Thailand – Page 3 – saskatoonie.com

January 13, 2022January 13, 2022

Grand Palace January 11

Palace and Temples

We took the MTR subway to the Sanam Chai Station Exit 1. From there we intended to walk to the Grand Palace. We ran into a guy, who was a tour guide. He set us up for a tour on a tuk tuk. We already know these are a bit of a scam, but we did it anyway. We got to see the Golden Mountain Temple which was where we met another man outside. He recognized the bracelet we had on from the Big Buddha in Phuket. He said that is the only lucky Buddha in Thailand! We need luck because we have our second PCR test tomorrow.

We made a donation of ฿20 each and we got 2 silver and 2 gold leaf shaped ornaments to write our names on and hang on a tree at the front of the temple beside the altar. We also got another bracelet. The temple is noted for it’s Golden Buddha. See the pictures below.

Once we were done at the Golden Mount Temple we got dropped off at the Tailor, we didn’t get anything and spent about 5 minutes there, that saved us ฿500 and got the tuk tuk driver a gas coupon worth ฿500. We were then off to the Reclining Buddha, which is right next to the Grand Palace. We bought water right outside the entrance because we were parched by this point. We went in the turnstiles and paid admission only to find we got a free bottle of water there. We actually drank them both. The Reclining Buddha is huge and yes it’s laying down. The buildings around the temple site are beautiful as are the grounds themselves.

Finally off to the Grand Palace, by this point we were sweaty and thirsty. We went through the gauntlet of temperature scanners and hand sanitizer, we were each given a golden sticker to identify us as having been screened for covid. We walked a long way farther into the admission area and paid ฿500 each for admission to the Grand Palace. We walked past a coffee shop and decided to cool our heels for a bit. We ordered passion fruit sodas and bought some cashews for a snack. We ended up buying 2 more bottles of soda water and diluted our passion fruit sodas. The liquid didn’t last long. We did eat and drink on a patio outside with a swamp cooler aimed in our direction. The temperature was at least 32º.

We have been to the Grand Palace before so we knew what to expect. The last time was long before covid, the crowds were huge back then compared to just a few people milling about now. The wind chimes were playing tunes in the breeze, something we had never heard on our last trip here. Last time all the people noise drowned out the wind chimes. We opted for a free English tour, but it was a sad waste of time. The tour guide had a strong accent, a face mask and a face shield. It was very difficult to hear her. We did gain some information we did not know from our last visit, so it wasn’t a total waste. It was just frustrating in the extreme heat. We would have bailed on the tour but it was such a small group. There were only four of us, we didn’t want to be disrespectful.

The grounds at the Grand Palace are large and covered with beautiful buildings and statues gilded in gold, covered in emeralds, tiny coloured tiles and tiny mirrors making an amazing mosaic that is more stunning than anything you can imagine. It is amazing. We saw a man on a high scaffold chipping away at a restoration and noticed even he was double masked. Could covid be that catchy outside? Hopefully not!

After riding the MTR subway back to our hotel we cleaned up and walked to Hemingway’s for supper. Gary had a cauliflower steak, at first sceptical, but surprisingly he thoroughly enjoyed it. Linda had a chick pea and bean burger which was spicy and delicious. We blew the budget for supper, just under $50 CAD but that did include 3 beer between us. Even happy hour beer is expensive here. ฿109 about $4.10 CAD for each pint. Actually, not all that bad by Canadian restaurant standards. We just don’t get out that much back home.

We walked back to the hotel and the same people were panhandling on the street as the night before. It’s a bit heart wrenching to see a mom with a baby sitting on the sidewalk with a cup for donations in the middle of opulent high rise hotels. They do have nice mobile phones so you really wonder if its just an easy living for them. Gary is such a sucker.

That was the end of our day, and the bed was calling our names. Melatonin may help you sleep but your kidneys still think night is day. The hot weather makes you thirsty so that doesn’t help. The bed is nice, the bathroom is nice and they are not far apart.

January 12, 2022January 12, 2022

Our Luggage Arrived January 10

We're in Bangkok with NO deodorant! +34º

Our deodorant is in our checked luggage somewhere in Korea! Did you know you can only buy roll on deodorant in Thailand? Most of that has a whitening agent in it so you get white underarms. We are already white! Isn’t it sad how white people want a tan, and tan people want to be white?

We were a bit late starting out this morning, but it’s hard to get going too early when we still haven’t got our circadian rhythm synced with the local clocks. Plus, Gary woke up at 1:30 am and called down to the bellmen to see if our luggage had arrived. We’d heard from the airport late in the afternoon yesterday to confirm our hotel and room info as they said the luggage was on the night flight to Bangkok from Incheon, South Korea, the airport of our last flight connection. The luggage had arrived and the bellman delivered it to our room within minutes! Gary double checked it was our luggage and then came back to bed. He found it easier to sleep knowing that our shorts and t-shirts had arrived, not to mention our stick deodorant!

