Up and out early, we don’t even bother with the gym as we have to be in the theater by 7:30 for our tour today. We are taking a ship tour that is the “highlights” of Phuket. Originally going to Wat Chalong, where the Big Buddha sits atop the mountain, we are now going to Wat Ladthiwanaram due to landslides on the road to Chalong. In addition we will visit Promthep Cape, the southern most part of the island and what is known as the “tail of the dragon” – Phuket island is shaped like a dragon. Then a Cashew nut factory and shopping stop, lunch and Old town Phuket – where we will ditch the tour and stay overnight. Figured it would give us something to do for the afternoon before hanging out in Old Town. We are moored off the coast of Pa Tong, on the other side of the island from Phuket, and figured this tour would be a good way to see more of the island and be our “shuttle” to Old Town.
So off we go to the theater to wait for our group and tender to be called. They taking everyone off in tour groups. We have 5 buses, which will all be called at the same time. The first group goes out of the forward pontoon, the second group called goes to the tender at mid-ship. We hang out until our group is called and we go back down to the forward tender. But we notice a huge group of Filipino (American Filipino) who are on our bus and were milling about the theater entrance are gone. And they don’t show up on our tender. Weird. We’re the first of the 5 buses, so we figure we are in the cat bird seat and will be first to all the stops. Um. No. Not so. Because the stupid Filipino group tried to shortcut the system to be first and went down to the mid-ship tender, thinking that is where we’d be called. Instead they ended up on the next tender, making about 15 of us who were on the correct tender wait for about 20 minutes for them to finally arrive. Honestly! Oh and then insult to injury? They rush ahead of us on a very long walk to the bus – literally shoving us out of the way – one of them stepped on the back of my shoe they were in such a rush – to grab all the front seats on the bus! And then they spread out so that the slow walkers in their groups could have good seats too. Totally rude. And when we made a comment, one of the ladies said, “That’s just the way it is.” Oh really? Don’t start woman. Just don’t even.
Finally on the bus with a very good tour guide, Sally, we leave Pa Tong on our way to Phuket. As it turns out, the schedule has been rearranged because there is a Chinese New Year festival in the old town (which Sally calls Chinatown) and buses aren’t allowed in old town after 1pm. So we will have a late lunch – around 2pm, maybe even 3 – and go to all our other stops first, including Old Town early. Not what we expected, but….we’ll deal.
Our first stop was the Cape which is a beautiful overlook to the end of the island and what does appear to be the dragon’s tail. Also here what we are calling a “fake” temple, one that has the 4 faces of Brahma and is surrounded by hundreds of elephants! As it turns out, this is a place that business people come to pray for success and give offerings to the Brahma statues. When their business is successful, they come back and offer an elephant – which is sacred to them – to the Gods. You know I’m in heaven – not only elephants, but a great concept!
Here we can also climb up a lighthouse tower with more gorgeous views out across the water.
Then it is back to the bus, where one of the most egregious Filipino walking bullies who was sitting in front of us, proceeded to talk on the phone for most of the ride making it incredibly hard to hear the guide. We have gleaned from his conversations, though, that they are leaving the ship in Singapore. Thank God. Don’t have them to worry about next cruise.
Next stop is Wat Ladthiwanaram, which is a nice traditional wat, but jam-packed with all 5 buses, because thanks to our system-shortcutters we are the last bus to arrive, in addition to other tour groups. It isn’t that comfortable to be inside or to even try to get pictures or walk around. Ah well, no biggie for us, as it is a Wat – not something we haven’t seen plenty of times.
Because of the festival, our next stop is Old Town, arriving there at 11am. Because of the whole situation, the people who are simply obnoxious and the fact that we are not interested in the Cashew factory (been there, done that) or the lunch, which Sally has described as designed for “tourist tastes” makes our decision easy. We ditch the tour in Old Town, thanking Sally and walking away! Phew. Such a relief.
The bus let us off on the same street as our hotel, only 3 blocks away! We immediately head there, passing a great street mural and wonderful old buildings we remember from our last visit here in 2018. The streets are all ready for the festival, lined with huge dragons, whose bodies and tails wrap down the streets. This will be so fun! Little did we know we would be doing the Chinese New Year Festival tour! The more we walk, the more we spot things that are jogging our memories of our 2018 trip – like the Old Coffee Shop on the corner that we visited in for beer – and all the shophouses with the fabulous exteriors.
Arriving at the hotel we find the family owners there and waiting. The room isn’t ready yet, but will be around 12:30, which is great for us, so we leave our overnight bag and head out in search of lunch. The owner suggested Tu Kab Khao as one of the best places for lunch, so off we go. Why not? And it is a great choice – a little classier than we expected, but oh so nice to sit in a beautiful old converted mansion – with A/C thank you – and have a pleasant quiet meal of real, traditional Thai food! We dig into a fantastic seafood omelet (we haven’t had a Thai omelet in forever!) and an excellent Shrimp Pad Thai. Yum. Add 2 Chang beer and we are ever so happy.
