of one arm and two legs, we could've probably just about afforded to stay in a poolside villa or have our own spa in a private outdoor garden, but both of these options seemed to me to be rather missing the point - who wants to stay at home in their villa all day taking baths when you're in a place as beautiful as Thailand? For the same reason, the fact that our room also boasted satellite television, on demand movies and a well stocked mini-bar totally passed by me un-noticed. We were far too interested in having a great time around the resort and planning our visits to nearby islands to take any notice of trivial things like that! There were plenty of choices at the resort when it came to food. At the top of the hill, next to reception, the Cliff Bar and Restaurant allowed us to sit outside sipping cocktails at sunset or have dinner surrounded by panoramic views of the Andaman Sea. On the other hand, if all our energy had been sapped by spending all day taking part in strenuous activities such as laying by the pool or shopping in Patong, we could opt to walk down the hill rather than up it and have dinner at the Bayview Restaurant overlooking the pool. This was generally more of a buffet set-up and we found that we could usually just wander in, mention our villa number and load up our plates. The chef looked to be constantly busy behind the counter, steam and delicious local smells emanating from his general vicinity throughout our meal - every now and again, he would emerge from his hiding place with a giant platter of mouth-watering delicacies and set them down at somebody's table before disappearing back into the makeshift kitchen. The Bayview did exactly what it said on the tin, affording us particularly spectacular views of the Andaman sea and the bay beyond the pool, and was a delightful place to relax at the end of the day. Both restaurants, however, are pretty popular local destinations - so much so that you can even book a table on the internet before you've even booked your room. Getting from the resort to the shops and nightlife could be done in one of two ways. If we were feeling lazy, we could get reception to call us a taxi. These usually turned up pretty quickly, but we wouldn't have really cared even if they'd kept us waiting as it would've just been an excuse to sit at the bar next to reception and gaze out to sea for a while. Alternatively, we could decide to get some exercise and set off on the long downhill walk in either direction - one way would eventually lead us into the town of Karon, the other to Patong. Either way, the downward journey was very easy - it was the return up the hill which taught us a thing or two about fitness. As a general rule, we walked to town and then got a taxi back. Actually, the taxis in Karon and Patong were not at all what we had been expecting as westerners. Rather than being comfortable enclosed vehicles as we are used to back home, a local taxi in Phuket usually consists of a guy driving a fairly old small truck with a cab up front and a rickety carriage on the back with a single long hard wooden seat on each side. The back of the carriage is completely open for climbing in and out, and the two sides consist of two long glassless windows through which you are more than welcome to fall whenever the taxi goes over a bump in the road. If you're lucky, the driver might even notice and come back for you. The small seafront town of Karon is a world away from neighbouring Patong, if you'll excuse my strange bending of the English language for a moment. Rather than being a loud vibrant place, Karon attracts people looking for a simpler holiday and provides only the amenities to get from one day to the next. It is, however, Phuket's second most popular tourist resort for precisely this reason. There are no streets of nightclubs or rows of packed restaurants, a refreshing fact which proves that the popularity of a resort doesn't have to rely solely on how much there is to do - on our first trip into Karon, it took me a while to even find a cash machine - and afterwards I rather wished I hadn't as it told me it was out of cash and then took the money out of my account anyway.There are a couple of low-key restaurants and bars as you enter the town from the direction of Patong, but very little beyond. Karon does have a street which runs along the beach, but it is lined with hotels and spa resorts rather than attractions. The sand is of the pure white variety you would expect to see on the outlying islands rather than the tourist destinations, and according to the website for the Central Karon Village it is known for squeaking loudly when stepped on. Personally, I cannot vouch for this as I have never encountered squeaking sand in my life and would probably run quickly in the opposite direction if I ever did, but I can certainly recommend Karon Beach as an alternative to the junk food wrapper covered seafront that is Patong - especially since the larger fast food chains have begun to descend on the area. This is very much the place to stay if you don't want to be woken up in the middle of the night by a drunken bar crawl staggering past your front door, and Patong is very much the place to stay if you want to be on a drunken bar crawl that gets to stagger past somebody else's front door! In contrast to Karon, Patong has become the favourite destination for young people looking for a wild, drunken orgy of parties and bars. There are even distinct heterosexual and gay areas of the resort. Back in the 80s, Patong was a