After a tropical fruit breakfast of passion fruit, dragon fruit, banana and mango we took a Grab to the Wat Kanlayanamit Woramahawihan temple. It cost us ฿278 about $10.50 CAD and took 30 minutes. It’s less than 12 km, this an average of 6 km per hour. The traffic was heavy and slow.

We toured around the temple, it had a large golden Buddha.

There was a large bell that you could ring. The religious belief is that you think about where you want your life to go and then ring the bell three times. No, we didn’t ring the bell.

When we were done at the temple, we walked along The Chao Phraya River. Our hope was to get to the other side by a ferry or small boat, but there was nothing available at the time. We walked along further and found the Santa Cruz Catholic Church. We took some photos outside but the building was not open to see inside.

We walked down a street we thought would take us to the bridge to cross the river. We wanted to take the MTR subway back to our hotel. We got stopped by a tuk tuk driver that wanted a fare, we ended up taking the tuk tuk to the Itsaraphap MTR station. The Itsaraphap MTR station is on the west side of the river, it was probably farther than the station we were walking towards but we didn’t need to use the bridge. We made a deal for ฿80 for the ride. When we got the the MTR the driver asked for ฿100, Gary said ฿80 and the driver suddenly realized he was caught in his own lie. We paid him the ฿80 and headed down at least 3 escalators to the subway. It was a long way down as the subway goes under the river. We had no idea how to buy tickets, this was our first time on the Bangkok MTR. One of the employees helped us buy the tickets and showed us how to do it, albeit so fast we could hardly follow what he was doing! He kept the touchscreen set to Thai which made it even harder to follow. We did catch the main points though. It was ฿35 each, pretty reasonable. They do covid screening, a temperature scan and hand sanitizer, before you use your token to get through the turnstiles. We rode the MTR and got off at the tenth stop which was Sukhumvit. The MTR was busy but not packed, we did notice about 1/3 of the riders wearing double masks. The next day we would do the same while on the MTR, just to be careful.

Once back at the hotel we checked out the pool area which we have not used yet. Its very nice and wasn’t too busy.

We walked to the Cali-Mex restaurant about 15 minutes away following Google maps. We sat outside to eat. The restaurant had lots of empty tables inside. The service was slow, the food was average, the beer was cold and ฿99 per bottle about $3.75 CAD. We spent more on beer than food!

On our walk back to the hotel there were street vendors along the sidewalk selling everything from fruit to viagra and sex toys. We did buy some strawberries and a bag of huge passion fruit. Passion fruit as big as large naval oranges! Since we are writing this the next day, we can tell you bigger isn’t better when it comes to passion fruit. The little ones are sweeter and more tasty!

Since we did get our suitcases, we are on top of the world now. Our bottle of melatonin was packed in our luggage and we really missed it the first night. It really helps with the jet lag if you take it before bedtime. It was a good night.

January 9, 2022January 9, 2022

A Long Story

A quick refresher on the Thailand Pass

As you may remember, we arrived in Saskatoon December 6 concluding five fantastic weeks in Phuket. It takes a good week to shake the brain fog of a 13 hour time change. That’s our excuse for not applying immediately for our e-visa for our January 7, 2022 trip. Really, our flights January 7 were a month away, 32 days to be exact.

Visas for Thailand are confusing. You can go for free for 30 days with a visa on arrival which we did on our October 2021 trip. The downside is when you stay longer you have to go in person to immigration with a passport photo, documents, photo copies of your passport and cash in hand. ฿1900 each about $74 CAD for a 30 day extension. We know this because we did visa extensions in Phuket when our return flights were cancelled.

Our January trip we plan on staying 84 days. That would mean 2 addition trips to immigration, there must be a better alternative. If you are over 50 years old, there is a “Retirement Visa”. It costs $130 CAD each and is done online through the Thai Consulate in Vancouver. That’s what we applied for. The retirement visa application requires a digital passport photo taken within 6 months, a copy of the last or most recent used visa page in your passport. Luckily, ours was recent from our Phuket adventure. Also required, a picture of you holding your passport with the identification page visible, a letter showing proof of health and travel insurance appropriate for Thailand, proof of residency at our address in Canada as well as proof of residency in the jurisdiction of the Thailand Consulate in Vancouver. The Saskatchewan driver’s licence with address and picture ID are used for both residency requirements. We also needed to print, fill out, sign and scan a declaration form. The last document required was a copy of our most recent bank statement, showing both our names and an appropriate balance. Basically an amount to prove you can live for 90 or more days in Thailand. Actually much more than that, if you are retired and broke, do not apply. You know the saying about getting your ducks in a row? We were really duck hunting.

Linda’s retirement health insurance which we pay for monthly provides a letter showing proof on insurance that we could download from their website. It wasn’t exactly what the Thai Consulate was looking for so we phoned the insurance provider and asked for a detailed letter of insurance coverage that we could use. They never did email it on time, so we ended up using the one off the website which is slightly vague but does include wording regarding COVID-19 insurance and amount of coverage which was a priority.

