Hey there once again. So if you read day 4 you already know that the whole village trip thing did not go as planned, and I am now back in Kathmandu. This is not a setback, but rather a simple change of plans. Let’s see how things went.
We met up in the garden downstairs at 9:40 AM and then headed out to a breakfast place near our lodging called Rosemary Kitchen and Coffee Shop.
School girls walking to class in the morning
We sat in the pleasant garden for breakfast, with the total cost for the three of us coming to 2007 NPR ($15.20 USD). The food was very nice, as was the ambiance.
While eating, Dorothee suggested that I check to see if I could find a “free walking” tour; I found one which was starting at 2 PM on Guru Walk.
This “free” model honestly makes a bit more sense in the European context, since the webpage makes it clear that there is a general expectation that each participant will “tip” at least 10 Euros, with a maximum group size of 5. Obviously, one can pay more. Putting things in perspective, a highly skilled trekking guide who in essence is responsible for your life, is generally only paid about $30 USD a day. In our particular group, there were four people and certainly each of us paid at least $10 USD, and I assume the fourth participant paid similarly. So, for a four hour walking tour, this “walking guide” earned more than double that which was paid for a full day to a trekking guide. I am in no way suggesting that the payment is “unjust” but seeing things from the Nepalese viewpoint, it doesn’t make as much sense as it does in Europe or other cities which are far more expensive. However, the walking tour did not start until 2 PM, so we still had some exploring to do on our own.
Dorothee was quite keen on visiting the Garden of Dreams, so at 11:15 AM we departed from the cafe and headed over in that direction. Along the way at 11:46 AM we briefly stopped in to visit the Tridevi temple.
Our time at the temple was very short, and by 11:55 AM we were entering the garden. The entry fee was 400 NPR ($3.03 USD) per person. While this is certainly not “expensive,” it is clear that this is meant to be more of a resting place for residents of the city than a must see site for tourists. So, if you are short on time, even though there are many great photo opportunities, international visitors can definitely skip the garden.
Certainly we could have spent more time there reading a book or something along those lines, but by 12:35 PM we were ready to go back to our lodging which was only a ten minute walk away. There we rested a bit and left once more on foot at 1:35 PM, arriving to the meeting point at Chaya Center Thames at 1:50 PM. Our guide Santhosh Pandey was reasonably punctual, meeting us at 2:09 PM. There we were joined by another pleasant woman from the United Kingdom, but I am afraid that I did not think to ask her name.
By 2:53 PM we had reached Hanuman-Dhoka Durbar Square. There are several different World Heritage Sites here. The entry fee for non SAARC visitors is 1000 NPR ($7.57 USD) and 150 NPR ($1.14 USD) for SAARC visitors. While this is a minor point, this is potentially important for “Anglo-Indians” visiting, because if you do not “look South Indian” you will be required to show either your voter identification card or your passport; AADHAR and PAN cards are not acceptable. Similarly, if you “look South Asian” just say that you are (The British woman in our group did this.), then they will charge you 150. Still, this is probably the “most important” heritage site in Kathmandu, so it’s definitely worth the entry fee regardless of the amount. There were many interesting things to see, but it is worth noting that some of the buildings and historical artifacts were obviously maintained much better than others; in particular, I noticed that the palace which had been used from the 13th to 18th century seemed rather shabby. We stayed in this general area until 4:22 PM.
Here were were waiting to see the royal Kumari. She appeared at one of the windows for 3 seconds at 4:13 PM.
Yes, a particularly adventurous traveler with plenty of time on one’s hands could walk to the Swayambhu Mahachaitya Buddhist temple complex from the site where we were located, but for the sake of expediency we took a taxi ride for 13 minutes, also asking the driver to wait for us so that we would have transport back to our homestay afterwards. According to our guide, it is MUCH better to make an arrangement like this, because it can otherwise be hard to get transport from the site. We paid a total of 1000 NPR ($7.57 USD) for this service; given that we did not get back to our rooms until 6:04 PM this seemed reasonable, but I suspect we could have bargained for significantly less had we really been in the mood to do the same.
A large amount of our time at this site was spent at the Buddha Thanka Treasure painting showroom. Given that they allowed us up on their rooftop to take pictures; this seemed fair. I should begin with saying that I am definitely impressed with the art created by those whose work was on display, but I was somewhat skeptical about some of the details given to us by the people working there. According to the sales people, every roughly A4 size painting they have there takes between 10 days and 3 months of work for an artist to complete. They furthermore stated that 40% of the artwork created by their 650 artists is shredded, because it does not meet their quality control standards. Finally, they indicated that all of the artists were on salary: 258 full-time artists and 392 part time (3 hours a day for five days a week). These paintings on canvas could be purchased for anything from about $50 USD to $500 USD. Certainly the artwork was impressive and I in no way dispute its value, but the total numbers did not seem to add up given the standard Nepalese minimum wage (one hopes that many of the artists also make more than minimum) and the information we were being given. Again though, I believe that my traveling companions would color me as being overly cynical on this particular point. Regardless, the artwork is beautiful and at least on the surface it seems that this organization is working to provide gainful, practical employment to many aspiring young artists while also preserving a valuable and beautiful art form. I have provided their website above should you wish to buy from them directly.
This was a clandestine picture taken within the art showroom, but given that I’m publicizing their work, I feel okay about the same.This site (like many others) is also called “The monkey temple” so unsurprisingly there were several monkeys. However, there really weren’t that many, and they were in no way annoying, so it’s safe to visit here if you are afraid of monkeys; just don’t have any food available and they will leave you alone.Our guide Santosh, Dorothée, Maria and I when we were saying our goodbyes.
As we had been quite satisfied with our breakfast and it was nearby, we decided to meet for dinner at Rosemary Kitchen and Coffee Shop at 6:30 PM. It took about 30 minutes for our food to be served, and I was reasonably pleased with my Beef Choela; Maria and Dorothee seemed similarly satisfied with their main course choices. I opted to skip dessert, but Maria had the truffle cake which she stated was “nice” and Dorothee had the yoghurt cheesecake which she pronounced to be “very good;” however, she was not at all impressed with the strawberry syrup that had been served on the side. The total for the three of us was 4792 NPR ($36.30 USD).
My pretentiously artistic photo at the end of our dinner . . .
By 8:25 PM I was safely back in my room resting and getting caught up on correspondence. Tomorrow we have no guide, but have booked a driver for the full day who will take us to a couple of recommended locations which are between 1 and three hours from the city. Given our success today, it would appear that we are fully back on track to have a successful and very enjoyable experience here in Nepal. Of course, there is still much to come, and the only way to find out will be to keep reading.
As always, should you have questions about anything I have mentioned so far, just let me know in the comments below and I will try to help as much as possible. Wherever you are, I hope your day was also as great as mine. See you soon . . .
Welcome back my frozen friends! Oh wait, that’s just me who is still frozen, not you. Ah well, certainly still a very interesting cultural experience.
Using night sight, view from the window in my room at 5 AM.
Not that I needed a number for confirmation, but at 5:10 AM it was between 1 and 2 degrees Celsius (34 degrees F) both inside and out. I can still hear raindrops on the roof, but they might be dripping from a tree rather than still actively falling. Getting up to go down to the bathroom, with every step, the wooden floor, stairs and then door creaked in such a way that I am almost certain that the entire house hears me. One thing is for sure, when all those kids I met yesterday hit adolescence, there will definitely not be any “sneaking out” at night; the whole house serves as an alarm system.
By 6 AM, based on my own imagination, I was cautiously optimistic that the rain would have stopped by 8 AM, giving us at least 2-3 hours to walk around a bit before it would start again. Checking the weather report on internet seemed to reaffirm my guess.
At 7:15 AM it was still very foggy, but not raining. I put on three shirts, plus my fleece jacket as I was getting ready to go down for breakfast. I topped off the ensemble with my ear warmer band from Ladakh, and yes, I was still cold. However, I tend to handle the cold fairly well, so no major complaints. Nevertheless, upon meeting up with Dorothee and Maria at 7:30 AM, the consensus was that we would head back to Kathmandu today.