quiet seaside resort just like its neighbour until westerners suddenly decided that it was surrounded by such beautiful scenery that it really was the place to go to get drunk and not appreciate any of it. This seems to be quite a popular theme with Europeans - find somewhere really stunning and cover it in fast food wrappers as quickly as possible. These days, Patong is very much the hub of activity on Phuket and contains the vast majority of its nightlife and restaurants. To be fair, if you're looking for somewhere to eat or shop on Phuket or you want to go out for the evening to a reasonably sized club, then Patong is the only real choice - but personally I would always stay elsewhere and go in for the evening. There is a large shopping centre in Patong, spread over several floors and selling everything from cheap clothes thru wines and spirits to souvenirs. Due to the large communities of new age holiday travellers and old style hippies heading out to Thailand for the full moon parties and island life,the clothing here tends to frown in the face of traditional style and you'll see many people wearing more gypsy style clothing, and this is openly available in the clothes shops throughout the island - although bargains can be picked up quite easily on clothing in general, especially if you're willing to take the risk that what you're buying might not be exactly one hundred percent authentic. In fact, this is very much something to be aware of when stopping in resorts such as Patong. We're all familiar with the concept of roadside vendors selling fake rolex watches, but in Thailand it is not unknown for an unsuspecting tourist to go into a large reputable looking department store, wander into the music section and pick up an apparent bargain such as a chart album for the equivalent of a few pennies, only to discover upon listening to it that they've actually got a recording of a talented impressionist covering the original songs - not something it will tell you on the CD case. One really obvious thing about the ridiculous exchange rate between the Thai Baht and the UK Pound is that nobody really knows what their money is worth from one day to the next. At the time of writing, one pound would buy me sixty-four Baht. This is never really a problem as you know that everything in Thailand is costing you next to nothing, but the confusion did prove useful to Tanya and I when we arrived in Patong and decided in a moment of madness to head for McDonalds for something to eat. While Tanya found a table among the throngs of tourists stuffing their faces, I went up to the counter and ordered - coming away with a tray laden down with food and drink which had probably cost me not much more than a pound or two. On the way back to the table, a drunken English guy came bursting through the door with his mates and knocked me flying, sending my tray clattering to the ground and spreading my food all over the floor. Stopping in his tracks, he looked momentarily horrified at what he had done before putting his hand on my shoulder, apologising profusely in a drunken slur and handing me a wad of Thai banknotes with which to replace our meals. I worked out later that he had given me enough money to pay for our first couple of days spending in resort, probably enough to have replaced our meals fifty times over - but by that time the group had moved on and we were forced to spend the change on souvenirs instead. It isn't often you arrive in a foreign country on a budget and almost immediately have somebody pay for your stay! Our stay in Phuket coincided with our first Valentines Day together, and we had dinner in one of the nicer restaurants on Patong sea front. I had, of course, tried very hard to arrange the dates of our holiday so that Valentines Day would be during our stay at the Rayavadee, the island resort I had ended up booking for the following week - but as you can imagine, getting such a place for Valentines was a little like trying to book a ticket to Glastonbury music festival the day before it starts. I didn't even like to ask how far in advance we would've had to book a table at the Central Karon Village, but the people were already lining up to get in when we left. Nevertheless, we found a romantic place along the front and were able to forget for a moment that we were in Patong and be surrounded by other couples celebrating the day. As it turned out, our stay at the Rayavadee a few days later was pretty much like an extended Valentines Day anyway. On our return journeys to the Central Karon Village in the back of a taxi, Tanya would try very hard to get me to join in with a romantic rendition of Close to You by The Carpenters. This would usually end in embarrassment, partly because it's not that easy to sing well when you're being tossed around in the back of a truck, but mainly because I've always had an unfortunatetendency to muddle all the words up between the various choruses in such a way that the song changes rather dramatically from one of the most beautiful love songs ever written into a bit of a farce. "Why do birds fall down from the sky, every time you walk by" doesn't have quite the same ring to it, and probably puts across completely the wrong message... (1) Since our stay, the Central Karon Village has been renamed the Centara Villas. Looking through the website, however, it doesn't seem to me that much has changed other than the name. When I looked, there seemed to be a sudden lack of photos of the villa exteriors, however, and they seem to have repainted the interior walls red. Perhaps the management aren't as impressed with their own facilities as we were! However, Considering where we were and how beautiful the resort was, I found the cost of staying at the Central Karon Village entirely reasonable - at the time of writing, the deluxe villa we stayed in is showing on the resort website at an online rate of 88 UK pounds per night. Many basic hotels in London charge more than this, and I don't remember any of them having majestic views of the Andaman sea. For a more detailed description of Phuket and the amazing limestone stacks and islands surrounding it, you may like to read my previous book - still available at http://www.offexploring.com/globalwanderer