We applied for our visa December 15. Once the documents are uploaded we got directed to a pay portal. We thought we would be smart and use Linda’s Mastercard for her visa payment and Gary’s Mastercard for his visa payment. It might prevent us having our credit cards locked again for having 2 identical transactions a few minutes apart which originated in Thailand. BMO did that to us last time. Linda’s payment didn’t generate a receipt. When Gary did his payment a receipt was generated. A closer look at Linda’s visa portal showed that payment was pending. We called BMO Mastercard and they had not declined her payment nor had it even shown up. We finally went into to Linda’s visa application and used Gary’s card which generated a receipt. Perfect.

The next day, December 16, 2021 we had our visa!

The next step then was to obtain a Thailand Pass. You can’t enter the country without it! The prerequisites for the Thailand Pass are: paid airline booking, paid hotel booking, paid arrival RT-PCR Covid test which is coordinated with the hotel but paid separately . The hotel booking also includes a private car for airport pickup. The hotel calls it a limousine transfer from the airport. You are basically considered contagious until your RT-PCR Covid test results come back negative. Back to the required documents, you also need appropriate visa, vaccination documentation and the previously mentioned insurance letter. We tried our first choice hotel and they wanted us to email our credit card for payment. Not going to happen! Then they sent us a payment portal link. It pre-populated the address country field with Thailand and we could not enter our own address. It was unsuccessful when we submitted our credit card payment. We phoned the hotel and came to the realization we would not be staying there. We went to our second choice hotel, The Grande Centre Point at Terminal 21. We went through the booking process and got a verified receipt for the booking but the Covid testing was a separate charge through the Bangkok Hospital portal. The medical payment confirmation showed some Thai font logo and “successful”. I phoned the hotel and asked for a better receipt. I might have been more successful phoning the pope at Christmas.

We really needed a better receipt for the Hotel and PCR test, and a better proof of medical coverage. We knew it! We uploaded all our documents to the Thailand Pass website. Airline itinerary, date of departure from Canada, date of arrival in Bangkok, date of departure from Thailand, visa documents, vaccine documents, medical insurance proof and scanned copies of our passport information page.

Several days passed. No word on our Thailand Pass. December 18th due to Omicron, the Thailand government announced the discontinuation of the Thailand Pass. They will no longer accept applications under the “Test & Go” program. However, they did say they will process the ones in the system. We got ours in on time, thankfully.

Before bed December 22, 2021 we both got emails indicating that our Thailand Pass application was rejected. Linda’s was rejected solely on the hotel receipt which did not show the payment of the Covid testing. Remember that was paid separately from the hotel booking. Gary’s was rejected on the same basis of not having a proper receipt for the covid testing as well as not having properly documented travel health insurance. Remember that letter that we were waiting for from our insurance provider? To add insult to injury, an insurance representative had called Linda at home several days prior to confirm what was needed. Still no document for insurance and of course the previously mentioned hotel and testing receipt. Looking back on emails, Gary asked the Grande Centre Point Terminal 21 hotel for a receipt on December 15.

OMG, we have an expensive hotel, covid testing and our return flights for 2 from Saskatoon to Bangkok, but now we can’t go? It was one of those moments when you could scream. All of this at bedtime! We couldn’t stop thinking about it. Gary sent a quick email to the contact at the hotel for a receipt. He also phoned the hotel. It wasn’t long before receipt that we needed was in Gary’s in-box. Gary then forwarded the required documents again for both of us to the support email for the Thailand Pass. We were lucky to find the email on one of their webpages. Within 2 hours his pass was approved. He now had the elusive Thailand Pass official document and QR-code. We thought Linda’s would arrive by morning. Guess what? It didn’t

We phoned a support number in Thailand, after 240 minutes you get disconnected. We dialled again, and 240 minutes later we got disconnected. This was supposed to be a 24 hour hotline but despite the lovely sounding voice on the other end saying please hold, high call volumes and the whole spiel with some nice music playing over and over again. No one answered. Ever.

In Asia there are some different messaging apps similar to WhatsApp they are LINE and SIGNAL. Gary, of course, has them all. He had previously used LINE to contact the owner of Lady Naya Villas and a few others. While in total despair, Linda ran across the ThaiConsular LINE link on some obscure webpage. On the off chance that someone actually used the app Gary sent off a message. The message included Gary’s Thailand Pass and our hotel receipt with the following message “Please Help Me. My wife and I are travelling together and my Thailand pass was approved and hers was rejected.” At 1:12 am December 24 they replied and provided two contact emails. At 3 am (Gary’s witching hour) he checked the computer and saw the reply on LINE. He sent an email to the 2 email addresses provided by the ThaiConsulate on LINE. He included a copy of Linda’s rejection email, her full name as on her passport, her passport number, the hotel receipt, the comprehensive insurance document that we had finally received, Linda’s access code for her Thailand Pass portal, our flight departure time and arrival time in Bangkok and of course her visa document. We woke up at 7:30 am, Gary was itching for Linda to check her phone for emails. Yippee, she had her QR code and approval document. What a great Christmas present, albeit a day early.