This might simply be a case of “be careful what you ask for,” because you might just get it. We had said that we wanted to get to know about authentic village life, and it looks like that this might be it. Our hosts seemed no less cold than we were, and no less enthusiastic about wandering around aimlessly outside, especially in the rain. The difference of course is that most of them don’t have the choice of escaping back to the comforts of the city when things don’t go as expected. Even in the possible freezing rain, the kids would still be walking to school, and there would still be chores which had to be done outside, as well as all of the day to day tasks of cooking and cleaning inside. This is life.
Fortunately though, the driver would not be able to arrive until about 10 AM, and it looked like it wouldn’t be raining until at least 10:30 AM, so if we were to eat quickly and get out into the street, at least we would be able to see a bit of what could be seen in the immediate vicinity before once again embarking on a ten hour journey.
While there is electricity and even wired internet service in the village, firewood is the main source of both heating and cooking fuel.I am not sure what this is, but I saw two different women soaking it in water and then leaving it to dry as was shown here.
We even had some time to be silly. We got some odd glances from a few of the villagers, but everyone seemed to chalk it up to “crazy foreigners” and simply left us to our own devices. I was sad that we did not get the chance to actually know any of them beyond the immediate family where we had been staying, but there was nothing to be done. Incidentally, Hit told us that this village was MUCH more developed than the other village which we had originally planned on visiting on Day 5 after a 3-5 hour trek on back trails.
Botka arrived with the transport at 9:41 AM. After having a quick tea, we were all set to embark on the ten hour trip back to Kathmandu. After some experimentation, we finally decided on the least uncomfortable (equal levels of possible discomfort) for everyone. Maria would sit in front, I would sit behind Maria, and Dorothee behind the driver. It still wasn’t super, but definitely better for my knees than yesterday’s trip.
The same as yesterday, approximately every 30 minutes we had to register our distance and time.I know you are thinking. . .. Hey, this doesn’t look rainy, and you are right. As is often common in the mountains, there are many “micro climates” here, especially with changes in altitude and even relatively small distances of 25 or so.
At 12:19 PM we were having lunch at the same place as yesterday, this time costing 1350 NPR ($10.22 USD) for the five of us. We dawdled quite a bit and did not depart until 1:15 PM. Going both ways, we had seen several hanging pedestrian bridges which crossed over the river, so we asked Botka if it would be safe to stop for a couple of minutes for us to try one out, and at 2:20 PM he finally spotted one which seemed to make sense. Dorothee, Maria and I were all extremely impressed by how well they were made. They did not shake at all, evidently also being made strong enough to bear motorcycles. For many isolated hamlets, aside from taking a boat across the river, this is their only connection to the main road. Of course, we took advantage to snap some photographs, some less silly than others.
More idyllic scenes abounded as our journey continued until we once more stopped at 3:40 PM to get a drink at Jhangajholi, Ratma Sunshine Food Cafe to let the driver rest a bit while we had coffee.
Maria had this amazing “paper soap” which she had brought from Turkey. I’m definitely going to see if I can buy this back in India.
When we were departing at 4:20 PM, I decided to try to catch up with my ANKI flashcards in Hindi which I had neglected for three days. I worried it might not work well as the road was frequently bumpy, but the Android app on my phone worked great, and 48 minutes later I was all caught up and ready to appreciate the remaining views as we neared the city.
Finally at 7:25 PM we were back to Sunrise Cottage in Kathmandu. We said our goodbyes to Hit and Botka, deciding to pay Hit for the originally intended six days of guide services (around $30 USD a day) and once again paying Botka the same 19000 NPR ($144 USD) as yesterday for his incredibly safe driving services. After taking a couple of minutes to freshen up, I proposed to go to dinner at nearby Hangkook Sarang Korean restaurant.
This was a bit of a splurge, but I really need some feel good food, and I had read that the Korean food here was great. Maria wanted to take a break from dinner itself, but was happy to tag along for the company. The total bill for Dorothée and I was 4650 NPR ($35 USD). We decided to not make any set plans for the next day and by 9 PM I was tucked away in bed.
So no, things definitely did not go as originally planned for the villages trip, and we’ve decided to stick close to Kathmandu for the remaining days. Was it a bit disappointing? Yes, but sometimes that’s life. You can’t control the weather, and sometimes it’s better to make a change of plans rather than stubbornly pushing forward in the face of adversity. Perhaps we would have had an even more amazing cultural experience had we been willing to trudge 4 hours through freezing rain to the next village, constantly being extremely cold for four days but also constantly enlightened by these life experiences, but that’s not what we decided to do.
Do I feel bad about coming back to the Kathmandu area? Not at all. It’s an amazing place with plenty to offer, and I look forward to seeing much more of it tomorrow. Feel free to let me know what you think of our decisions, or even just leave a word of encouragement in the comments section. As always, thanks for following along; I’m sure there are more great things to come.
No there isn’t a problem with your screen, my hand was just unsteady at 5:25 AM when I took this photo while we were waiting for Hit to arrive with our transport for the day.
Welcome back readers. If all goes well, this will be our first day on the track to find out the little things that actually make up Nepali village life real, or at any rate, as much as can be see in four nights of travel.
It was definitely the right call to reserve an entire transport for ourselves. A ten hour trip with ten people would have perhaps been educational, but that is one lesson I am willing to forego as long as I have a choice.
By 5:33 AM our driver Botha was pulling out of the drive. As one might expect, the scenery along the way was pretty, and the road was constantly twisting and turning up and down the side of the mountain. For the most part the road was reasonably “good” but yes, there were patches where it was just dirt or where we had to drive though very small bodies of water. However, I certainly never felt unsafe.
I had originally thought that I would probably end up sleeping most of the way despite the beautiful scenery, but as a result of the still rather cramped conditions for my 1.82 metres and 90 kg frame, plus the often rather bumpy and swerving road conditions, that was clearly not likely to happen for much of the ride. By
Sitting behind the driver was a better option due to the softer back of the seat. The front seat had initially looked better, but my knees jammed into hard plastic unless the seat was put back so far as to make the back seat unusable for my traveling companions. While not “comfortable” conditions for me, it was fine. I think Maria and Dorothée, who are both a bit smaller, were actually reasonably comfortable the whole way
At 8:45 AM we stopped for breakfast near Khurkot. I forgot to ask the name, so I’m not actually sure exactly where we were.
The food was more than adequate and some would no doubt even say delicious. Certainly the server was gracious. The cost was 350 NPR ($2.66 USD) for each of the three of us. I assume we were also paying the cost of Hit and Botka in that as well. By 9:30 AM we were back on the road again.
Removing a bit of my feelings of road safety was this memorial marked by mirrors. Evidently a bus had gone off the road here killing 45 people. Still, the fact that there weren’t mirrors everywhere along the way seemed to indicate this was not a common occurrence.
As we were going along, Botka regularly stopped the vehicle to speak to someone near the side of the road. At first I thought maybe he was asking about road conditions ahead or perhaps even directions; although, in retrospect, as there was only one obvious “road” that was a foolish initial assumption. Hit then clarified that Botka was evidently registering time etc . . . with the official. This is a way that they use to keep people from going to fast along the twisting and many times rather narrow roads. At 12:05 PM we stopped for lunch in the town of Ghurmi.
The initial portion placed on ones plate is not very large, but then these people go around giving more if you want. This seems like a good way to ensure nobody leaves hungry without encouraging food wastage.The tasty momos we ordered was separate from the standard lunch.While obviously seen as more of a decoration than an actual food item, the spinach was delicious.
The cost for all five of us including the momos and two beers (no, neither was for the driver) was 1950 NPR ($14.76 USD). And by 1 PM we were once more in motion.
The road started to climb upwards again and we arrived by 3:37 PM we had arrived to our first village destination, Siddhicharan. It was raining, and rather cold, but our hosts were kind.
Dinner was around 7 PM and then we played cards with the kids. Again, our hosts are very pleasant, but it was also 5 degrees Celsius and rainy with a not very encouraging forecast for the next few days.