After leaving Mae Hong Son in February 2002, Tanya and I headed for the gulf of Thailand. Ultimately, our final destination in the country was a small island resort off the coast of Krabi, a place which Tanya knew little about as I had been keeping it a closely guarded secret. On the way, however, we had a few days to spare and had decided to spend them in Phuket so that I could show her the beauty of Phi Phi and the surrounding scenery that I had loved so much on my previous trip. This time, however, I had booked us into somewhere a little further from the nightlife of Patong. The Central Karon Village is a resort complex on the top of a hill halfway between Patong and the nearby village of Karon and, from the pictures in the brochure, the resort looked to be not only extremely romantic but also positioned just far enough away from Patong to afford us the peace we were looking for while still being within reach of the shops and restaurants (1). Almost as soon as our taxi turned off the road and drew up in front of the lavish looking reception building, I knew the Central Karon was going to be everything I'd hoped it would be. Built on the side of a steep hill overlooking Karon Beach and the bay, a narrow private road zig-zags downward between rows of wooden villas supported on stilts. The road is truly private, only being just wide enough to allow two narrow golf carts to pass each other carrying guests up to reception at the top or down to the swimming pool by the beach at the bottom of the hill. Flights of steps wind between the villas, connecting each flat stretch of road and creating the effect of several levels as you make your way down to the beach. Telephones are positioned at intervals along the side of the road, so that anyone wishing to get anywhere without having to climb the hundreds of steps between the villas can simply ring for a golf cart to come and collect them. It felt a little like being on fantasy island. The room I had booked for Tanya and I was grandly titled a deluxe villa, and we were driven on our golf cart to the nearest telephone point from where the driver helped us carry our luggage up the remaining steps to our accommodation. Entry to the villa was through a small wooden patio which, due to the stilts holding it up against the edge of the hill and the steps leading away in both directions, also doubled as a balcony on which we could sit and watch the sunset or watch the almost non-existent waves on the sea through the trees. Our patio doors led into a small cosy bedroom, most of which was taken up with an eastern style four poster bed over and around which had been draped mosquito netting, and waiting for us on the pillow was a single red flower. Adjoining the bedroom was an en suite bathroom which, bizarrely, contained a large open window over the top of the shower which flooded the room with light during the day and showed us the stars at night. The amount of light in the bathroom also served another purpose because, even more bizarrely, the room also contained a small indoor garden in the form of a selection of plants planted in a bed of soil along the length of one wall. To me, the villa was perfect - and yet it was not the most expensive option. For the mere cost of one arm and two legs, we could've probably just about afforded to stay in a poolside villa or have our own spa in a private outdoor garden, but both of these options seemed to me to be rather missing the point - who wants to stay at home in their villa all day taking baths when you're in a place as beautiful as Thailand? For the same reason, the fact that our room also boasted satellite television, on demand movies and a well stocked mini-bar totally passed by me un-noticed. We were far too interested in having a great time around the resort and planning our visits to nearby islands to take any notice of trivial things like that! There were plenty of choices at the resort when it came to food. At the top of the hill, next to reception, the Cliff Bar and Restaurant allowed us to sit outside sipping cocktails at sunset or have dinner surrounded by panoramic views of the Andaman Sea. On the other hand, if all our energy had been sapped by spending all day taking part in strenuous activities such as laying by the pool or shopping in Patong, we could opt to walk down the hill rather than up it and have dinner at the Bayview Restaurant overlooking the pool. This was generally more of a buffet set-up and we found that we could usually just wander in, mention our villa number and load up our plates. The chef looked to be constantly busy behind the counter, steam and delicious local smells emanating from his general vicinity throughout our meal - every now and again, he would emerge from his hiding place with a giant platter of mouth-watering delicacies and set them