The first set of posts from this series is our trip to Thailand in 2015. This is about to get personal, but bear with me. Last summer, L and I were planning on taking a trip to Europe and road-tripping along the coast of France and Italy. Unfortunately, we had to scrap that plan since L couldn’t get enough days off to make the trip worth it so we’ll probably save it for our honeymoon. We surfed the net to see what the most affordable flights out of Tokyo were and we saw a flight to Bangkok was pretty reasonable. 3 years ago, my father suddenly passed away while he was on a business trip to Bangkok so I knew I didn’t want to really spend any time there. I’d also been there before and I’m more of a beach girl when I’m on vacation so I wasn’t really interested in going back. L wanted to go to Bangkok but he was understanding and we decided to go see Phuket and Koh Samui – two places I really wanted to see. We booked an Air Bnb at each place, booked our inter-island tickets, and got ready to depart on our Thailand adventure!
Haneda airport is our favorite airport to depart from because it’s way closer to home than Narita is, as it’s actually in Tokyo. I think it’s a common misconception that people think Narita is in Tokyo city – but in reality it’s almost 2 hours away. Haneda also has beautiful stores and restaurants so it’s never boring to get there early. We hung out in a restaurant through security and got ourselves some drinks before our flight.
Obligatory in-flight food photo. We flew Thai Airways to Bangkok airport. It was actually quite a pleasant flight and the food was …. plane food. This was the “breakfast” which we barely touched. I think our favorite was probably the yogurt 🙂
Touchdown in Bangkok! So crazy story. We landed at around 3:00 am Bangkok time and our next flight out was at around 7:00 am. I had ordered a pocket wi-fi for our duration in Thailand and figured we had enough time to pick it up during this layover. Bad idea. We had to run around ALL OVER the terminal to find the post office that was holding onto it. L was super cranky and I was trying so hard to keep his spirits up. Luckily, we found it, headed back towards our gate and decided to load up on caffeine and McDonald’s breakfast sandwiches. Excuse the close-up of my munching face. Had to document this very crucial part of our layover. Bangkok airport has these beautiful gardens outside that we wanted to go see, but didn’t want to risk missing our connecting flight to Phuket so we didn’t venture out that way.
Our flight from Bangkok (BKK) to Phuket was on Bangkok Airways. The flight was short but we were fed (again, didn’t eat much) and took a quit cat-nap before starting our day in Phuket.
When we arrived in Phuket, we got off the plane, picked up our luggage and headed out towards the “pick-up” area where lots of taxi drivers and shuttle drivers were holding up signs waiting for their passengers. We were supposed to have a ride to the airport, but when I turned on our pocket wifi, I saw I had gotten a message from our Air Bnb host. “Sorry, your driver cancelled at the last minute. Can you just pay for a cab and I’ll pay for the difference?” -_____- At this point, we were already on the curb waiting for our driver so I was pretty bummed, but we decided to find a taxi that would take us to our apartment. That hour ride was quite the adventure in itself, but we made it. We stayed at the Absolute Twin Sands in Phuket, which was absolutely breath taking. The first photo is the view from our balcony. Unfortunately, the construction site right outside the hotel was totally ruining our could-have-been-perfect view, but it didn’t bother us too much. Once we settled in, we ordered some food from the one hotel restaurant (which we absolutely loved) and took a quick nap before getting ready to hit the town.
We were lucky in that we were able to use the hotel shuttle to go down to Patong – one of the biggest tourist areas in Phuket, which was about 10 minutes from the resort. We figured we’d wander the streets and find somewhere to eat dinner. We got distracted by the beautiful sunset right on the ocean and it was absolutely breathtaking!
I was warned by friends NOT to hang out in that area but of course, my stupid butt didn’t listen and we IMMEDIATELY regretted it. Guys AND girls grabbing us from left and right trying to get us to come into their bars or watch “ping pong shows” (if you don’t know, it’s better not to ask). Trash, bugs, and rats everywhere – not to mention drunk tourists making as*es of themselves. Yikes. Not my scene. We walked to the end of the strip where it was a little more quiet and found this seafood restaurant that had lots of tourists AND locals – so we assumed that was a good sign.
This meal was absolutely scrumptious and I’m so glad we decided to check out Patong. It was absolutely gross (hahahaha) but something to check off the bucket list. At least the sunset and the dinner was worth it and wandering unknown streets with the love of my life was an adventure to remember. After dinner, we found a tuk tuk to take back to the resort – that was an experience in itself, too. That wraps up Day 1: travel + adventure. Next week will cover Day 2: Engagement Shoot!
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