Before going up to bed, we chatted and decided that the best course of action would be to see how the weather actually looked tomorrow morning, but probably we will try to head back towards Kathmandu on Wednesday rather than walking for four hours to an even more isolated village. It’s just too chilly and rainy and we don’t have adequate clothes. Hopefully, we will be able to get out a bit in the morning to see something of the area around the local village. The forecast seems to indicate that would be reasonable for a few hours, but we will have to see. As I got in bed at 9:30 PM, the rain was still coming down and it was 2 degrees Celsius both inside and out. . ..
Hey there again. Day two had a lot more to see, and fortunately for you my intrepid readers, a lot less to read.
I was up at 7 AM to finish my blog post for Day 1, and then at 8:40 had tea with Dorothee, Maria and our guide, who is called Hit.
I had hoped to have a bit more clarity about the rest of the trip after speaking with him, but that was not the case. This was making me still feel very uncomfortable with heading off to a village in the middle of nowhere tomorrow, but then I realized that I needed to reframe the situation.
I had been viewing Hit as a travel agent or trip planner who was also doubling as a guide/translator. However, that is not his role; rather he is a travel facilitator when we attempt to do tourism in a couple of villages which are not actually setup to handle tourists. He can give us a general idea of what it will cost to negotiate being paying guests in the homes of local villagers for four days as well as the cost and methods of travel to them. In this way, one could see him as the “old school version” of a guide. Yes, this requires a great deal of trust, but if we want to have this experience, then it is what we have to do. The only point I actually did continue to feel a bit odd about what his insistence that he not have a daily set payment, but rather at the end, we would pay him whatever we thought made the most sense.
This is of course silly because he DOES work as a professionally contracted modern guide, so there is clearly a set minimum amount he is expecting. As is the habit with guides all over the world, if you want to give a tip, then you do it, but there is still the general expectation of an absolute minimum percentage for the tip when one has an individual or small group guide. So, after a bit of debate amongst ourselves and some online investigation, Dorothee and I found out what is actually generally the standard daily rate for a highly qualified guide in Nepal, and we simply decide to go with that amount once we had confirmed the plan with Maria.
We did have one tough decision to make though. Would we travel as “standard travelers” in the vehicles which they call jeeps, but I assume are more like land rovers (will see tomorrow), each paying 2200 NRP for the ten hour trip tomorrow, or do we buy out all ten seats in one of the jeeps, and travel just on our own? Given that two of us are rather large; I am 1.82 meters tall, we decided to bite the bullet and pay around NPR 7300 each for the one way trip. This would also give us more flexibility for stopping to take pictures etc . . . Along the way without inconveniencing other travelers. So that will be roughly $56 USD per person for transport to the first village rather than $17 USD. Based on how things go heading towards the first village, we will decide what to do when we come back to Kathmandu from the final village.
A bit after this we decided to head out to find breakfast and then continue on with the two temple visits we had decided that we wanted to do today.
I have no idea what these tiny little duffel bags are used for, but we’ve seen them all around the “foreign tourist” section of the city.
After wandering around for about 20 minutes trying to find an “amazing breakfast place” which we had read about online, going to the place where we told it had been moved, and then giving up when it was not there either, we decided to just go into the very next place we saw, which turned out to be a very fancy place called Kathmandu Guest House. The breakfast buffet was decent if perhaps a bit overpriced at NPR 1500 ($11.50 USD) per person, but the gardens were beautiful and the ambience is of course what we were really buying, not the food. I of course obstinately insisted on going overboard with the food amount in order to get my money’s worth. Regardless, if you want a pretty place to have breakfast, I would recommend them.
At 10:38 AM we started off walking towards Pashupatinath temple complex, which Hit had told us was about an hour walk away. While this was accurate information, Maria and I at least had imagined a far more leisurely walk than Hit had in mind, but we certainly did see a lot of interesting things along the way. Separately, we made a mental note as to what Hit thinks of as “standard walking speed” so that we can refer to the same in the future when he tells us how far we have to go until reaching any additional destinations.
I had thought there were lots of motorcycles on the roads in India, but Kathmandu at least seems to have the average Indian city beat on that score.For some reason I can’t quite pin down, I keep having concerns about the electrical installations in Kathmandu.
By 11:30 AM we had arrived to the Temple complex, which had a cost of 1000 NPR ($7.68 USD) to enter. I really had no idea what to expect, since I was just going to where Dorothee had suggested. Still, I am happy to report that it was money well spent. We were there for almost 90 minutes and easily could have stayed much longer without being bored.
This is a family preparing for the cremation of an older relative. We saw much of the process including the beginning of the open air cremation. Contrary to what you might believe, it was not really particularly shocking to see; although, having such a private moment out for random tourists to see seemed a bit odd. There seemed to be some sort of a wildlife preserve for a few grazing animals on the site. This fellow had been far away, but evidently he understands Spanish, because I was able to talk him over to stand right next to the fence so we could all get pictures. One little local boy was particularly pleased with my deer whisperer skills.Whether or not it’s true, a local man explained to me in a mix of broken English and broken Hindi that on a yearly basis, family members return to pray for their loved ones who were cremated here.
In case it was not obvious, this first temple complex that we visited was a Hindu site. Again, we easily could have stayed there for several hours, especially if we had been traveling with a specialized cultural guide, but at 12:45 PM we decided it was time to walk over to the next site. As none of us had had the foresight to take a proper sun hat or even sunblock today, I found myself resorting to comical attempts to stay in the shade and/or cover my head and neck with my fleece jacket. Note to self, always take the sun hat, even if the the day is supposed to be very overcast.
Arriving at roughly 1:15 PM to Shree Boudhanath Area, it immediately struck me that this temple area seemed more like a bustling town square with an impressive religious symbol in the middle, rather than an area normally visited for actual religious purposes. Cost for entry, which I assume was not charged to locals, was 500 NPR ($3.84 USD) but only 100 NPR ($0.77 USD) for SAARC citizens. I had my Indian Aadhaar card with me, so I greeted the ticket seller in Hindi, showed my card, and only paid 100.
Of course pictures were strictly forbidden in the Buddhist shrine area, but you know me . . . A “no photos” sign is always a challenge to be undertaken.While photos were prohibited, apparently sleeping is just fine.
Having first assured ourselves that there were sun awnings, at 1:45 PM we went to the rooftop area of Hello Cafe to rest for a bit while having a drink and chatting. We paid 970 NPR ($7.45 USD) for three glasses of local Gorkha beer and a lassi drink. This local beer was actually quite decent, so if you are open to trying local beers while traveling, go ahead and give it a try; there’s a good chance you may like it.
From 2:45 to 3:15 pm we were in a cramped taxi headed back to the homestay, paying 500 NPR ($3.84 USD) for the privilege of being smashed together in order to NOT spend more than an hour once again walking while enduring the unrelenting sun for which we had not properly prepared. All in all, we definitely agreed it was a bargain.
Maria was quite pleased at how slim she looked due to the smashing process. I’m not sure how it would work, but there’s a definite business opportunity here for some enterprising young entrepreneur in the beauty industry.
From 3:15 PM to 5:45 PM, I rested a bit and then packed for tomorrow’s trip. When Maria came back from her short shopping trip outing at 5:50 PM we went to a nearby restaurant for a quick dinner before heading out to get water purification tablets and cash for our village adventure which would begin at 5:30 AM the next morning.
Yes momos are a stereotypical Nepali food, but they really are a tasty addition to almost any meal.Evidently we will be drinking river water in one of the villages, so it’s best to take reasonable precautions.
So that’s where things pretty much ended for the day. I’m cautiously optimistic about tomorrow’s ten hour road trip to the first village. I’m not adventurous enough to try such a thing on my own, but with two great travel companions and our local guide/facilitator/negotiator/translater Hit along, I’m sure it will be a great time.
If you want to find out what happened with village life, you’ll have to wait until day three’s post. As always, thanks for following along, and don’t hesitate to ask additional questions in the comments section.
Hey everyone, I know it has been some time since you last heard from me, but I am once again on the move and eager to share what is happening with my latest adventure.