We had our Covid PT-PCR tests booked and completed on January 5. We had checked out various providers and decided to book with Haztech again. Prices are pretty much the same but not all companies provide the test we need. Haztech does, also it’s the same price for mobile service that comes to the door! We had our tests at noon and the email with our negative results arrived in our email at 2:51 am January 6th.

People must think we are crazy. If this keeps up we might be crazy soon. Thailand here we come! What could possibly go wrong? Let me think, the flight we are taking from Saskatoon to Toronto was cancelled the first 3 days of January. Bad weather and Omicron has created a real issue with flight delays and cancellations. When we booked in November Omicron wasn’t the issue it is now!

Saskatoon > Toronto > Incheon > Bangkok

27 hours travel time

Back to reality. Our flight left Saskatoon on time despite the bitterly cold weather! We didn’t get to sit together because Linda was upgraded to Business Class, leaving Gary back in economy with no food. Apparently, they gave Linda the upgrade because she’s an awesome person that was the exact weight required to balance the plane. That’s correct, they upgraded her to the front row on the right side by herself to balance the plane. What a stroke of luck, she got the Business Class full meal deal including breakfast with real cutlery. Economy gets no food, only coffee or tea in paper cups. Gary had envy, Linda had guilt. Either way it was weird not being seated together on this flight. Gary had 2 seats to spread out which was ok.

We had the option to upgrade to Business Class for $5000. We passed on that deal. As luck would have it, Linda got a free upgrade on one flight. It’s easier to tempt someone if they know what the prize is.

The flight from Toronto to Incheon Korea was delayed 1 hour and 39 minutes. The reason was mechanical trouble before the aircraft’s last flight which was Frankfurt to Toronto. Our third flight, AC6996 on Asiana Airlines from Incheon Korea to Bangkok was held at the gate long enough for us to get on board. Our baggage did not.

Menu on premium economy with Air Canada flight 061 from Toronto to Incheon .

3M N95 masks are not pretty nor are they real comfortable, The head straps are better than ear loops for 30 hour durations but they are uncomfortably tight. They interfere with glasses and have the added benefit of giving Gary gopher cheeks.

The free Tripcase app which is an excellent tool to track your flights , hotels and more. It will automatically update with gate changes and flight times as they become available.

On arrival in Bangkok each passenger was identified as “Test and Go” or “ASQ” (Alternate State Quarantine), a polite term for quarantine in your hotel), We are Test and Go, we get tested on arrival at hotel and hopefully get results in 12 hours (read more on this below) and are free to go. We presented our QR code and proceeded to processing. There are rows and rows of plastic chairs, and about 20 people to check each person’s entry papers. They had a pink coloured quarantine form to fill out. We were some of the few travellers or immigration staff wearing N95 masks. Actually there were a few airline staff from Toronto also wearing N95 masks.

Once our documents were filled out and checked we walked through Immigration where our QR codes were read and every document we had were double checked. After that we were off to luggage carousel #19 and a man standing there holding a sheet of paper with our names on it. We were listed with everyone one else from Toronto whose luggage never made the connection in Incheon. We spent 20 minutes filling out forms for lost baggage claims on 2 suitcases. They say our luggage will be on the same flight and come in around midnight Jan 9 and hopefully get delivered to the hotel on the 10th. Once we were done filling in lost luggage forms it was off to the exit. We found the correct driver and about 40 minutes later we were checking into the hotel.

After check in we were escorted to the 4th floor for covid testing. It is actually done outside on the terrace. Several deep stabs and swirls in one nostril and we were good to go to our suite, room 2105.

We ordered a fruit plate and ate some trail mix for a bedtime snack. The bathroom in this hotel is really nice. We showered and went to bed.

We found our breakfast outside our door when we woke up. After eating we were informed the hospital is running late with test results. We don’t get our test back until 6pm. That’s our first day in the hotel, in bathrobes. We washed out some well worn travel clothes in the sink with a bar of soap. Maybe by the time it dries we can go out or even better our luggage arrives. Until then we are checking out the Terminal 21 ASOK Mall online map. We can hit the ground running when we finally get clearance.

Our lunch supplied by the hotel, paid by us in our Test and Go package with the hotel. The food was good.

We have a few video clips below of our trip.

Late breaking News: at 4:30 pm Bangkok time we were advised that our covid tests were negative.

December 7, 2021December 7, 2021

Going Home

December 5, 2021. Going Home!

December 5, 2021. Our day started at 5:30 am. We showered and dressed in our travel clothing, including knee high compression stockings and running shoes. The shoes were an odd feeling. First time wearing shoes in 5 weeks.

Linda had fruit prepared the night before and in the fridge, no risking our clean clothes with food prep. We had the last of our yogurt, cereal and fruit. We over ate because of how much food we had left on hand.

