Our flight to Phuket doesn’t depart until 2:35pm, and the airport is close by. We enjoyed breakfast, then walked around the hotel grounds. It’s a large property and very shielded from the nearby neighborhoods. There’s little audible evidence that traffic is just beyond the trees. I left Judy in the room getting ready for the day, and went back to the pool area to spend some time writing about yesterday’s Chiang Rai trip. As long as I have decent internet, I need to get the pictures uploaded.
Shangri La Hotel
We catch our taxi at noon and are at the airport 20 minutes later. Check-in is quick and easy. Of course, our bags are overweight, and we have to pay extra, but again, it’s around $30, instead of $150 like it might be in the US. As we wait for the plane, it becomes obvious we’re headed to a beach destination. It’s like a Spring Break crowd, very young, noisy, and headed for a party.
Mr. Burger, on our way to the airport.
Chiang Mai City Wall.
On board the plane I managed to get seats near the front, and we had room to spread out (no one in the middle seat). The flight “fun” began as we neared Phuket. We knew the weather was unsettled, and as we began to descend the ride got bumpy. This went on for a while, and then we heard the landing gear come down. Suddenly, the pilot hit the power and we pulled up beginning to climb. It took about 5 minutes of hard climbing and we popped out of clouds looking at some beautiful ocean/island views below. Finally the pilot came on and said the thunderstorms were a little strong, but would clear out in 15 minutes, so we’re circling. Eventually we started down again, the ride got bumpy, lightning and thunder were popping all around us, the landing gear came down, and suddenly we were on the ground. Applause broke out from the party crowd in the back.
Phuket, as we loop around.
We collected our bags, and walked out into the sea of people with signs looking for fares. We found contact I booked two months ago, and were lead to a nice SUV for the drive to Khao Lak. The drive takes about 80 minutes and we pull up the entrance of resort at 7:15pm. It’s weird to enter a hotel lobby where there aren’t any doors. It’s all open-air with a nice breeze blowing in. They load us into a cart along with our luggage, taking us to our room. Since it’s dark, it seems like a long way. The guys haul our bags down some the stairs and show us little about the room. As they are departing, Judy shouts, and when I turn, she is pointing at something. She thinks she saw a lizard scurrying around. The luggage guys looked around a little bit, but decided to turn the job over to housekeeping who showed up 5 minutes later.
After pulling out some furniture they finally began to point at something down in a cabinet behind the fridge. They chased it around the walls and up to the ceiling before finally knocking it down with some kind of spray. It was a fairly large lizard.
Around 11:00pm, Judy received a text message from Shannon announcing their arrival. We immediately grabbed our shoes, and searched out their bungalow down on the beach. We had a nice reunion visit out on their deck. Around midnight, flight fatigue began to set in on them. They’re flight from Sydney was nine hours. We made breakfast plans and headed back to our room.