Those of you who have been following along since the beginning will remember Dorothee, with whom I visited Ladakh last year. This year when I was telling her about how my trip to Cambodia was looking like it was going to fall apart, she was quick to mention that she had separately been planning a trip to Nepal and wondered if I would be interested in tagging along. Long story short, as you can tell from the title of this entry, I ended up saying yes. For those of you who are not keen to know all the details about my actual travel to Nepal from Bengaluru, India; feel free to skip ahead, but there is some really good info about what happened once we arrived to the airport.
So once again, I ended up on a crazy early morning flight. I had booked a round trip ticket on IndiGo to Kathmandu from Bengaluru, with a cost of 20,000 INR ($240 USD). With a departure at 5:30 AM, that meant I would have to leave from my place in New Yelahanka (about 22 km away) at 2:45 AM. While recently it has become more difficult to get easily get cars from my area, using Ola (similar to Uber) I was able to be in a car by 2:50 AM with plenty of time to spare. Incidentally for those who may be coming to India to travel, despite the fact that both Uber and Ola supposedly accept all types of electronic payment, at least with my experience in Bengaluru, in the last couple of years, most of the drivers only want to take you if you can pay cash; this takes away part of the convenience of cash free travel, but at least it is still “reasonably easy” to get a car . . . Certainly it is easier than trying to flag down a cab or even a rickshaw.
While there was much more traffic on the road at that hour than I would have expected (at any time there were at least 20 other vehicles easily visible) travel was smooth and I had arrived to terminal 1 of the airport by 3:18 AM.
Also, unlike my other recent flying experiences in out of Bengaluru in the last year, there were comparatively few fliers, and by 3:22 AM I was already inside the airport trying to get the IndiGo automated check-in machine to work. Regular flyers with this airline will not be surprised to learn that the machines were not working, but again, amazingly the check-in line went amazingly fast, and by 3:38 AM I was already headed up to security.
While no disrespect is intended, going through security in an Indian airport is frequently a bit of a comedy. While I have no doubt that officials are honestly trying their best to keep us safe, the process often appears to be arbitrary and at times even nonsensical. Nevertheless, things again seemed to be going amazingly fast, with me walking through the metal detector at 3:46 AM. Of course the detector beeped (I have never had it NOT beep in india) and they proceeded to move the detector wand all over me. Interestingly, it seemed to be that almost all of my body was registering metal except for my chest where I have surgery staples. Fortunately the official chose to believe his hands from the pat down rather than the wand, and I was completely finished with the process by 3:48 AM.
Yes, this is a common site.
Shortly thereafter, Maria and Dorothee who had arrived separately, also got through security.
By 4:10 AM we were at Jones the Grocer having a fascinating conversation about religion and its relationship to the workplace. Perhaps not everyone wants chats like this while on holiday, but I was extremely happy for the high quality “non-work” intellectual engagement. I think that we will be a very good travel trio.
My croissant, which was reasonably good, and large cappuccino was 512 INR ($6.20 USD). Dorothee and Maria also seemed satisfied with their selections.
Right before 5 we headed over to our Gate, and at 5:06 AM we were on the bus to the airplane. Readers from the many parts of the world, in particular the USA, will find it odd that we took a plane to the airplane, but in many countries this sort of boarding arrangement is the norm rather than going down a jetway. Again, so far everything was going great. So what about seating?
Many of us over the age of 35 remember a time when those who travelled together were almost always automatically seated together, and while a preference could be expressed for window or aisle, it was just sort of luck how things would actually turn out. However, this was the norm, and you certainly did not expect to have to pay an additional fee. In fact, this was one of the “rewards” both of arriving early to the airport and then later on for doing online check-in ahead of time. As a “budget airline” this is certainly not the case for IndiGo.
To be fair, their seats are not especially uncomfortable, but if you are allergic to the middle seat like I am, and furthermore have a special preference for either aisle or window, you pay ahead for your seat selection. In my case I chose the second cheapest option (middle is of course the cheapest) and did standard aisle seating for a cost of 400 INR ($4.85 USD) per flight. Interestingly enough, on IndiGo, the most expensive option is not the most comfortable if you are a taller person — I am 1.82 meters. Rather the second most expensive option (exit row) is where you get the most leg room; although, you sacrifice being able to recline. That having been said, with so little space, what sort of animal reclines their seat anyways if there is a standard sized human seated behind oneself? Pro tip: the absolute BEST IndiGo seat, if you can get it, is the exit row seat that has no seat immediately in front of it.
Anyways, by 5:38 AM the plane was in the air and I was doing my “daily” ANKI flashcards for Hindi. I have for the most part kept up with these perfectly since completing the three-week Hindi course I did in Dehradun in December and January. However, as I had skipped the previous day, I had 298 cards to do, which took me 47 minutes. Yes, I was tired, but I wanted to take advantage of this alone time to study, since later on I knew I would either be exploring with Maria and Dorothee or trying to churn out this daily entry to my travel blog. By 6:35 AM I was ready to turn on sleep sounds and try to get a bit of rest for the remainder of the flight; the sleeping didn’t work out so well but we arrived safely and on time to Delhi by 8:15 AM.
If you have been skimming through until now, this is where you need to start actually paying attention, especially if there is any possibility you might have to do a transfer to an international flight departing from Delhi at some point in the future. Dorothee has an almost visceral dislike of the Delhi airport, but I tend to be more ambivalent. That having been said, her dislike is not without reason. I know it’s amazing how many people this airport handles on a daily basis, but they frequently do not make it easy nor intuitive to navigate.
While it’s not always the most easy place to navigate, the Delhi airport has some very beautiful elements of design.
Shortly after entering the terminal, we saw a very large area labeled “International Transfers” which amazingly, while properly staffed, seemed to be almost empty. It looked like once again we were going to get a quick and easy transition to the next part of the trip . . . If you have spent much time in Delhi airport, you know that is not what happened.
For some unknown reason, this relatively abandoned transfer area is only for Air India customers. There is no sign to indicate this, but rather someone in their infinite wisdom has decided it makes more sense to hire a full time person to individually tell the thousands of daily non Air India flyers making international transfers that they have to go somewhere else which makes no sense whatsoever. While you will not remember it, and the process will likely have changed anyways by the next time you do it, this is what you have to do.
First you have to exit the secure area as if you were departing the airport, doing so near baggage belt 4. From there you turn left and go to the end of the hallway (it is easily manageable for a normally healthy person, but it is still a bit of a walk) then up the escalators which you will see, into the main check-in area of the terminal. IF you have boarding passes for the next flight, you can then head directly to immigration, which is to the left. If for some reason you do not have the boarding pass, you will have to get in line as if you were checking in from scratch; most of the time this is not the case, but it does frequently happen, so do not freak out if before transferring through Delhi you are told you will have to get your next boarding pass at the terminal in Delhi. If this all seems like a way too confusing process, just do what we did . . . Walk one minute, find someone to ask what to do next . . .walk another minute . . . Ask again until you get to immigration.
Despite all of this, amazingly things were still going much faster than most of my air travel experiences through major airports in India. So while it may seem odd, at least today, I couldn’t really complain that much, because the system seemed to be “working”.
By 8:27 AM we were in line for immigration, which yet once again, amazingly had relatively few people and a line which was moving along at a rather brisk pace. Do note that many of the lines do not have larger trays to put your electronics etc . . . So you may have to hunt around like I did to take larger trays from another line. Also, if you are new to traveling in this part of the world, note that there are lines for men and separate lines for women. It is easy to see, because the women’s lines have these curtained off areas for the security pat down; no, I don’t know why. Unlike in Bengaluru, for this security check you were required to keep your boarding pass in hand, and it seemed to be an issue for many people since there was no signage to indicate the same. Again though, the system still seemed to work quite well today, and by 8:45 AM we were through and looking for a place to eat something a bit more substantial.
This was not where I would usually have chosen, Dorothee suggested the Irish House. The server was very friendly as she kindly told us that more than half of the items we requested from the menu were not actually available, and I ended up with a fairly decent chicken Cesar salad for 609 INR ($7.38). By 9:40 AM we headed towards the gate, where I was happy to learn that Maria is a dog person. So we had some pleasant chat and shared pictures of our fur friends.