down at somebody's table before disappearing back into the makeshift kitchen. The Bayview did exactly what it said on the tin, affording us particularly spectacular views of the Andaman sea and the bay beyond the pool, and was a delightful place to relax at the end of the day. Both restaurants, however, are pretty popular local destinations - so much so that you can even book a table on the internet before you've even booked your room. Getting from the resort to the shops and nightlife could be done in one of two ways. If we were feeling lazy, we could get reception to call us a taxi. These usually turned up pretty quickly, but we wouldn't have really cared even if they'd kept us waiting as it would've just been an excuse to sit at the bar next to reception and gaze out to sea for a while. Alternatively, we could decide to get some exercise and set off on the long downhill walk in either direction - one way would eventually lead us into the town of Karon, the other to Patong. Either way, the downward journey was very easy - it was the return up the hill which taught us a thing or two about fitness. As a general rule, we walked to town and then got a taxi back. Actually, the taxis in Karon and Patong were not at all what we had been expecting as westerners. Rather than being comfortable enclosed vehicles as we are used to back home, a local taxi in Phuket usually consists of a guy driving a fairly old small truck with a cab up front and a rickety carriage on the back with a single long hard wooden seat on each side. The back of the carriage is completely open for climbing in and out, and the two sides consist of two long glassless windows through which you are more than welcome to fall whenever the taxi goes over a bump in the road. If you're lucky, the driver might even notice and come back for you. The small seafront town of Karon is a world away from neighbouring Patong, if you'll excuse my strange bending of the English language for a moment. Rather than being a loud vibrant place, Karon attracts people looking for a simpler holiday and provides only the amenities to get from one day to the next. It is, however, Phuket's second most popular tourist resort for precisely this reason. There are no streets of nightclubs or rows of packed restaurants, a refreshing fact which proves that the popularity of a resort doesn't have to rely solely on how much there is to do - on our first trip into Karon, it took me a while to even find a cash machine - and afterwards I rather wished I hadn't as it told me it was out of cash and then took the money out of my account anyway.There are a couple of low-key restaurants and bars as you enter the town from the direction of Patong, but very little beyond. Karon does have a street which runs along the beach, but it is lined with hotels and spa resorts rather than attractions. The sand is of the pure white variety you would expect to see on the outlying islands rather than the tourist destinations, and according to the website for the Central Karon Village it is known for squeaking loudly when stepped on. Personally, I cannot vouch for this as I have never encountered squeaking sand in my life and would probably run quickly in the opposite direction if I ever did, but I can certainly recommend Karon Beach as an alternative to the junk food wrapper covered seafront that is Patong - especially since the larger fast food chains have begun to descend on the area. This is very much the place to stay if you don't want to be woken up in the middle of the night by a drunken bar crawl staggering past your front door, and Patong is very much the place to stay if you want to be on a drunken bar crawl that gets to stagger past somebody else's front door! In contrast to Karon, Patong has become the favourite destination for young people looking for a wild, drunken orgy of parties and bars. There are even distinct heterosexual and gay areas of the resort. Back in the 80s, Patong was a quiet seaside resort just like its neighbour until westerners suddenly decided that it was surrounded by such beautiful scenery that it really was the place to go to get drunk and not appreciate any of it. This seems to be quite a popular theme with Europeans - find somewhere really stunning and cover it in fast food wrappers as quickly as possible. These days, Patong is very much the hub of activity on Phuket and contains the vast majority of its nightlife and restaurants. To be fair, if you're looking for somewhere to eat or shop on Phuket or you want to go out for the evening to a reasonably sized club, then Patong is the only real choice - but personally I would always stay elsewhere and go in for the evening. There is a large shopping centre in Patong, spread over several floors and selling everything from cheap clothes thru wines and spirits to souvenirs. Due to the large communities of new age holiday travellers and old style hippies heading out to Thailand for the full moon parties and island life,the clothing here tends to frown in the face of traditional style and you'll see many people wearing more gypsy style clothing, and this is openly available in the clothes shops throughout the island - although bargains can be picked up quite easily on clothing in general, especially if you're willing to take the risk that what you're buying might not be exactly one hundred percent authentic. In fact, this is very much something to be aware of when stopping in resorts such as Patong. We're all familiar with the concept of roadside vendors selling fake rolex