Thailand! third and final stop...PHUKET!

Phuket,Thailand

So we booked our flight to Phuket mid trip, I kinda wish we did it sooner because I believe we could of saved at least 100, but the flights were super trip if you think about it, only 160 bucks for each person to fly across the country. When looking at the site when booking the flights it completely throws you off as an American because everything is in Thai baht, so it said our flights were 4,960$ Baht. Haha crazy right?

So off we go from Chiang Mai to Phuket. The flight was only  3.5 hours long. When we arrived it was late at night and as soon as we walked off the flight it just a short walk to your bags and out the door of the Airport. Then boom, taxi companies are in your face like paparazzi trying to get you to buy a cab with their company, we literally could barely walk through. Jeremy asked a few guys how much and they were all pretty much the same, and EXTREMELY expensive compared to the other two areas of Thailand we were. Chiang Mai cabs were MAX 150 Baht, in Phuket they were saying it would cost us minimum 800 baht per person! We had no choice so we did it... now you're probably thinking dang Cena you are so cheap, but believe me when you get use to paying 1 dollar for a cab you don't want to pay 25 dollars for one. 

We take the cab, which is actually a big scary van  that they shoved a load of people in. Jeremy and I were scared and the guy was going extremely fast, AGAIN, whats up with these taxi drivers. Did I mention there is NEVER any seat belts in these cabs. Two random stops and a couple curvy mountains later we arrive at our hotel in Patong beach, Phuket. So many people told us to stay in Patong because it had a lot of nightlife and was touristy. It was definitely that, but i think Jeremy and I were wanting something a little more peaceful and beachy for the end of our trip. We were a bit disappointed in our place automatically and here are the reasons why:

- they lied and said our hotel was next to the beach

-the lady walked us to our room and it had three locks on the door and told us its important to lock all three so nobody breaks in, um ok?

-our room wasn't clean, I wont go into detail.

The room was aweful. It didn't help that I was uncomfortable and couldn't wait to book a different room and Jeremy had an event going on at home, he wasn't there for and was having anxiety about all night and didn't get any sleep. Next morning we woke up and booked a new hotel in Cape Panwa, Phuket.

It was a long drive to Cape Panwa. Its almost at the tip of Phuket which is pretty much the tip of Thailand. The room wasn't that expensive, it was as nice at our first hotel in Bangkok. It sat right on the beach. We were treated like King and Queen, our room was huge! We stayed at By the Sea Hotel.

When we first got there we went to the back of the hotel and there was  the swimming pool and a restaurant that was literally on the beach, just walk over three steps and boom your on the beach. There were a few beach chairs and a couple feet away there was the water.

We left  and went into the city the first day because the city of Phuket was about 40 minutes from where our hotel was, there was nothing really around us just a few more hotels and about 4 restaurants. We got dropped off at the Phuket Mall, well this mall should be called the mall of desserts, because literally every couple stores there was some kind of dessert you could buy, which is heaven to me! We did a little bit of shopping for desserts and then headed back to the hotel. When we got back we went down to the beach and something was different, the tide went so far out, it looked crazy! so we took a few cool pictures of it.

 The mall of desserts ^^

 That night we walked the beach and explored to see our options for what was around us. We noticed there were a ton of designs in the sand, they were super cool but we were curious as to how they got there. Eventually we saw these things popping down in holes and moving all over the sand that were CRABS! and they were the same color of the sand or clear? SCARY! I hate creepy crawlers. They were everywhere, all different sizes we even saw HUGE ones that were as big as the ones we eat.

To be honest we didn't do much but be lazy and eat while we were there, we got massages and mostly laid by the beach relaxing, Cape Panwa is very quiet and we really liked that.

One of the Nights we were walking the beach when the tide was down and heard a crackling noise in the muddy sand where the water use to be. Jeremy and I tried throwing rocks in the mud to see if we saw anything move, we looked super close but couldn't see much and possibly because it was getting dark. We ended up walking down the beach to a restaurant and stopping to eat. When we were there we saw someone out there with a bucket and a flashlight looking for something, so we asked one of the workers what the man was looking for and the man told us prawns. The restaurant we were at had a large portion of prawns on their menu. I guess when the tide gets low the little shrimp get caught in the sand and thats where they catch them. Nothing like a fresh meal!! 