Let’s hope the pics continue to look this happy as the trip progresses.
By 10:52 AM we were on the plane and then we were taking off at 11:15 AM. As I had already established that sleep was not going to work on these planes, I decided to listen to my audiobook Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin This was a short flight, with us touching down in Kathmandu but at 12:51 PM.
Those of you who follow along with me on a regular basis know that I am a big fan of e-sims, generally recommending Airalo, but this time around that did not seem to be the best fit, with international roaming on my Airtel connection actually being a better fit for my needs, costing me about $36 USD for 10 days of service, including 5 GB of 4G data and 100 minutes a day of outgoing standard local and/or calls to India. Furthermore, all incoming calls are included. Getting a local SIM in Nepal I think would have been a bit cheaper, but form what I had read, it would have been more of a hassle with all the paperwork. Whether it is cheaper or not, this time around I am actually happy with my international roaming option, so keep it in mind that it may be worth comparing before selecting options when traveling.
There was one unpleasant surprise when we got off the plane and started heading to get our luggage. There was a line where they were demanding that we show either a negative COVID-19 PCR test or a vaccine record. According to the online information we had found beforehand, this was no longer being requested. Yes, I had thought it might still be good to have, but I could not find my previously downloaded electronic copy, and the Indian Cowin site seemed to not be working the previous two days, so I didn’t have it. Keen-eyed Dorothee however noticed that they did not actually seem to be looking at the papers, so she just palmed me her certificate after she had it “reviewed” and I used her certificate as well to get through the line. Yes, it is just as comical as it sounds . . .but hey, it worked, so no complaints from me.
Yeah, they accept Visa . . . But what about MasterCard?
Next we were on to immigration. As we were all three doing visa on arrival, we had printouts of sheets to present along with our passports so that we could pay our fees. It seems that it would have made more sense to pay online when applying, but the system is that you have to pay in cash. Furthermore, you evidently have to pay in foreign currency, but not all currencies are accepted. It all seemed rather random: Dorothee was told to pay in Euros, Maria in British Pounds, and me in US Dollars. No, we could not use a card and we could not use Nepali Rupees. Having been warned ahead of time of this oddity, I had US dollars with me to pay my $30 USD. However, Dorothee did not. Dorothee being Dorothee, somehow convinced them to take Indian Rupees for her payment even though it was not one of the listed “accepted currencies”. Anyways, I was glad we were able to get it done.
We then tried to get Nepali rupees out of the cash machine in that area, but it appears to only work with international Visa cards, not Mastercard. Incidentally, I have noticed that most of the ATM machines here only take international Visa cards, but there I did notice a couple today that had the Mastercard symbol, but I did not have a card along to try. This DID seem to be a problem for many other travelers who only had a MasterCard card with them, so keep that in mind if you plan on using at ATM here with an international card. I am not saying MasterCard is impossible, but Visa is definitely more accepted.
By 1:42 PM we were through immigration and straight on to get our bags at 1:44 PM which were already waiting. Again, all oddities still existing, so far most things were going very quickly today. I hope it continues like that. We then made our way over to the prepaid taxi counter, which was closed, but then when we asked at a separate booth next door, they told us to just go downstairs. Upon arriving there, again, this one appeared to have nobody working, but once again upon asking, someone came to help us, so we paid just 900 NPR ($6.91 USD) for our 5 KM ride to Sunrise Cottage Guest House.
Dorothée was very excited about this temple!
Despite having an extremely aggressive driver and very little traffic, it took us 32 minutes to get to our lodging, since the driver had a hard time figuring out the directions, even when speaking by phone with the front desk at the cottage.
Still, we finally arrived at 2:27 PM and were greeted with cups of tea by Rishi. After getting settled in and looking around a bit, we decided to head out walking at 3:35 PM.
As luck would have it, it seemed that it was going to rain, so despite already having bought a Poncho in Ladakh which I never used, I ended up buying another one here for 1500 NPR ($11.50 USD). Last time I went with a serious dark blue, but this time we all agreed that something brighter was more in order. If nothing else, it would keep Dorothee and Maria from losing me in a crowd. Furthermore, as long as I was wearing it, it seemed to have the magical ability to stop the rain from actually coming down. One way or another, it seems to be serving its purpose.
At 4:30 PM we decided to check for some local restaurant recommendations online, and we decided upon Legendary Food Kitchen, which we all three agreed was nothing fancy, but certainly reasonably priced and completely satisfying food. One important point in its favor was it was clear that everything was actually made fresh once it was ordered.
So, if you are looking for wholesome local nourishment at a fair price, this is definitely worth checking out. We then continued on walking.
By 6:20 we were ready for a dessert, but most of the recommended places seemed to be closing at 6:30 PM, so we went ahead and just walked into The baking factory. To be honest, the drinks and pastries were mostly unremarkable, but I thought my “brownie” (actually a chocolate cake) was acceptable, and Maria actually quite enjoyed her chocolate danish.
Finally, by 8 PM we were back to the guest house to take some rest before day two. Looking back, I see that this entry was perhaps too wordy, but as few people read all the way through anyways, I decided to err on the side of including all the information which might be useful. If nothing else, maybe you liked the pictures. If you were one of the intrepid readers who made it all the way through, the wow!
As always, thanks for following along, and I look forward to sharing my further adventures in the coming days. If you have any questions or comments, just stick them there below. For now, it is already 11:30 PM and I need to get to bed, so see you tomorrow!
For those of you who have been following along, you know that I was a bit uncertain about this “island hopping” tour, but it was actually really amazing. Several companies do something similar, but mine was organized through The Wilderness Phuket (Tel 0835565006221) and the tour itself was directly managed by Andaman Surprise (Tel 081-4266623). In my particular case, everything was setup by my guide on Day 5, Maria Wanpen Ngan-khang. Our main guide for the day was Tuktuk, but he had an impressive team of several people. I think that Maria had worked out some sort of a discount, so for the two of us (Elisabet and I) the cost was only 3400 THB ($89.85 USD) but it definitely would have been fair for it to be more expensive, so even if they quote you a bit more, I would still encourage you to go if you can’t get a better price.
We were picked up at Elisabet’s house in Koh Kaew at 9:00 AM sharp and taken to the meeting point where they had plenty of snacks and drinks available while we were waiting for other participants to arrive. All of this was included in the cost of the tour.
We waited maybe 30-45 minutes for everyone else to arrive, but it was a comfortable spot and we could also walk around in the immediate area, so it did not feel like unpleasant downtime. This also gave people the opportunity to either change clothes or even buy some extra reasonably priced swim/snorkel gear in the shop area where we were waiting. The area itself was very beautiful.
I opted to buy some swim slippers for 400 THB ($10.57 USD), since I have “baby feet” and knew that I would be uncomfortable walking on rough or hot sand. Then we received some basic instructions and the group was divided into two so that there would not be too many people in a single group. I didn’t count the actual number of participants in my group, but I think it was between 15 and 20; certainly, it never felt like there were too many people as there was plenty of space. We then headed to our boat.
I had been expecting something MUCH simpler, so I was extremely impressed by the boat and also very appreciative. The seating was comfortable and the tarp helped ensure that we did not bake in the sun while travelling around from island to island.
The first “stop” at 11:35 AM was viking cave. We were not allowed to actually enter, but evidently there are 2000 year old paintings inside as well as some sort of special bird. Even from the distance it was impressive.
I didn’t fully understand, but I think that originally the organizers had planned for us to do snorkeling somewhere else, but they had received word that the area there was very crowded, so they put down anchor and told us that we would do snorkeling here. For those of us who were not strong swimmers, they suggested that we use life jackets since we would be in the water over 30 minutes and there would be nothing available to hang onto nor stand on given the depth of the water. Both Elisabet and I decided to go with the jackets, even though the sea was very calm.
Like me, this was Elisabet’s first time snorkeling
I had been diving once before in Goa, and while I had liked it, had not been especially impressed with what I saw. However, I was certainly game to try. Incidentally, for those concerned about hygiene, we were each given new mouthpieces to use; although, I hope they were simply well-sterilized and then reused since they seemed like very sturdy, potentially costly bits of equipment.
