The Truman's Tour of Thailand
19 February 2009 | Phuket and surrounds, Thailand
Well, the Truman's have been and gone. Weeks were spent waiting for them to arrive but our time with them flashed by in a blur, one minute they were here, the next they were gone! We miss them already!
In the lead up to their arrival Jay and I decided to go into a marina to get some work done and generally get the boat into ship shape condition before our guests arrived. We were excited ourselves about going into the luxury of a marina, our thoughts on what the marina was going to be like was based on our marina stays through Malaysia, little did we know we were in for a world of disappointment. The Royal Phuket Marina is up a small river which is only easily accessed at high tide as it is very shallow. As we made our way up there, following the concrete pylons that led the way, we had little water beneath us in some sections which led us to ponder how on earth the mono-hulls manage to get up there! The speed limit is 5 knots and it is very narrow, of course I don't think the speed limits mean a lot to the Thai's as we had hit peak hour for the tourist speed boats running to the islands and dozens of them came roaring around the corners dodging around us at speed and creating an uncomfortable wake. We made it to the marina in one piece, slowly but safely and our first task was to take on some diesel. The fuel jetty is positioned at the entrance to the marina which is open to the river and therefore the wake from the speed boats, so tying up to the jetty was an experience in itself but once we had filled one tank and went to move on to the other we realised that their hoses were not long enough (they were ridiculously short in fact!). In hindsight we are lucky that the hose reached the tank on the side tied to the jetty! This meant we had to untie from the jetty, swap over all the fenders and ropes, turn around, wait for a break in the river traffic and retie to the side that now needed to be filled.
We finally made it to our allocated berth, looking around we realised we were in the middle of a construction site, while the restaurants and bars look to be completed, the residential area to the left of the entrance was under construction. There appear to be no laws in Thailand as to when work can be undertaken and I fully understand why the Thai's work at night, it is simply too hot during the day! But something is very, very wrong when you are paying to stay there (this marina was not cheap, the price was more expensive than a lot of marina's we have stayed in in Oz), I don't think being woken up at 4am in the morning by a jackhammer is acceptable! We went up to fill in our paperwork and check out the facilities (in Singapore and Malaysia we had pools, free internet, TV Rooms, gyms etc), the facilities were virtually nonexistent. In place of a pool they had a musical fountain (whoop de doo!), the bathrooms were sparse and not air conditioned, they didn't even have power points in them and they were frequently dirty looking as taking a shower meant the whole room ended up wet. We got directions to the laundry thinking that we could at least get our washing done while we were here but on arrival we discovered it was a laundry shop, this meant we could get someone else to do our laundry for AUD$1 an item (we had a lot of washing!) There were some nice restaurants but they were all expensive for Thailand, luckily we had a lot of work to do and without the distractions of 'facilities' we got everything done a whole lot quicker!
Paul and Gemma finally arrived to much fanfare and jumping on the spot! We dropped their bags off at the boat and did what any self respecting Aussie would do in a situation like this, we headed to the bar! At the Skippers Bar we caught up on news from home while downing drinks like they were water, my undoing was 'Happy Hour' where we drank as many cocktails as we could fit into the time frame. The next day I paid for it, while the other 3 enjoyed a leisurely breakfast I stayed near a bathroom and while they sat on the deck in the sun on the way to Krabi, I lay on my bed trying to sleep it off. However, I did come to life again when we arrived and we went ashore to see the penis shrine and to have a feed at Rai Lei beach.
We climbed into the Princess lagoon again, this time there was more water to be seen, and generally explored before moving on to Ao Nang where we shopped, ate and got massages. This was the general theme for the duration of their stay. At Chicken Head Island we attempted a snorkel but the water wasn't very clear, Gemma swam around the rock thinking it was smaller than it was and arrived back at the boat exhausted. We then moved on to Phi Phi Don, visiting our friend Lek again at her restaurant and the next day we jumped into the inflatable and headed over to Phi Phi Lee. It was here that we were able to share the beauty of Thailand with the Truman's and I think it was Gemma's favourite place. We idled into a lagoon were we swam before exploring the island, snorkelling and swimming on the way before reaching our final destination, 'The Beach' at Maya Bay. We pulled up on to the beach and had a picnic while sharing a bottle of Veuve that Gemma had brought along for the occasion. We laughed at the tourists who struck poses in the water trying to look sexier than they were and then Paul and Jay decided to mimic them, coming out of the water throwing their heads around and striking poses. It was a great day that was over too quickly.
Our final stop on the Truman Tour of Thailand was Nai Han Bay. This is where we have been spending a lot of time, we use it as a base when we are coming to and from places and having spent so much time here we pretty much have it wired! From here we hired motorbikes and took off to Patong for a look. Paul and Gemma got a flat tyre which is not a good thing in the traffic we were in (people have died doing that!), the boys went to get it fixed and while they were waiting they went to a bar and got propositioned by a woman running an escort service while Gemma and I had a not so intimate facial in the shopping centre with about a hundred other people! We also managed to visit the Big Buddha of Phuket which was impressive and will be even more so when it is finished!
So with all the shopping, drinking, eating, sleeping, massaging and general relaxing it was a great break for us all. Although Jay got the flu, Gemma got a bacterial skin infection and Paul and I got drunk, I think we all enjoyed ourselves. The only complaint I have is that it went by too quickly, hopefully we'll see you guys again in Sumatera!
For those of you who are interested the photos from the Truman's Tour of Thailand are now in the photo gallery.