Phuket? Phuk-et

It’s been a while!  Time to play catch up on the blog… so… what happened after Ko Pha-ngan?  I decided I wouldn’t hit any more of the gulf islands, and make my way to the islands on the west side of Thailand, in the Andaman Sea.  Ko Phi Phi was recommended to me by many people, so I decided it would have to be on the route, even though it was a popular, touristy island.  I got a bus ticket to Phuket, which I think is the longer way to Ko Phi Phi, but I figured why not stop in Phuket for a short while?  I decided to stay in Phuket Town, rather than the party beach of Patong, which I’m glad I did.

The bus ride from Surat Thani was about 4 hours, but I had some good American company in the back of the van to chat with about their teaching escapades in Korea. I’m running into more and more native English speakers that are teaching English in 3rd world countries like Thailand.  It turns out they are in-between semesters right now, so most of the teachers are taking a “vacation from vacation” for a couple weeks.  We were trying to decide whether the driver knew the two Thai people (a lady and a kid) we picked up at random places along the way.  I thought they were family, but they thought that Thais just are friendly like that and that a family would probably talk less (the Thais chatted the whole way there).

Most notable scenery along the way to Phuket were some unknown fields of trees.  They were all planted in formal rows, and nearly every farm plot had them.  It wasn’t until a week later when I was asking about this that I learned they were rubber trees.  (See cover photo for this post) Apparently it’s a big industry in Thailand, at least on the the way to Phuket 🙂  I could see a farmer working on the tree, tapping it like so:

That’s where latex comes from!

I only spent one night in a hostel in Phuket Town, but that’s really all you’d need on that side of town.  The van dropped me off at a random place downtown but I decided I could walk the 1.5 km to my hostel.  Oops, turns out it was the wrong hostel, and they directed me to right one which was about a 2 minute walk from where they dropped me off.  Oh well – it happens.

I went to the night market and watched a local Thai band playing (quite young!)

The next morning I got breakfast.  I liked it here because it was the place that seemed like had the most locals, local restaurants etc.  I went to what I believe was something like an egg pancake place.  Pancakes with fried egg on top.  Good stuff.

Off to the boat to Ko Phi Phi, cause Phuk-it!