Unfortunately, I had no way of taking any pictures, but it was absolutely amazing. The best was I can describe it, is that it was like swimming in a giant tropical aquarium. The variety of fish was stunning, as was the coral, even though much of it was bleached. As the water was crystal clear, it was easy to see all the contours of the nearby seabed as well as the fish, even though due to the life vest I was of course not able to dive down further to get a closer look. There was one type of blue fish which I would say was the size of a large trout which kept drawing my attention; it had several shades of blue, as well as a bit of green and yellow. Once I got a bit more used to breathing through the snorkel tube, I was having an amazing time. Words really do fail me, but this was definitely one of the most amazing experiences of my life.
We continued with snorkeling until about 12:20 PM. Despite how much I liked it, I think this really was the right amount of time. Even with the life vest, moving around in the water could be a bit tiring, and many people of didn’t have the extra support.
They had a handy freshwater shower system when we got out of the water so that we wouldn’t be itchy from the dried seawater back on the boat.
We then continued onwards until 12:35 PM where we had another stop. I forgot to ask where we were, but based on the map, I guess it was probably Pileh cove. Wherever it was, it was very beautiful.
There we had the option of going out on traditional wooden long boats which had an additional cost, paddling around in a clear acrylic rowboat, taking a try doing paddle boarding, more swimming, or just lazing around on the boat while appreciating the beautiful surroundings. We decided to just hang out on the boat and chat, also taking advantage of the plentiful included drinks and snacks whenever we wanted. We were there until 1:07 PM, which again, seemed like the perfect amount of time. Then we were off again.
We arrived to Maya bay at 1:15 PM. There it is prohibited to swim, but it was nice to walk around, and it was okay to wade in the water. This area had been completely closed to the public for many years due to excessive tourism, much which was the result of it being the main filming site of the movie “The Beach”. Even without the popularity of the movie, it was easy to see how the place had been overrun with tourists due to its amazing beauty. I was happy that the Thai government had been willing to take a stand on the conservation and recuperation of the site and even now was still strictly limiting which activities were permitted.
We were back on the boat at 2:05 PM and then had a short trip to Phi Phi island, arriving at 2:17 PM. Here was where we would have our buffet lunch and if time permitted, wander around until 3:20 PM.
From 3:20 – 3:27 we did a short jaunt to monkey beach. The name is of course self-explanatory.
We only stayed there until 3:36 PM and then continued onwards to Khai Mai island.
We arrived at 4:30 PM. The primary function of this island seems to be that of “island bar”. So far, it was by far the most stereotypical representation of Phuket area beach life which I had seen. Still, for one hour it was fine, especially since our tour organizers setup a table with multiple drinks and snacks which had no additional cost. Of course, many opted to buy alcohol and rent one of the beach chairs, but for the most part Elisabet and I were just content to wander around a bit, even though there really wasn’t far to go. Supposedly this island had lots of cats, and I was eager to see the same, but in total I only saw five, and none of them particularly drew my attention. Despite the later afternoon hour, the sun was now quite intense, and the beach also had lots of broken coral and shells which made it uncomfortable to walk without special slippers like those I had bought earlier. Still, we were only there an hour, and like everywhere else we had been, it was still in its own way a very picturesque place to hang out for a bit while on vacation.
At 5:30 PM we headed back to where we had started from in Phuket. The last boat trip was only 28 minutes, and with the stunning cloud formations and the beautiful sunset, it was a perfect ending to our outing.
So this entry is less than a “Day 6” than it is an evening 6, and it’s mostly just a recount of our trip to Phuket FantaSea. In order to use funds from my PayPal balance, I bought the tickets through Trip.com, but the cost was about the same as buying direct from FantaSea. To be certain, the main website states that all resellers are obligated to sell tickets according to the official stated rate. I opted for the show + buffet with theater gold seat upgrade. So for two people it was $116.78 USD; paying at the park would have been 5100 THB. That does make it look like I got a bit of a discount, but I suspect it was just due to a favorable exchange rate issue.
In addition to the theater and buffet hall, there is a connected small, but beautiful “night theme park”, and entrance to the same is free with theater tickets. The park and buffet opens at 5:30 PM, with the show starting at 9:00 PM. Elisabet took care of the round trip transport via inDrive, paying a total of 740 THB ($19.42 USD). It was 14 km (8.7 miles) each way, taking about 35 minutes each way, mostly due to intermittent rain and rather twisty roads. We arrived at 6:30 PM.
From the moment we arrived, everything went very smoothly with the process to first exchange our electronic voucher for tickets and then to go through into the park area itself. Due to the light rain, not everything was fully operating, but there were still beautiful displays and nice shops with prices reasonably comparable to what one would pay elsewhere.
This area is clearly all about the pictures and of course the shopping. As we didn’t do any shopping, we focused our energy on the photos. It would have been nicer without the light rain, but it was nevertheless a magical experience. At around 7:40 PM we went through to the buffet hall.
The buffet was very well organized in order to minimize any long lines. The food was “decent” but not amazing. There was a fancier “seafood upgrade” pack we could have bought, but as I’m allergic to shellfish, that didn’t make much sense. Around 8:45 we made our way over to the theater entrance where I snapped one last photo of Elisabet before we got in line.
Cameras and recording devices were strictly prohibited within the theater, even to the extent that we were required to turn in our cellphones before entering. While this was initially disappointing since even the theater itself was very beautiful inside, I have to admit that this was a good idea on the part of the organizers since lighting played a very important role in the show. With such a huge theater, I have no doubt that people would otherwise have regularly been destroying the atmosphere with the light from the their screens.
The entire show itself was only a little over an hour, but it was so incredibly well done that I in no way felt that we had paid too much. Words really don’t do it justice, but that’s all I can offer. It was a mix of several different mini shows which kept us entranced for the entire time. They began with some sort of traditional Thai dancers. They then transitioned into a very elegant shadow puppets story which was followed up by a comedic magic show. Following that were the four black light lit trapeze artists with the final show being a mini play of a love story where the “princess” was captured by a demon and then of course triumphant battle to get her back.
The show itself had at least fifty (I think more like a hundred different people), several water buffalo, a flock of chickens, a group of goats, flying doves, a tiger, and of course elephants . . . All of which appeared on the massive stage. Our gold seats put us squarely in the middle of the stage at a perfect distance to still appreciate the immensity of it all. The only thing that was a bit difficult for us to fully appreciate were the trapeze artists, since they were almost immediately above our heads, so we had to strain our necks a bit to see. Despite the trapeze part, I’m definitely very glad I paid the gold seat upgrade.
Certainly, if you are ever in Phuket, you should definitely see if you can go to the FantaSea show. I’m almost certain that you’ve never before seen anything like it. Yes, I can understand why some people would have misgivings about the animals in the show. I didn’t have enough expertise to notice the same, but Elisabet thought that some of the elephants’ ears looked “mistreated”. To be fair, I didn’t think the elephants themselves actually added that much to the show; they could easily remove them and it would still be an amazing spectacle, but then I suppose that would also sort of undermine the whole “elephant theme” which was definitely dominant throughout the park.
While not impossible, it did take Elisabet some time to hail us a car to return. As soon as we got back to the house, we immediately headed up to our rooms since upon Elisabet’s recommendation and with Maria’s (My guide on day 5) help, we had planned a full day island hopping trip for day 7.
As I don’t tend to be much of a beach/ocean person, I had my doubts about a full day in the sun, but I was certain that with Elisabet along I would have a good time. Our trip to FantaSea had far exceeded my expectations, so I was starting to have the hope that the same thing might happen with the various island visits.
As always, thanks for following along with my travels and hopefully I’ll see you with day 7.
Day 5 was a bit different as I had opted to go on a “full day” guided tour. As such, much of this entry could be read as a review. I first discovered the GetYourGuide app in Barcelona, but have since then referred to it several times. The app itself seems to be an aggregate of quality tours from different local providers in a given location. The prices there are always comparable or a bit less to those found elsewhere. I paid $58.50 USD for the From Phuket: Khao Lak Highlights Full-Day Tour and it was definitely worth that and more. I think the actual company that did the tour was TripGuru and my guide was Maria Wanpen Ngan-khang.