watches, but in Thailand it is not unknown for an unsuspecting tourist to go into a large reputable looking department store, wander into the music section and pick up an apparent bargain such as a chart album for the equivalent of a few pennies, only to discover upon listening to it that they've actually got a recording of a talented impressionist covering the original songs - not something it will tell you on the CD case. One really obvious thing about the ridiculous exchange rate between the Thai Baht and the UK Pound is that nobody really knows what their money is worth from one day to the next. At the time of writing, one pound would buy me sixty-four Baht. This is never really a problem as you know that everything in Thailand is costing you next to nothing, but the confusion did prove useful to Tanya and I when we arrived in Patong and decided in a moment of madness to head for McDonalds for something to eat. While Tanya found a table among the throngs of tourists stuffing their faces, I went up to the counter and ordered - coming away with a tray laden down with food and drink which had probably cost me not much more than a pound or two. On the way back to the table, a drunken English guy came bursting through the door with his mates and knocked me flying, sending my tray clattering to the ground and spreading my food all over the floor. Stopping in his tracks, he looked momentarily horrified at what he had done before putting his hand on my shoulder, apologising profusely in a drunken slur and handing me a wad of Thai banknotes with which to replace our meals. I worked out later that he had given me enough money to pay for our first couple of days spending in resort, probably enough to have replaced our meals fifty times over - but by that time the group had moved on and we were forced to spend the change on souvenirs instead. It isn't often you arrive in a foreign country on a budget and almost immediately have somebody pay for your stay! Our stay in Phuket coincided with our first Valentines Day together, and we had dinner in one of the nicer restaurants on Patong sea front. I had, of course, tried very hard to arrange the dates of our holiday so that Valentines Day would be during our stay at the Rayavadee, the island resort I had ended up booking for the following week - but as you can imagine, getting such a place for Valentines was a little like trying to book a ticket to Glastonbury music festival the day before it starts. I didn't even like to ask how far in advance we would've had to book a table at the Central Karon Village, but the people were already lining up to get in when we left. Nevertheless, we found a romantic place along the front and were able to forget for a moment that we were in Patong and be surrounded by other couples celebrating the day. As it turned out, our stay at the Rayavadee a few days later was pretty much like an extended Valentines Day anyway. On our return journeys to the Central Karon Village in the back of a taxi, Tanya would try very hard to get me to join in with a romantic rendition of Close to You by The Carpenters. This would usually end in embarrassment, partly because it's not that easy to sing well when you're being tossed around in the back of a truck, but mainly because I've always had an unfortunatetendency to muddle all the words up between the various choruses in such a way that the song changes rather dramatically from one of the most beautiful love songs ever written into a bit of a farce. "Why do birds fall down from the sky, every time you walk by" doesn't have quite the same ring to it, and probably puts across completely the wrong message... (1) Since our stay, the Central Karon Village has been renamed the Centara Villas. Looking through the website, however, it doesn't seem to me that much has changed other than the name. When I looked, there seemed to be a sudden lack of photos of the villa exteriors, however, and they seem to have repainted the interior walls red. Perhaps the management aren't as impressed with their own facilities as we were! However, Considering where we were and how beautiful the resort was, I found the cost of staying at the Central Karon Village entirely reasonable - at the time of writing, the deluxe villa we stayed in is showing on the resort website at an online rate of 88 UK pounds per night. Many basic hotels in London charge more than this, and I don't remember any of them having majestic views of the Andaman sea. For a more detailed description of Phuket and the amazing limestone stacks and islands surrounding it, you may like to read my previous book - still available at http://www.offexploring.com/globalwanderer

Phuket, tous les genres réunis dans une île, quiétude et bien être au milieu d'un site entre jungle et mer d'adamam au baan krating au sud de l'île, petit bungalow avec jardin magnifique et piscine à l'eden bugalow à Patong, fiesta et ambiance garantie pour sa proximité avec bangla road.

Phuket, tous les genres réunis dans une île, quiétude et bien être au milieu d'un site entre jungle et mer d'adamam au baan krating au sud de l'île, petit bungalow avec jardin magnifique et piscine à l'eden bugalow à Patong, fiesta et ambiance garantie pour sa proximité avec bangla road.

Phuket, tous les genres réunis dans une île, quiétude et bien être au milieu d'un site entre jungle et mer d'adamam au baan krating au sud de l'île, petit bungalow avec jardin magnifique et piscine à l'eden bugalow à Patong, fiesta et ambiance garantie pour sa proximité avec bangla road.