We walked out of our villa door and the “guys” were waiting, all 4 of them ready to haul our luggage to the lobby. We got our deposit back from Lady Naya Villas. We actually had a few charges for huge bottles of water that were deducted from our deposit. Remember we made herbal tea? Yup, we used bottled water. Having our laundry looked after during our stay was NOT one of the things we had to pay for. Also, we did not pay extra for printing multiple itineraries, changed itineraries, immigration documents, PCR test results, and ArriveCAN printouts. The list goes on and on. Andrew and Marisa really look after their guests in a friendly and economical manner. We are so appreciative of Andrew driving us to have PCR tests on 2 occasions, also to Immigration for a visa extension and multiple drop offs and pickups around the Rawai and Nai Harn area. Oh, ya, he even took us for groceries once before we had a car, and even once after we had the car as we were to chicken to go on our own to the large grocery store where the main kiosk was located where we needed to get our cell phone internet SIM cards topped up.

Anyhow we checked out feeling an emotional twinge. Lady Naya Villas and staff was our home and family for 5 weeks. As we write this it’s making us lonesome for Thailand already. We even said goodbye to the cats!

The taxi was ordered for 7:15 am and he was early. Goes to show, it never hurts to be ready early. The trip to the airport took 1 hour. We got checked in, it seems like a distant memory now. The departure lounge was freezing cold!! We had to dig out our puffer jackets aka winter coats! This first flight with Bangkok Airways, from Phuket to Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport was uneventful. Can you believe Suvarnabhumi is pronounced “soo·waan·aa·poom”? Our first flight carrier, Bangkok Airways uses the tagline “Asia’s Boutique Airline”. Bangkok Airways actually have 3 of their own airports, the most famous on Koh Samui which is a small airport and an amazing place!

FYI, Bangkok has 2 airports, Don Mueang International Airport (DMK) and Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi Airport (BKK). After arriving at the Suvarnabhumi Airport we had to retrieve our luggage and check in for our next flight. Since our first flight was domestic our luggage was unable to be tagged through from Phuket to Saskatoon. Our second flight was with Thai Airways International. Wow, the paperwork, it took us 20 minutes to get checked in with Thai Airways.. Check in was intense. The Thai Airways agent had 2 other staff taking photos with their phones of both the computer screen shots and our documents. We had to present printed copies of our most recent RT-PCR test, proof of vaccination and our completed arriveCAN printout. Once all of this was checked over and input into the computer, 3 sets of boarding passes printed. Our baggage was then tagged through to Saskatoon but we would have to retrieve it in Toronto to clear customs. Everything checked off and complete we headed to the gate. The gate was in a very deserted part of Suvarnabhumi airport. We were the first passengers to arrive.

The Airbus A359 (350-900) was already sitting at the gate. This plane has 10 lavatories, 32 business class lie flat bed seats, 289 economy seats and 16 crew seats. 321 total paying passenger seats. We all could have sat in first class, all 10 passengers. That’s correct, we had 8 other passengers on board with us and 5 total crew, 15 humans on a plane that could carry 321 passengers plus crew. We made a video which you will hopefully watch. The video includes a quick tour of the rear section of the Airbus A359 cabin, video of take off, landing in Hong Hong plus footage inside the empty Hong Kong airport on our way to the transfer desk where we had more paperwork. This was the best 3 1/2 hour flight we have ever taken. The plane was loaded with cargo, but you have to question the financial liability of operating a passenger jet with a list price of $350,000,000 USD carrying only 10 paying customers with 311 seats unoccupied.

The Cathay Pacific flight CX826 from Hong Kong to Toronto was not so nice. It was packed full. No social distancing at all. The scheduled flight length of 14 hours and 47 minutes is the longest we have ever endured. Some observations. The food served on Cathay flights departing Hong Kong is shit. The food served on Cathay flights departing Canada is excellent. The travel part of travelling is not fun. The fun part is the destination.

We had to circle Toronto one loop for 20 minutes due to weather. Once at the gate they could only let out 50 passengers at each go. We finally got into the terminal and it was obvious that several flights had arrived at once. Canada’s busiest and largest airport, Toronto’s Pearson International Airport can’t handle the surge very well. We did our entry declaration at a kiosk that gave us much grief. We spent at least 10 minutes getting it to work. It reads your passport, takes your picture and eventually spits out a printout that you then take to a customs officer. There was a very long line for the custom officers. We finally got our turn and Gary mentioned that Linda’s ArrivCAN app appeared to have lost its information! The Agent said “It’s all good, the system saved the information”. YAY. Actually, we never noticed our ArriveCAN status was on the paper that the kiosk gave us.

We collected our bags, sat down, found a hotel online and then figured out where to catch the hotel shuttle. A short shuttle ride, a quick check in, an even quicker shower and we finally crawled into bed around 11 pm. We got up at 4:30 am because Gary couldn’t sleep. That was likely a blessing as it turned out the security lineup was about 1 1/2 hours long. We had time to spare to buy 2 yogurt and one cup of cubed watermelon at the astronomical price of $17 CAD. Two Starbucks coffee for chasers and we had breakfast for under $30 CAD. It wasn’t much, but during the covid pandemic food services are extremely limited. People still travel, they just can’t eat.

Our flight to Saskatoon was almost full with only a few empty seats. The 3 1/2 hour flight was good. We were able to see several places from Thunder Bay to Saskatoon with the clear weather.

Our next trip to Bangkok is booked. We will see what happens January 7, 2022. One month to go.