I was picked up at Elisabet’s house in Koh Kaew at 7:20 AM (10 minutes ahead of schedule) in a full-sized tourism van. I’m afraid that I neglected to write his name, but Maria said his name would translate as “chicken”. After about 5 minutes we picked up Maria, and that was when I discovered that I was actually going to be the only one on the tour; I had known that this was a maximum 10 person tour, but I was surprised (yet gratified) that they would still run it with only one person. The first stop en route was the Sarasin bridge which connects Phuket to Phang Nga province on the mainland.
Volunteers clean both the tanks and the turtles on a daily basis (or at any rate, that’s what I understood)Turtles are placed in different age groups, not being released until they are considered to be large enough to have a much better chance of survival.
I looked around at the conservation center until 10:03, and then we had a short trip to a Tsunami memorial center, arriving at 10:20 AM.
My guide Maria and the police boat which was left stranded on land to serve as a memorial for those who died trying to protect others.
It was a sobering experience to read some of the experiences of the survivors, including my guide Maria who had been on Phi Phi island that day. Now she is able to happily appreciate the beauty of today day as a survivor, but she remembers fleeing to the hills with her young son and the horror at knowing that so many others would not make it to high land on time. There wasn’t that much to actually see there, so by 10:40 we departed for the rafting center, arriving at about 11:15
I wasn’t really sure why we had to go this last little bit in the back of a pickup truck, but it was fine, just another addition to the whole experience.
The bamboo rafting experience was basically just me sitting while a very nice man pushed us along with a pole. Certainly the water was very clean looking, and the trees along the bank were pretty. The man managing the pole also kept an eye out for snakes etc in the trees and tried to point them out to me so I could take pictures, but with the distance and how well they were concealed, it was hard to capture them with my camera.
I was finished with the rafting by 11:50 AM, and Maria was waiting for me with coconut ice cream and an assortment of tasty toppings.
After eating my ice-cream with toppings I decided to go back to the restroom to change since I wasn’t planning on getting wet again that day. The bathrooms were very clean, and anyone would find them to be more than adequate.
By 12:25 we were back on the road headed towards Lampi waterfall, arriving at 12:50 PM. There were crystal clear pools of water around the waterfall where one could safely swim, but as I was traveling on my own, I didn’t see the point of getting in the water. Regardless, the area was very beautiful.
I was glad to see that the waterfall was officially declared safe for the day.The bridge was sturdy but a possible safety concern were the bolts sticking out of the top of the wood where one walks. They were long enough to puncture through flip-flops and definitely could easily trip up an unwary walker.
I could have stayed longer and no doubt would have had I been accompanied by a friend or even just some other traveling partners, but by 1:30 PM I decided I was finished. Maria and the driver asked if I would like to go get something to eat, as they estimated that it would otherwise be 3:20 by the time I was back to the house. I told them that unless they were hungry, I would prefer to just head back and get something to eat at the house. They both agreed that it was fine to head back, and due to extremely favorable travel conditions, I was actually back at the house right at 2:40 PM.
Upon arrival I prepared a simple snack and wait for Elisabet to get back from work. I completely forgot to take down notes about times etc, but she suggested that we go check out Bang Tao beach which was relatively close by.
We had originally thought to have dinner at one of the beachfront restaurants there, but it started raining fairly heavily, so we opted instead to head back to the the house and eat something simple there. It was an absolutely wonderful day, and I was looking forward to all of the great experiences I would have during my remaining time visiting with Elisabet in Phuket.
I hope this entry has helped you see more of the outstanding adventures you can have while visiting Phuket. If you would like more information about anything I’ve mentioned just let me know in the comments section, and I will do my best to fill in any gaps.
As promised, today has a lot more action than the first three days and there might also be a bit of controversy about the way I decided to start out the day.
After a lot of internal debate, early in the morning I decided that it would be okay for me to go see the seal and dolphin 11 AM show at Dolphins Bay Phuket. Yes, I’m fully aware of the associated ethical issues and also fully aware that a lot of my readers will be upset that: (1) This show even exists, and (2) that I went to it. For those who are upset with me, if it helps, all I can say is that all of the animals seemed to be in very good health, and at least during the show itself, there was nothing that might remotely be interpreted as abusive behavior. With that in mind, once I decided to suspend my concerns, this was a really wonderful show.
It took me 45 minutes and 350 THB (9.26 USD) with inDrive to get there. I had “reserved” a deluxe seat online ahead of time, but that doesn’t really seem to be all that meaningful since you don’t pay until you arrive. Nevertheless, even though I barely arrived at 10:56 AM sharp, a worker immediately met me when the car arrived, quickly steering me to the ticket booth and ushering me smoothly until the performance area. I had a great seat, near the middle of the stage in the third row
I suppose ones luck may vary, but the only difference with the first two rows and the third row was that spectators were more likely to get wet in the first two rows. Also, I guess the most unobstructed pictures would also be from the first row. Regardless, I was happy with my deluxe seat which had a cost of 900 THB ($23.77). It seemed like the only way to pay was with cash, but they probably also accept local “Thai pay QR codes”.
They started out with the seal show.
The seal show was great, but clearly they were just meant to be the opening act. There was no doubt that the real stars here were the dolphins.
The show itself was only 35 minutes, but I definitely felt that it was worth what I had paid. Yes, there was a lot of shillling going on to get people to pay 400 more THB to have a picture with a dolphin but running a show like this, including the proper care of the animals and salaries of the trainers is no doubt expensive, and the crowd wasn’t that big. The 400 actually seemed like a reasonable amount given that a whole family could have a picture together rather than paying separately for each person. So IF you are the sort of person who would be okay with going to see a dolphin show, this is one which I highly recommend. If however you think I’m an evil person for going to see such a show, please just forgive my moment of weakness while on vacation.
Since it had been a very long trip to get to this area of Phuket, I decided to see if there was anything else reasonably close by that it seemed I might want to visit. I saw that there was another temple complex, Wat Chaithatharam, just three kilometers away. The temperature wasn’t too warm and it wasn’t raining, so I decided to walk.
Along the way, it started raining, so I decided “to shop” for awhile in a grocery until it let up. Unsurprisingly I didn’t actually buy anything, but I did like seeing all the different products. There were several snack foods that interested me, but I was afraid they might have shrimp byproducts in them, so I took a pass. Still, it was nice to see everything. Due to my shopping detour it took me 90 minutes to arrive to the temple complex.
The main tower of the complex can be seen to the left.
It rained intermittently while I was there, but my umbrella was more than adequate. Admission to the area was free, and there was a lot to see. No doubt I would have appreciated things more with a knowledgeable guide, but even wandering around on my own, it was a very good one hour visit, and I easily could have spent more time.
These seemed to be covered in gold leaf, much which was flaking, and I saw a couple of people stick little papers with tape on them. I assume that’s some sort of a prayer?Here there were supposedly several Buddha relics. There was very little signage in English or Chinese, but there was quite a bit in Thai
It was 2:10 PM when I finished and then decided to return to Phuket town where I would be able to go to the Aquaria aquarium. I was a bit hesitant as I had already been to two different aquariums in Dubai less than a month ago. Still, it was more or less on the way back, so I figured that I may as well give it a try since my friend Elisabet would be busy at work until 5:00 PM.
It was 173 THB with inDrive to go to the aquarium, but I paid 200 ($5.28 USD) and by 2:30 PM I had arrived to the central Phuket mall, which is where the aquarium is located in the basement. There I paid a full price foreign adult entry fee of 890 THB (23.50 USD); I think I could have paid a bit less if I had bought the ticket through another online provider, but I wasn’t sure that I would be getting the “foreigner ticket” so I decided to just buy in person and go straight in. Again, as far as I could tell, it was either cash or “Thai pay” only; however, I didn’t ask.