Haha

The restaurants on the beach at night 

Cutest little boy who decided to come play phone games with jeremy while he got a massage.

Every night we ate at all the different restaurants on the beach including our hotels which was really nice. Since they were all outside we got eaten alive by all the mosquitos. Before going to Thailand I read about bringing repellant because of the mosquitos being so bad there and people can catch things there from them. Well we really had no problem with the bugs till Phuket, Jeremy and I were both so over the bugs, crabs and mosquito bites by our last day.

We were in Phuket for 4 days, on our last day there we booked a tour to the James Bond Island. The tour included seeing monkey caves, a long tail boat ride through Phang Nga Bay, where we ate lunch then headed to James Bond Island, after the island we then transferred onto these canoe rafts where we explored caves. To get into some of the caves we had to lay down flat in our raft to enter through. it was pretty crazy. One of the caves I got scared because my face was so close and there were worms crawling on them. When I laid back if I were to look up while going under the cave I was sick but if I looked forward it wasn't as scary, but actually really cool. There were guys actually paddling the raft for us which we totally didn't expect, we thought we would have to do it ourselves, which we kind of wanted to. A few of the guys around us were saying how beautiful I was and that I looked like a Thai woman. Jeremy got a little jealous, if you ask him he will tell you all the things they were saying to me. I actually got that several times in Thailand, that I looked like I was Thai, I even had a woman talk to me in Thai while I was there because she didn't think I was a tourist. So if I adopt a baby from there some day then he/she and I might end up looking pretty similar :)

Pretty much every day in Phuket it was gloomy but still hot and it rained a little each day, we got pretty lucky it didn't rain our whole tour till the very end on the boat ride back, it poured down on us pretty hard.

Phuket was definitely beautiful. A little bit more pricey, which was okay, we just didn't expect it. We said if we ever go back or to another country with Islands and beach we would stay at an all inclusive place like we did for our honeymoon.

Jeremy and I feel extremely thankful and lucky we were able to take a trip half way across the world to Thailand, we have such busy lives and work our butts off all year long so we can enjoy such a nice vacation like this. It was definitely an adventure. Everyone has asked us where our favorite place was there and we would both tell you Chiang Mai in a second. We will definitely go back and we would love to live there someday. The vibe is so different there, everyone is so peaceful and nice. Not to mention it didnt seem touristy at all even though we did the most tourist things there. We really love to travel, it opens our eyes up to all the things we have and take advantage of, it makes us appreciate things and people. When I was in thailand I realized its not as easy for other people in different countries to travel like we are able to. It would take someone who lives in Thailand a lifetime to be able to save to come to America. We are so thankful to have met all the people we did and learn about the Thai culture. This will definitely be one of my all time favorite trips! Im so happy I have my husband by my side on vacations like these because not only is he a blast but we are both pretty dang adventurous!

Some things I don't think I've mentioned yet :

*** There is a picture of Thailand's King and sometimes Queen on every major street corner and in front of most businesses.

*** On our last tour we had lunch and they said it was authentic Thai food, but Jeremy and I had been in thailand long enough to know that it was definitely not authentic thai food, it was kind of a disappointment.

*** On our tour we met a couple from South Africa, Italy and Pakinstan. What a mix right?

***By the time we reached Phuket our hotels were always offering continental breakfast and had the option of regular american coffee or thai coffee, Jeremy and I would always choose Thai coffee. In fact I'm missing thai coffee badly.

***I would say the best thing we ate in Thailand would have to be Pad Thai. We had it more than 3 times.

Thanks for reading all my long blogs about our time in Thailand!! Hopefully  this is helpful information for anyone who wants to travel there someday! 

Thailand! Second stop...Chiang Mai

9 hours later we wake up in Chiang Mai!

First thing we get off the bus and swarms of taxi workers ask us if we need a ride, this is how we got scammed in Bangkok's airport and paid way too much so we said no no no no  then walked away took a breath got situated and decided we weren't paying them over a certain price so we haggled our price down and walked over to a taxi truck. Something was different... this guy wanted us to get into the bed of his truck where there were benches and a roof. It was not like this in Bangkok. haha This was fun.. and our new way of getting around in Chiang Mai.