On our way out of the restaurant, we realize we are right across the street form Saeng Tham Shrine – the Shrine of the Serene Light – which used to be known as the “little hidden Chinese temple” that only locals knew about. Yeah, well, this is now tourist-town and nothing is hidden around here anymore! And case in point, there are a ton of tourists filling up the narrow little alley entry way, but we can still get a feel for the little 150-year-old Hokkien Chinese influenced temple. Beautiful terracotta tiled roof and floors, fabulous carved dragons and at the peak of the roof, gorgeous murals (of which we can’t take pictures) and tons and tons of offerings and incense burning. A nice little visit.
Next we decide to visit the Thai Hua museum which we have visited previously, but thought we would refresh our memory on the history of the island. The museum is housed in a stately building that was once a school for the Chinese immigrants who came here to work in the Tin mines. Whereas last visit, there were docents around to explain different exhibits, today we are on our own and happily wander through the mansion looking at the different displays explaining the melding of the Thai and Chinese cultures, the Chinese migration for tin mining, the relationship between Phuket and Penang (most of the mine owners were rich immigrants from Penang and the flow of migrants came through Penang), a series of displays detailing various immigrants who came to work in the mines, then ended up owning mines themselves and providing funds to shrines and the town, as well as a sample classroom, set up as it would have been in the 18- and 1900s. There was also a multi-media presentation about the trade routes that brought the immigrants here which was interesting but cut short when a family of Chinese came in and changed the language from Thai with English subtitles to all Chinese. Thanks.
Deciding it was time to head back to the hotel (conveniently located 3 doors down from the museum), we took our leave, running into a band of revelers marching a dragon down the street! Let the festival begin!
There is no one in the lobby at the hotel, so after taking off our shoes and stowing them in the cabinet drawer for our room, we explore the kitchen and breakfast area, which is so sweet and pretty – with it’s open-air garden area – then head upstairs to our sweet 3rd floor room with balcony overlooking the festival-feted road.
But, before we stay in for the afternoon, we make a sojourn to the 7Eleven down the street for beer before it turns 2pm (remember, no alcohol is sold between 2 and 5pm in Thailand). On our way back from our beer run, we find the local market, with fresh fruit and vegetable vendors. Oh, if only….but we have no way to cook anything and we sure can’t bring anything back to the ship, as they keep warning us! We also stumble across one of the street murals – Mardi in Baba. Don’t ask what it means – we’ve no idea, but it is fun to look at!
Back in the room we alternate between the balcony to watch the goings on outside and the cool airconditioned inside. Overall an excellent place to spend the sweltering afternoon – blissfully on our own and not on that darn bus!
As the streets start filling up, we decide to head out early for dinner – just to be sure we can get a table. Which proves not to be an issue at Cha-Phu, the restaurant we chose because we saw they had Crippy fish (otherwise known as crispy fried fish!). We were the only people there! Unfortunately, when we ordered our fried fish with garlic, we did not get the whole crippy fish we were thinking. Turned out to be a very oddly shaped small piece of thick fish – fried perfectly with tons of fried garlic – but still – not what we were thinking. The gyoza was good though. And the wait staff was very sweet (the waiter was obviously new because a waitress helped him with everything and sort of provided back up). Ah well, you can’t win them all.
Back out on the streets, we wandered the festival which turned out to basically be a food festival with occasional stages for music and dance. And far more staid than Penang! Thank heavens. Nowhere near as many people here and no crushing crowds. Just table after table of street food. In actuality it was all a little too “corporate” for us – every vendor had on a red apron emblazoned with some sponsor information and it was just, oh so sanitized maybe is the word?
The dragons along the street were all lit up, which was very pretty. We found another mural, this one of the king. There was a traditional dance going on at the Queen Sirikit Park where the huge Golden Dragon station was located. We stopped to watch that for a while, and then waited to see if the sweet younger dancers waiting on the side would begin their performance. They were all standing and ready, but nothing happened for a good 10 minutes, so we headed back up the street, running into a fantastic rock band made up of teenagers – so great and talented!
Continuing to wander, we made the circuit down to the Promthep clock tower which had a mesmerizing laser light show projected upon it, along with a monstrous red bear! Again, why a monstrous red bear? We’re clueless, but it was adorable!
Then we wandered back through the dragon tails to the hotel where we spent the rest of the night alternating between the balcony and the a/c in the room – enjoying the music and dragon parade outside – but also cooling off inside when we got overheated.
Great night out! And we know we aren’t missing anything on the ship as tonight is another Johnny Balance show because apparently the fly-on singer didn’t make it? Don’t know, but good for us, we are happy here in the middle of Old Town, enjoying our little break from the very “cruise-y” Celebrity Millennium.
Andiamo 