The standard displays were nice enough but I was unfortunately comparing to my aquarium experiences from a couple of weeks ago in Dubai, so was not overly impressed. However, while the displays themselves were not outstanding as far as aquariums go, they did a good job with the two shows I saw, and that made it worth the visit.
The mermaid show which started at 3:00 PM was only a little over 5 minutes (maximum 10?) But they did a really great job with coordination of the music and the “mermaid’s” movements.
Then at 3:30 PM was the “feeding show.” In this case there wasn’t any music, but it still was rather interesting since for obvious reasons. The fish flocked around the diver, guaranteeing much better views, in particular some of the large manta rays. This went on for perhaps a full thirty minutes.
By 4:15 PM I had exited the aquarium and started finding my way outside of the mall. It is worth mentioning that if you are into that sort of thing, the mall itself also seemed quite nice, but I just wanted to get back to Elisabet’s house so we could visit once she was done with work. This time the quoted inDrive fare was 271 THB, but I again rounded up to 300 ($7.92) and was back at the house by 5:05 PM.
At 5:40 PM we once again went out walking, this time to The Boat Lagoon. It was a great walk and we had a wonderful time chatting, continuing to catch up with many different topics.
We then headed back towards Elisabet’s area for dinner, arriving at around 7:45 PM, this time eating at a tasty pizza and pasta place called Da Moreno Pizzería and Italian Restaurant; it’s definitely a place worth visiting if you are in the Koh Kaew area. A tasty, ample meal (truth be told it was probably too much food) for two was 750 THB (19.80 USD).
We were back to the house at 9:25 PM and both headed straight to our separate rooms. Elisabet was to have an extra long day at work the next day and I was to have a rather early start myself since day 5 was to be my special tour day.
I was a bit hesitant about doing a full day group tour to places unknown, but it promised to have many exciting adventures covering everything from sea turtles to water falls. While I was trying to keep my expectations in check, I really was rather excited to see what was to come. Spoiler alert, day 5 was even better than day 4! But, you’ll have to read the next entry to get the full details.
Thanks for continuing to follow along, and I’ll see you down the path!!
I’m trying to churn these out a bit faster now so that there’s also the possibility of getting back to trips I had earlier neglected, so don’t be surprised if the next few entries come out very quickly.
On day 3 I really needed to sleep in, so didn’t actually wake up until 9 AM. To be fair, back home in Bengaluru it was 7:30 AM, so I wasn’t being incredibly lazy. I had a good shower, lazy breakfast of Kellogg’s Special K with almond milk and finally decided to get a car into Phuket town at 11:30 AM. Theoretically I could have tried the bus again, but it seemed rather unreliable, and I was already running late.
There are other types of local transport used by locals, but I feel like you need to know Thai to use those and even then you would need to know a lot more about your destination than I did. Elisabet had tipped me off that the Grab app was very reliable for car hailing, but also rather expensive. A much better option is inDrive; which seems to be a more democratic version of Uber. I didn’t want to mess around too much with price negotiations so I got a car for 246 THB but ended up paying 300 (8 USD) because the driver had no change. For Thai visitors this isn’t a problem because they have a ubiquitous payment system that works with QR codes, but visitors will need to keep lots of cash, preferably with smaller bills, since most places seem to not take cards. It may seem a little expensive for those who are used to prices in Southeast Asia, but it was 13 km (8.1 miles) and the cars seem to generally be very comfortable with good air-conditioning, which is something you are likely to value here. Anyways, by 12 noon I was in the historic part of Phuket.
I was rather excited to see these public telephones, both which appeared to be fully functional even though nobody was waiting to use them.
While everything was rather pretty, it was basically just lots of shops and places to get a bite to eat. I am not much of a random shopper, so endlessly looking in stores generally doesn’t do it for me. Also, as I had eaten breakfast rather late, I wasn’t yet ready to eat.
I got another possible “fraud alert” in my email from HDFC so decided that I needed to find a place to sit so that I could call and try to work things out with them. The reported charges had all been made by me, even using my passcode, but I was worried they might block my card. I attempted to follow the instructions given in their email to notify of my trip via Internet banking, but the instructions didn’t actually work since the webpage has since been redesigned. After about an hour of trying to call different HDFC numbers in India but never being able to resolve anything, I just gave up after sending a reply to the fraud alert email, hoping that an actual human would read it. Really, HDFC India needs to have a number where international travelers can call to speak to an real human when they are abroad. To be fair, this is the first time I had a problem with them while traveling, but I just hope they don’t block my card.
I then continued my wandering and found a small Buddhist temple complex. I forgot to get the name, but it’s right there in the center of the town, so it would be easy to find.
The instructions about the proper way to dress when visiting the temple were both helpful and easy to understand.
I wandered a bit more but noticed it was basically more of the same. There were a couple museums listed nearby, but I wasn’t really feeling up to museum visits, and today was some sort of a local memorial day, so I thought it likely they might be closed anyways. So at 2:30 PM I opted to go ahead and get some food at an open air eatery, Loktien Phuket local food, that seemed to have a few customers. The menu was mostly in Thai and the server didn’t understand English. Given both the obvious propensity of Thais to put bits of shrimp into food and my anaphylactic reaction to the same, I decided to play it as safe as possible.
Spicy pork, fried egg, rice and dragon fruit drink 80 BHT (2.12 USD).
The pork was good but yes, a tiny bit too much chili for me. Much later in the night I did have a bit of an upset stomach, but I think it was not because of any cleanliness issue but rather that I just wasn’t used to that much chili. The menu was quite inexpensive, for everything and I suspect the food here would be a real “authentic” treat for both seafood lovers and those who can handle/like a bit more chili in their food. As I was in no big hurry, I then decided to walk towards the bus stop and head back to Elisabet’s place in Koh Kaew.
See if you can appreciate the tree formation to the leftHere you can appreciate the tree better. I think it’s dead, but still it’s striking
After an hour of waiting for the bus and also noticing locals come, wait for awhile and then walk off, I decided it was a lost cause and once again took out my inDrive app. This time it was only 220 THB (5.83 USD) and I was actually taken in a VIP taxi. I didn’t think to take a picture of the outside, but it’s evidently a rather big deal. Certainly it was both spacious and very comfortable inside. I guess it’s usually more expensive, but if you were to have four people and it’s an option, I would definitely recommend the same.
The driver seemed great and the car was very nice, so I would recommend that you try him. Of course usually it would be with the meter rather than with inDrive rates.
It wasn’t until I arrived outside Elisabet’s house that I realized that arriving in a car like this was such a big deal. Several of the neighbors came running to look at the car and speak to the driver. Elisabet was also shocked and worried that I had paid too much, but she was quickly mollified when I told her the amount and also that I had used inDrive.
We chatted for a bit and then we decided to go for a walk around the area before it was too dark to start out.
As it was getting darker, Elisabet suggested that we check out the local neighborhood temple which she had not yet visited. As you can see, it was very nice.
We then had dinner at a nearby restaurant which Elisabet really likes called NaNa Healthy Cafe and Bistro. I would definitely recommend others to visit it.
The bill for both of us, including my coconut milk soup with chicken was 459 THB ($12.15 USD). I really appreciate all the effort my friend is making to spend time with me. She has a full time teaching schedule, but she’s really making time to share with me every evening.
Next, we headed back to the house. It’s worth noting that Elisabet said she wouldn’t have been walking around in poorly lit areas like this by herself, and even with me, she steered us towards “more populated” areas. It may be that she is being overly cautious, but it seems like solo travelers, especially women, might want to exercise standard “reasonable caution” when wandering around at night in Phuket if they are a bit off the beaten path. It’s also worth noting that is not “normal” for people to walk around here, perhaps because of the heat and sun during the day?
We got back a bit late, had a little more chat and then Elisabet said she really needed to get to sleep, but that I would be welcome to stay up longer watching TV or something similar. However, I also wanted to get to bed at a reasonable hour, since I had quite a few plans for the next day while she would be at work.
As always, thanks for following along, and let me know if you want more information about anything I’ve mentioned. These first three days were a bit slow, but I think you will find both days four and five to be rather packed.
Travels with Jay 