6 am we get to our hostel Dozy House Cutest little place! I would totally recommend staying here if you want to stay in a hostel it was 20$ a night, the owner is absolutely amazing! Extremely good english, super helpful with EVERYTHING! It was a great experience staying at her hostel, especially for a first timer in a hostel! It was really sad because we checked in and something with our room got messed up through our booking site, nothing to do with Dozy house so we had to find a different place to stay the other two nights in Chiang Mai but that ended up good as well! Anyways we get to Dozy and the owner checks us in and books our first tour THAT MORNING for us! We really wanted to spend the day with elephants so we did the Yogi Mahout Elephant tour which was awesome! We drove about 45 minutes into the Jungle where a lot of thai villages were and the elephants! We started out changing into these really rediculous but fun clothes they wanted us to wear, took a bamboo raft through a river, ate some yummy curry and fruit, Hopped onto an elephant bareback, jeremy sat on her butt and I sat right on her neck behind her ears, it was the coolest thing ever, then we hiked up to a waterfall, and lastly we stopped by an art and craft village and saw the homes of the village people in Chiang mai,while we were there we watched a lady create scarves and table clothes from thai fabric.

Next day we checked out of our hotel room and moved to The Soho Bar and Guesthouse, awesome place! we didn't know it till we stayed there the first night that it was above a Gay bar, which was so awesome! we met the nicest guys in there that were travelers too and the owner is an amazing artist, oh and super sweet!

Second day in Chiang Mai we went to Wat Phra Doi Suthep Temple in the morning, the drive up to the temple was sickening.. it was a super steep and swirvy mountain to drive up, I felt so nauseas in the car. When we got there we walked up more than 300 steps. Walked by a cart selling fried bugs, this was the only place in thailand we saw bugs, wet told each other we would try one but at that moment we were just not ready to try one yet. Since it was our only time seeing a fried bug cart we never ended up doing it, THANK GOODNESS! On the way up Jeremy saw these cute little girls all dressed up and took a picture of them and I forgot to warn him that my friend Audrey just had been there and they ask for money if you take pictures of them. Little hustlers. I really loved the fact that you had to take off your shoes before going inside a temple. Jeremy hated the fact he always had to bring a spare pair of pants with him incase we went to a temple because they don't allow shorts or tank tops.

Steps ^^^

I think someday if I decided to adopt, I will adopt from Thailand, all the Thai people thought I was Thai, even tried speaking to me in their language, lets be honest, these little ones are adorable!

I loved how they served corn on their food carts there! 

corn, condensed milk, & sugar 

^^^

 Right After the Temple , we decided to go to the Tiger Kingdom. We get there, pay and then have to sit in the waiting area. In that area you can see people walk in to the tiger cages and lay or pet with the tigers, well I decided to watch these girls go in the cage and this one girl was acting so ridiculously scared and I was kind of making fun of her. I couldn't stop laughing at her. Our number gets called to go back to see the tigers,I was pumped and excited. Then we go into the cage and they tell us okay you can go pet the tiger or lay by it, well as soon as I walked into the cage I was TERRIFIED! Hahah just like those girls. I'm an idiot for making fun of them, it was really scary, the tigers were super calm, lets just say I consider Jeremy and I brave for doing that!

 Yup TERRIFIED!

^^^
But, they are pretty beautiful animals.


Third Day Chiang Mai-
 The start of our day was super nice, we ate some breakfast at a new place next to our guest house and stopped by this little coffee shop I fell in love with while we were there. We ended our day with a really fun Thai cooking class. It was probably one of the highlights of the trip. Jeremy and I have been wanting to take a baking class together so this was a good test run on how we would do in a class together. So we both have ADD and never listen to the full instructions but our food ended up tasting amazing! There were 7 people in the class so it made it way more fun and we all got to know each other and hear travel stories, it was definitely a good time. The best part was our teacher, she was extremely good with her english and was HILARIOUS! It made me so sad to leave the class at the end, I felt like I was leaving my home for a really long time, thats how great our class was! Jeremy and I have a recipe book of what we made so we are excited to have a Thai Dinner party soon!

