This post is long over due, but what can I say, sometimes I get the urge to blog and sometimes I feel none. We went to Thailand on our honeymoon back in November and it was an amazing trip. Seems like it’s the place to go these days since it is so cheap but really absorbing the culture is something else. Aside from Turkey, I’ve never been to Asia before, and Andrew has never left the continent so it was a very eye opening experience for both of us.
I have shared our itinerary below as a full overview of our trip. I have included recommendations and what we did. If anyone has the opportunity to go for 16, or so, days like we did I would recommend doing exactly what we did as we don’t really feel like we missed out on anything except a Half Moon/Full Moon Party.
Flight to Bangkok (with a layover in Gangzhou, CH) – (2 Nights)
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Le Bua State Tower – Where they filmed Hangover II and where the famous Sky Bar is.
In Bangkok we took a river boat to Chinatown and walked all the way through to where the temples are. (About 6 miles) where we got tricked into going to get Andrew a suit. – Whether you get tricked into doing it at a specific place or not I’d definitely get a suit though – We spent about $400 for pants a jacket a shirt and tie btw. – You could probably get it for less.
It WILL rain on you, have a poncho or a lightweight umbrella and don’t wear leather sandals lol – I would actually suggest buying a couple of the cheap ponchos for your bags too incase you end up traveling on a rainy day.
Flight to Chaing Mai – (3 nights)
We considered spending 1 night in the city of Chiang Mai instead of 3 nights at the Spicy villa but we were already bouncing around so much that we thought it would be nice to stay in one place for a longer period of time. I don’t think either of us regret this.
Spicy Serene Villa – We spent $40 a night plus $300 total for transport from the airport and back, river rafting, jungle trek to the waterfalls (about 7 mi), elephant rides, thai cooking class, all of our meals and we had a tour guide who hung out with us for the entire time and taught us about all the plants, villagers, lifestyle, cooked us all our meals, etc.
I can’t say enough good things about this place.
This place is basically one step above camping. You will basically stay on a random mattress with a comforter (no other bed sheets) a bug net and four pieces or parchment board nailed together and plastic lining on the floor. The shower is basically above the toilet and there is no wifi and just newly electricity. – THAT BEING SAID if I can handle it you can too. Just don’t go in with high expectations because it was amazing.
Flight to Phuket – (2 nights)
Kata Beach Resort & Spa – The hotel is nice but don’t get massages at the hotels, the massage places are EVERYWHERE and are super cheap. – I mean you can get one if you want to splurge (Thailand splurge) but… try the ones that aren’t part of the hotel first cause you may be able to get your fix.
Phuket was a little lack luster (maybe because this is where I found out I lost my job) but there are a TON of tourists, we just got huge beers and got drunk in the water. Played in the pool, got overly expensive ( for Thailand $15?) cool looking drinks that we didn’t even use the photos of because we were too buzzed to take good ones.
We got three massages in two days AND the fish massage. We went to Patong Street which is where the Lady Boys and ping pong shows are. Took a tuk tuk. MEH
Cab & Ferry to Koh Phi Phi – (3 nights)
We had left a night open between Koh Phi Phi and stayed here an extra night to recoup. We were tired of packing up our bag every two days so it was nice
Koh Phi Phi Cabana Hotel – (site seemed to be down, not unusual for Thailand ha) This hotel is prime placement. It’s super close to the ferry, there is a beach on either side of the hotel and our room had the most perfect view out into the bay. You are really close to all the bars and shops too so it’s not a long walk to get anywhere – Actually it isn’t a long walk anywhere on the island regardless of where you stay but it seemed like this was one of the best hotels in general. There are no cars on the island
It seemed a little dead the first day that we got to Koh Phi Phi because we didn’t realize that you just have to turn left into all the streets where all the people are! Once we figured this out we were able to find lots of people watching and much better food. We took a longtail boat the day after we got there and we did the full day. – When deciding between full or half day, I’d just say do the full day because you are going to have someone showing you the best spots to snorkel and sightsee, plus you get to sit back and enjoy which is a nice breather. We made some friends on the boat that showed us what they had learned so it was also nice to hear other people’s experiences. – I’d just bring your own booze – There is a booze cruise but I kinda wanted to be sober for all this stuff we were going to get to see for the first and maybe last time. – Eventually I was like, ok I’ll have a drink haha. – The lunch they serve you is rice and eggs and watermelon so don’t have high expectations for that either. – Though it wasn’t bad. – Oh on top of the price of the long tail trips you will have to pay an extra 400 baht a person or something like that for a “national park fee”. They don’t tell you this until you are at the island and they won’t let you get off the boat unless you pay it…. everyone eventually caved and paid it because no one wants to sit in a boat the entire day. – Also worth noting that I had to pee really bad and the guy let me pee off the boat while it was speeding along – would NEVER happen in the US.
The longtail boat includes Monkey Beach and Maya Bay (or more famously The Beach)
View point – Not as hard as you would think. We climbed up there in ~15/20 minutes for an awesome view and I was just wearing sandals.
Get a bucket. Alcohol + Booze super fun. – We found a bar where a guys was singing all of the most popular currents songs you could sing along with him and people watch.
There are also fire shows and stuff on the beach, worth watching.
Ferry to Cab to Longtail boat to Karbi/ Railay Beach – (5 nights)
Railay Village Resort – This was the best part of the trip. It was pouring when we got there and we had just dragged our suit cases along in the rain and mud ACROSS the peninsula (which isn’t that long) but we were wondering what the hell we got ourselves into. As soon as we got to our room we were super impressed it was beautiful and the beach was lovely too. There are two sides to the peninsula (duh) a three minute walk across. The first place we stayed was on the far side (but the one with a bit more of a view) Not to say the other side doesn’t have a view too.
We drank and ate good food, we got a Kayak and paddled around the corner to a couple of the islands and through a cave – AWESOME – honestly I don’t think you’d need the kayak for more than 1.5 hours though, unless you’re really trying to get aggressive. This is when we found PraNang Beach and Caves. We returned the kayak and if you walk to the side of the peninsula with the pier and walk all the way south, you can walk BACK across the peninsula (around some cliffs) where there are often a ton of monkeys! And to the caves/ beach.
This may be just about the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen and there is a cave with a bunch of wee-nees too – not so beautiful but interesting….
We loved Railay so much that while we initially had plans to take the ferry back to Phuket stay a day, fly back to Bangkok and stay a night we actually just decided to stay here an extra two nights, ditch the flight and get a new one directly from Krabi > BKK. Definitely a wise decision and this is the only thing I would really do differently.
When we extended our stay we were being cheap so we decided to stay here:
Railay Princess Resort – Still not too shabby at all.
Tipping is not mandatory though some people expect it and sometimes you feel like a jerk if you don’t. I kinda let Andrew decide who we tipped and didn’t (definitely tipped our tour guide in Chaing Mai as much as possible though.)
We didn’t do a full moon party but that would be something to look into – Another place people go is Koh Phangan for the partying but we didn’t go there either.
