Thailand: Land of a Thousand Massages

On the morning of January 7th we took the ferry from Macau to the Hong Kong airport. With comfortable assigned seats and ferry attendants that walk around and make sure you're OK, this was one of the nicest ferries we've ever been on. The only thing that bothered me a bit was that they told us to fasten our seat-belts. I've never been on a ferry that had seat-belts, let alone one that made sure people fastened them. 

But the trip was smooth, and a few hours later we boarded our Cathay Airlines flight to Phuket. Cathay is one of the highest rated airlines in the world, and now I see why - wide seats with lots of legroom, nice flight attendants and free Haagen Dazs! Lenny was so excited!

After landing in Phuket we were picked up and taken to the lovely Nai Harn Hotel, about an hour from the airport. Our room was wonderful and had one of our best views ever.

After eating a good dinner at the hotel, we headed down the street for our first massage of many! Massage places are everywhere here. Nearly all of them are good, and the massages are usually around $10-12.

In the next few days, we swam, snorkeled, ate lots of good Thai food, got out on the water, and explored the small towns surrounding our hotel. Nai Harn Beach is said to be one of the top beaches in Thailand. It is truly lovely.

Besides cheap massages, Thailand also has cheap food. One night we had a taxi take us to a restaurant about a half an hour away called Eat. (Lenny wants to open a restaurant/monastary/bordello and call it Eat, Pray, Love!)

Upon arrival we were told that yes, we had a reservation but they didn't have any tables! As it turned out, the owner had taken our reservation but had neglected to tell the staff. But all was OK. They sat us at the bar and gave us free drinks and desserts to make up for their error.

After a week at Nai Harn we headed to our next destination in Thailand, Koh Lanta. A driver from our hotel in Koh Lanta (Lanaya) picked us up at Nai Harn. The four hour journey in their luxury van was wonderful and went by quickly.

After that we took a short boat trip in Layana's beautiful boat over to the hotel.

Our stay in Phuket had been so nice we wondered how we were going to beat it, but we actually liked Koh Lanta more! The beach was quieter and went on for miles, and while our room didn't have an ocean view it was still lovely. The only slight negative was the rooster next door, who woke us up every morning at 5 - unless the monk chanting prayers on a loud speaker at 4:30 got to us first!

Our first day in Koh Lanta we rented a car and that night we drove to a restaurant about a half an hour away. The food was good but the drive back was not fun. In addition to driving on the left, the roads were not great, they were poorly lighted, and there were many motorbikes weaving in and out of traffic! So I can't say I was disappointed when the next day our car wouldn't start. We called the car rental company and an hour or so later they told us they had fixed it, but when we tried again it still didn't start. And so we made the decision to not have a car and instead take tuk tuks. Yes!

In the week that followed we snorkeled, scuba dived, swam, walked on the beach, and yes, got a lot more massages!

Here we are on one of our snorkeling trips.

Although you can't tell by the photos, we saw lots of beautiful fish! Which got me wondering about the day to day life of the average fish.

Me: So do fish just spend their whole lives looking for food?
Lenny: No, most of the time they're in school.

And just in case you were wondering if we learned Thai while we were here, I'm proud to say we did. Well, at least we learned a few key words - nam (water), hong nam (toilet) and moo uan (fat pig). Moo Uan (pronounced moo wahn) was actually the name of a restaurant we went to. It has since become our pet name for each other, not because we are fat pigs but because it sounds so cute! Here I am with my moo uan celebrating our first anniversary on January 17th!

To  see more photos and videos of our trip to Thailand click here.