 Second spiciest thing I ate in Thailand
 ^^^

Siam Rice Thai Cooking School 
This is our awesome teacher, Yuii

We made 5 Dishes in 4 hours, it was all extremely spicy and delicious!

These are the dishes Jeremy made :
Spicy soup w/ sweet basil
Pad Thai
Jungle Curry
Jungle Curry w/ chicken
Sticky rice with fresh coconut

These are the dishes Cena made :
chicken in coconut milk soup
Yellow Curry Paste
Yellow Curry w/ chicken
Sweet and sour Vegetables
Banana in coconut milk

Fourth day in Chiang Mai-
Jeremy and I decided to go to the zoo before we had to catch our flight to Phuket.
I'm not a huge zoo person, I feel like the animals are so sad  and mainly for the fact that I am lazy and know that every zoo is a ton of walking. Thats exactly what we did, a ton of walking and only saw five animals, but we did get to feed a giraffe. That was pretty awesome!

Jeremy and I were both taking pictures of the artists drawing's of the bear more than actually looking at the bear it self. haha

Lastly I took these pictures of jeremy randomly in one of truck taxis on our way to the airport to catch our plane to Phuket, and I really love them. He's got such a great smile. 

Some things I haven't mentioned yet :

***Leaving Bangkok to Chiang mai We had to catch a bus in the evening, we took the sky train to the area we needed to be in to catch it, our hotel told us it was walking distance from there, at least we thought thats what they said. That was not the case. We ended up on a very dark street in bangkok with nobody around and hauling all our luggage, we were both a little scared. We tried asking a few people where to go but our acting out and english language didnt help us much. Finally we found someone and he tried to help us get a taxi but there was literally no taxi, which was so weird for Bangkok. The guy ended up offering us a ride in his work van to the bus station. Jeremy was terrified and i kept telling him we are going to be okay because he tried to help us get a cab and EVERYONE in Thailand is nice, seriously. We were fine and were dropped off safely, we handed the guy some money and he truly didnt want to take it but we told him we were very thankful for his kindess. This was the ONLY time in Thailand we felt nervous of our surroundings.

*** Jeremy and I mostly ate from the food carts because the food was better than restaurants, in our opinion and way cheaper. Neither one of us got sick the entire trip. Jeremy thought for sure I'd get sick. His stomach isn't sensitive.

***I am really a huge girly girl when it comes to bugs and creepy crawlers, so with that in mind I researched every place we stayed at and at night I kept my eyes peeled for any bugs when we were out and about. All our rooms were super clean. I only saw a grasshopper on our elephant and two cockroaches on the sidewalks in Chiang Mai, they were the size of mice. So that made me pretty happy thats all I saw. haha

*** Jeremy and I went to the Bittersweet coffee shop everyday for coffee and desserts, sometimes even twice in one day.

*** We really did get massages everyday, I mostly stuck to foot massages but in Chiang Mai Jeremy convinced me to get a Thai massage and I did. Big Mistake. Super cool experience though. The masseuse would intertwine her body with yours, stretch and massage you, I was in pain for a couple days after. 

*** Jeremy got really good at haggling prices in Chiang Mai, we were getting taxi rides 150$ Thai Baht, which is almost 5 US dollars. By the end of our four days there we got rides around the city for only 40$ Thai Baht which is a little over 1 US dollar.

*** Yuii, our teacher from the Cooking school asked us all what "aint" meant in english and we all laughed because its not really a word and its useless, but people say it. She then said I have heard this thing that says aint in it, and we ask her what and she then said " aint nobody got time for that" in her thai accent. We died laughing. Jeremy has it on video if you ever need proof. 

*** Chiang Mai was the cheapest city we went to in Thailand. Our elephant tour was the most expensive thing we had to pay for in Chiang mai, including our rooms.

*** Chiang Mai was definitely our favorite place in Thailand. We have talked about buying a vacation house there someday.

Next Stop Phuket!

To be continued.......

Heres a sneak peek of our time in Phuket...