December 4, 2021December 4, 2021

Our last day in Phuket

What do you do on the last day in Phuket?

We went for coffee at the Smile restaurant. Actually, cappuccinos, in fact we had 2 each. The best coffee we have had since we left home!

We had to relinquish our rental car at 11:30 am. The rental guy and his associate arrived on time and with a quick walk around the car said everything was good, gave us our deposit back, less the one day extra rental, and away they went! Back to walking! At 2 pm we went for our final massage and we are both ready to fly! No more stiff joints and muscles. We got some pictures with Oi, the owner of Herbal Massage and Greeinn Sports Massage. Then we had some herbal tea!

December 3, 2021December 3, 2021

Beautiful Weather Today

We started our day with covid tests at 8 am

If you want to travel, you need to watch the video below. It is the reality of traveling with covid. This was test number 4 and it sounds like test number 5 comes when we land in Canada. Oh yay! The test is not fun. It’s about the only thing in Thailand that is not fun.

When we returned from a beautiful day at the beach we had no power. It appears this creature climbed up the electric pole and started a bbq explosion. We decided to go buy some supplies, namely covid rapid test kits for less than $4 CAD exactly ฿100 each. What is a matter in Canada? You can’t even buy them! On the way by the power pole the linemen were removing this fried creature from the insulator/fuse. Apparently it made an explosion sound. We walked down this road many times, we sure didn’t know snakes were in the grass!

Tomorrow we turn our rental car in at 11:30 am, 15 days after we picked it up. At 2 pm we go (back to walking) for our final massage in Thailand. We talked to a Romanian couple at the beach today. He was telling us how great the massages were in Thailand and we were just nodding up and down. They are the great!

We’ll be packing up tomorrow and Sunday we have a car picking us up around 7 am. What a grind! There will be time to sleep on the plane!

Bangkok Airways flight 272 to Bangkok 1 hour 30 minutes

Layover in Bangkok 2 hours 5 minutes

Thai Airways International flight 638 to Hong Kong 2 hours 45 minutes

Layover in Hong Kong 1 hour 25 minutes

Cathay Pacific flight 826 to Toronto 14 hours 50 minutes

Layover in Toronto 11 hours 20 minutes (maybe a hotel?)

Air Canada Flight 8615 to Saskatoon 3 hours 30 minutes

We arrive in Saskatoon December 6 at 10:50 am

December 2, 2021December 2, 2021

Beach day in December

Yay, sunshine!

Surprisingly, today turned into a great beach day! The beach today was sunny and the sea was calm. The waves were small and of course the water is still bathtub warm. For some reason there were not that many beach beds in use today.

When we got back from the beach we got the information for our covid test tomorrow morning (Friday). We are leaving here at 7:45 am to get tested and should have the results by 8 pm the same day. The cost will be ฿2500 each about $95 CAD. We are 99.9% sure we are fine.

Saturday will give us time to get the car returned, do some packing, have a massage, and finish filling in the ArriveCAN app with our test results. We actually talked to the guy in the other half of our duplex villa, he got tested today. He said they test both nostrils and go deep. Great, something to look forward too! The guy’s name is Sergei, he is from Moscow and is originally from Omsk, Oblast, Siberia. He is an engineer in the oil industry. He was extremely interesting to talk to, and we yakked for an hour and a half. Sergei is not the guy that got drunk and disorderly a few nights ago. We don’t know his name but we do say hi to him and his wife every day. His wife says hi in return and he just looks ahead and doesn’t acknowledge us.

Sergei was surprised we have been in Mexico because there is so much crime there. He was very interested in house construction materials and absolutely everything from weather to internet costs. Guess what? Internet is 1/5 the cost in Russia but so is their pension. He was also interested in central vacuums but he did say they do have a Roomba. He was impressed with pipes in the wall for a central vacuum, he was also impressed with our smart home and all the gadgets. Gary showed him our radon levels which are high right now because the ventilation is off, and also the camera we have aimed at our driveway. But, he can’t believe we don’t have nuclear generated electricity, especially when Gary told him of Saskatchewan’s vast uranium reserves. Comparing costs is a two way street though as he paid less than half of what we paid to get to Thailand. Actually they paid less than $1000 for their flights per person. They have fibre internet for 1/5 the cost. The downside is, he lives in an apartment. We do love our house when we are home.

The only thing we have left to do before we leave is drive to an ATM to get some extra cash so we have money on arrival for our next trip here. Also, possibly buy a few rapid covid tests to take home because they are cheaper and available here.

We messaged Oi at Herb Massage today and booked a final massage for Saturday at 2 pm. It’s best to get limbered up before the 4 flights we will have to endure to get home. The massages in Thailand are always great. Especially when you see the same massage therapist, they know what buttons to push! It’s so funny because most of these gals are 1/2 the height of us, but they can pack a punch. They have strong hands.

