Phuket, Thailand

We just finished celebrating another holiday in China: October 1st was China’s National Holiday, which is kind of like the 4th of July in the U.S.

The National Day of the People's Republic of China (PRC) - “guóqìng jié” – kicks off a “Golden Week” holiday where the majority of factories and many small businesses shut down.

Wikipedia describes it pretty accurately… Three days of paid holiday are given, and the surrounding weekends are re-arranged so that workers in Chinese companies always have seven continuous days of holiday. These national holidays were first started by the government for the PRC's National Day in 1999 and are primarily intended to help expand the domestic tourism market and improve the national standard of living, as well as allowing people to make long-distance family visits. The Golden Weeks are consequently periods of greatly heightened travel activity.

This holiday can be a frustrating time for our U.S. office. It falls during a busy time for product development and causes big delays in receiving samples, price quotes, and shipments of goods. The Chinese government has considered eliminating the arrangements for extended days off in the past, but for now the holiday remains. Read more about it by clicking here.

Since we don’t have family to visit in China and we didn’t want to fight mass quantities of Chinese travelers, we decided to leave the country and explore a new destination: Thailand.

We booked flights to Phuket, an island in the southern part of Thailand. We spent the night before our flight at a Hong Kong airport hotel; since it’s connected to the airport by a walkway, we figured it would be easy to roll out of bed and start a relaxing vacation.

Wrong! We’re so bad about running late for things, and even though we were practically sleeping in the airport terminal, we still almost missed our flight due to forgetting luggage in the room, standing in the wrong check-in line, and other misc. delays. We checked in at 8:20 for our 8:55 a.m. international flight. The woman behind the counter told us we needed to run… or rather “hurry! HURRY!” shooing us away from the counter. We sprinted through the airport with 14-month old Dean in arms and made it with a few minutes to spare.

The first couple of nights in Phuket we stayed at Kata Beach Resort, which is about an hour south of the airport on the southwest side of the island. Our taxi driver, who we hired for 500 Baht (about $16), misunderstood us when we left the airport and took us to Karon Beach Resort and Spa. It was beautiful, with doorways made of giant dark wood circles and brilliant purple orchids everywhere, and they greeted us with fresh fruity beverages plus chilled hand towels. We didn't realize we were in the wrong place until the woman behind the counter couldn't find our reservation.

She quickly sent us on our way to the correct hotel, less than 2 miles away, via a hired a Tuk Tuk. Seemed strange to us that we could travel almost 50 miles via taxi for 500 Baht, but a couple more in a sketchy rickshaw cost us 200 Baht.

After finally checking in, we ate lunch at the hotel restaurant and headed back to the room to sleep the afternoon away. Traveling can be so exhausting, especially with a baby in tow (plus, we just like to sleep!)

We tried to go to the pool around 8 p.m. but discovered it closed at 7. This was surprising to us, but I guess it’s the norm at most resorts in Phuket. We walked down to the beach and there were people setting off fireworks in the sand right next to a table of fireworks for sale. The fireworks scared Dean at first, but we calmed and reassured him. After the 3rd boom, he was curious enough to watch with big, round wide eyes as the fuse lit and the rockets zoomed into the air. This was his first time seeing big explosions of light in the sky. Every time the boom went off, he gripped my arm tighter, but then said “wow!” in the sweetest little voice.

We also saw two big paper lanterns almost as tall as Dean floating like fireballs in the night sky. I’ve never seen lanterns like these, but they made me think of UFOs. You light a fuse, which acts like a hot air balloon to lift the paper lantern into the air “for luck”. They are supposed to carry away bad luck, sins or worries. I think the paper might catch on fire at some point and burn up the entire luck lantern. Or maybe it's like a helium balloon, and it eventually lands again as rubbish?

After the beach trek, we crossed the street for an authentic meal at a local restaurant. We feasted on wonderful Pad Thai noodles and Tom Yum soup, plus shared a non-alcoholic fruity beverage served from a pineapple. When we got back to the hotel it was late – around 11 pm – and we crashed into bed.

The next morning Dean woke at 4:30 a.m. alert and ready to go, so we took a walk around the property. Here he is checking out a gold statue in his PJ’s:

After that first day it rained every day, sometimes hard and for the entire day, so it was pretty dreary outside most of the time. Ahhh... perfect weather for sleeping and eating.

We changed resorts after two nights and moved to the JW Marriott resort in the northwest part of the island. I think this is most beautiful resort / hotel I have ever experienced, and it’s really affordable. Here we are at the check-in counter after each receiving a Thai lei of fresh flowers.

The only problem with the resort was that we felt really isolated, with few options for dining other than room service and an overpriced steak house. There were also no good local markets within walking distance, and taking a cab to get anywhere decent started at 1700 Baht (about $56.00). We quickly learned that there’s a taxi mafia – you can get from the airport to your destination for cheap, but you’ll be paying double or triple to get back!

On Monday, the rain let up for a little while and we had our biggest outing of the trip: an elephant excursion. It was a very “touristy” thing to do, but it was a lot of fun.

Dean and I fed watermelon to 2 baby elephants.

Then the 3 of us loaded up on our elephant and took a 30 minute guided tour. We learned that elephants used to live wild on the island, but there is not enough undeveloped land left for them, so all that remain on Phuket are now domesticated.

Matt was completely against the elephant excursion because he feels it’s wrong to exploit animals in this way. One of the guides explained that elephants can live up to 70 years, and the majority of those used for tourist means today were originally used in the logging industry. The Thai government banned logging in 1989, which left these gentle giants out of work.

It makes me sad to think that the elephants will never be free again, especially considering the elephant is the national symbol of Thailand.

Another thing that was a bit depressing about the trip is that we visited 3 different beaches, and all were so polluted! Trash like plastic and glass bottles, candy wrappers, misc. plastic tabs or bags, and random shoes were everywhere.

Pretty much every day we either played in the pool or at the beach (often in the rain), slept a lot, and noshed on authentic Thai food or hamburgers with french fries (so nice to have that “western” option). Then we headed back to Shenzhen. Overall the trip was relaxing, and it was wonderful to spend time together with my two favorite boys.