Tonight we ordered Grab food delivery, it was great! We had chicken wraps and Iranian Shiraz Salad from the Little Persian. The wraps are large and mostly meat with a bit of coleslaw and homemade pickles and dressing sauce. The cost for everything was ฿445 or about $17 including tip. Speaking of food, we chatted at the beach with a couple from Sweden, we have seen them several times at Karon beach. They were laughing about how hard it is to go back home and back to the grind of making meals again. It really is great to be able to eat at so many different places or have meals delivered to your room for a price that is less than the cost of the unprepared food/ingredients at home. It’s only fair to include the cost of the beer tonight. ฿200 or $7.60 CAD for 4-490 ml cans of Tiger beer. Ok, we just did the calculations on that, and that is 6 cans of 325 ml beer – 3 each. It was hot today and we never had beer yesterday so please don’t judge us!

December 1, 2021December 1, 2021

Touring Phuket by car

Cloudy Day Again

Remember the tea we got from the owner of Herb Massage? The picture above shows what was in the bag. It makes great tea, slightly spicy but it is refreshing.

It rained overnight but stopped when we got up this morning. We Skyped with Linda’s Mom first thing so we could chat before her bedtime. We mulled over what we could do today with the cloudy weather. We decided to go for a drive up the east side of the island. We had a light snack before we left, just in case.

Before leaving we stopped by the front lobby where there is a garden hose. We wanted to wash off all the bird poop on the car. We never even got the garden hose out before 3 of the guys that work here ran over and started washing our car! It needed a lot of scrubbing because the droppings had dried hard enough that even all the rain overnight never even touched it. Soon we were on our way after the many thank you, thank you(s)! I guess we have stayed here so long that we have really gotten to know them but truthfully we don’t even know their names. Some Thai and Burmese names are beyond our ability to say let alone remember. They only have limited English but we do communicate with them pretty well. They are always on the look out for us as we leave or return. After a good ten minutes we were on our way with a sparkling clean car.

We drove an hour and ended up checking out the Phuket Boat Lagoon, the location where 5 Star Marine Phuket operates from. Our original plan was to take a tour with 5 Star Marine one day during our stay here in Phuket. So far, that has not happened due to inclement weather and our inability to forecast if tomorrow will be a nice day. We have had several nice enough days, we just can’t forecast what tomorrow will hold. That is a bit disappointing. We have had a lot of help from Shaun, the owner of 5 Star Marine and we thought the least we could do is pop in for a visit. The drive up there took about one hour, it’s mostly 4 lane road with some traffic lights along the way. At the risk of jinxing our luck, we have managed fairly well driving here. Normal rules don’t apply and you just have to think ahead all the time. Two people thinking ahead is better than one. It’s a given that the guy up ahead will cut you off. It’s also a given that you will be stopped for a light and bikes will pass you on both sides at the same time. Some bikes carry 2 parents and an infant, of course no one wears a helmet.

The most confusing thing is the red and green arrows, both straight and right turn arrows. You can have a red straight arrow and a green right turn arrow at the same time. The right lane can then turn but the straight through traffic should stop.. The opposite is also true. A green straight arrow and a red right turn arrow means both lanes can drive straight through, but there may be a right turning vehicles stopped to turn right so look out. That’s a good way to rear end someone or get rear ended yourself. The speed is 50 km/hr along this road but we averaged about 80 km/hr, we were passed by faster traffic along the way. One of those vehicles was a truck hauling long logs and bamboo. He drove like there was no tomorrow, weaving in and out of traffic and passing anything in front of him. Slightly nerve wracking.

On our way home, once in our familiar neighbourhood we stopped at the Family Mart. On the edge of the parking lot there is a fruit smoothie and refreshment kiosk. We ordered 2 smoothies, a mix of mango, pineapple and passionfruit. The smoothies were amazing. The girl running the place already knew us. She apparently met us at the massage place next door. We are after all, the white, tall, old people.

While we were sitting at the kiosk drinking, we saw the Russian couple from next door run into the Family Mart. When they left we saw them on foot head back to the villa. On our way home we stopped for an ice cream at the local store. Just as we left the the store the skies opened up again. We drove in a torrent of rain back home. We saw the Russians standing under an eve on a nearby building trying to keep dry, about 150 metres from our villa. When we were backing into our parking spot they came walking in looking rather wet. As we were getting out of the car, 2 of the guys that work here came running out with huge umbrellas to save us. They are so thoughtful, but luckily we had our umbrellas in the back seat, just in case.

For supper tonight we drove to the Smile restaurant. The waitress had a big smile when she saw us! Linda had Pad Thai, we shared spring rolls and Gary had Chicken and Vegetables with Cashew Nuts. We both enjoyed our meals and between the 2 of us we drank 3 bottles of Soda water. Total price of food and drink was ฿280 or $10.60 CAD. There are slightly more expensive things on the menu, like fish and chips for ฿150 or $5.70 CAD but it is not local fish. Check out the spring rolls and Pad Thai photos below.

It’s doubtful you could even find bean sprouts at home that are this fresh unless you grow them yourself. The food quality is excellent!

November 30, 2021November 30, 2021

Finally Sunshine

Sunny day after a sleepless night.

Last night was not great for sleeping. It’s like every trip has to cross paths with some moron. Well, our paths crossed last night. The moron, from Russia, in the villa next door drank alcohol from the minute he arrived from the motherland. That’s not the worst of it, he brought a boom box to play his tunes from his phone, outside for everyone to hear until 4:20 am. It was before 4 am when Gary opened the door and yelled STF UP! He turned down the noise for all of 5 minutes, shortly after that we texted Marisa and she came over twice before he went to bed. Much to her horror he was naked on one of those encounters. He was in the pool for a while, but didn’t drown. Maybe that’s when he shed his shorts. The worst part is the guy spent all day inside his air conditioned villa. We did see a few beer bottles on his table. We hope he passes out earlier tonight.

After sleeping in, we finally got up and had breakfast, phoned Gary’s sister Bev for her 65th birthday and drove to our favourite beach. We picked up a couple of smoothies and 2 bags of cookies in case we got hungry.

The beach was a riot today. The waves were much larger but with the big breakers comes a bit of a rip current. You know the kind of current that sucks you out to sea. That was the kind of fun we had today. We ended up going out farther than we realized, and soon we could not touch bottom. The waves kept coming and the backwash kept sweeping us out. Finally we said enough, let’s start swimming in. Gary was thinking “where is the life guard?” There are actually lifeguard stations down the beach but you can’t always tell if someone is there or not. We swam for a few minutes and finally we could stand up in waist deepwater. That was our exercise for today. No beach walk.

Later, the tide went out farther, the waves were crashing in shallower water. It was perfect to play in the waves again. Gary rode a few waves onto the beach. Back and forth, out and back. There were waves with a swell of at least 1 1/2 metres high when they started to break. It is amazing the difference in the size of the curl on breaking waves just 10 metres in either direction down the beach.

We called it a day at the beach at 4 pm, drove back to the villa and cleaned up for supper. We drove to the Lotus store and bought Linda 2 croissants for breakfast Wednesday and Thursday. We then drove to the restaurant of choice, Smile Restaurant.

Linda ordered Panang curry, Gary ordered sweet and sour stir fry with (6) shrimp. Both meals included rice. We also shared a green papaya salad. The total price of ฿270 about $10.25 CAD, not including tip. The food was really good, we hope to get back there again before we leave for home on Sunday.

After eating we walked next door to the fruit market and bought some mangos, dragon fruit, passion fruit, bananas and pineapple for breakfasts.

Back at our room for the night we enjoyed a rehydration with watermelon. The temperature was perfect today, we welcomed the occasional cloud. This evening it is very muggy and almost raining. We don’t know what to expect tomorrow.

November 29, 2021November 29, 2021

The last few days

Rain again today!

Today is Monday, November 29 and it rained hard and on and off from the time we got out of bed until supper time. Gary spent all day trouble shooting his video editing software only to realize late in the day that his new GoPro camera shoots in higher resolution than his video editor can handle. The remainder of the day was spent working around the problem.

Linda made some tea that, Oi, the lady who owns Herb Massage gave us. This tea is good, but before it is steeped it doesn’t look like tea leaves. It’s a bag of dried fruit and herbs and stuff that we definitely won’t be bringing back to Canada. As near as we can tell, the ingredients, which are not listed on the bag, are ginger, galangal, pandan leaves, goji berries or some kind of dried plum and some other stuff we have no idea what. They serve this tea after a massage and we really liked it and asked Oi where we could buy some. Silly us thinking it came in a tea bag or leaf form!! We picked it up yesterday and when we asked her what we owed her she said she wanted to give it to us, there was no charge.

With all the rain, we thought we might as well kill some time and get a massage this afternoon. We had a 90 minute massage again at 3 pm. At first we both thought maybe we’d gone too soon for another massage as we both had some tender spots but both of us felt really good afterwards. We both had terrible knots in our neck and shoulder muscles to say nothing about a few leg muscles but the massage ladies worked on them lots and got them loosened up. Just wish we could take one of them home with us!

On our way home from our massage we stopped at our little local store again. Sadly, still no candied peanuts or peanut brittle back in stock and we bought the last two of the ice cream bars we like!! Hopefully stock arrives soon!

With all the rain we decided it was another night to order supper by Grab. We ordered the pineapple fried rice again. It is extremely tasty! We will probably spend the evening reading, thank goodness for our Kindles. Linda is reading “Go tell the bees that I am gone”. It’s the series that the Outlander TV series is based on by Diana Gabaldon. It was only 690 pages in the printed version.

On Saturday we had a great day at the beach. We made this video. First the squeaky sand then the waves in the water. Only certain parts of Karon Beach make this noise when you drag your feet in the sand.

Yesterday was cloudy, the precursor of what we got today. We did manage to get a bit of touring in around the area. We went to the viewpoint by the Windmill, and a bit farther south to the viewpoint of Promthep Cape.

There is huge park and walkway along the edge of the cliff. There was a wedding photo shoot while we were there. They will have some awesome photos! Actually we have one too.

We pieced together this video around Promthep Cape.

Check out Promthep Temple in the video below.