We woke up sleepy-eyed, having sent Esther's good friend (Crystal) off to Melbourne the night before, to catch our early morning (8.30am) flight to Phuket. Traffic to the airport was clear (duh, it was early on a Saturday morning), and checking in was a breeze since we had nothing to check in. ;p We had breakfast at MacDonald's before proceeding to board our flight.

After 1.5 hours, we landed in Phuket International Airport. The descent provided a stunning view of the pockets of beautifully carved islands (by water and wind) that surround the Phuket peninsular, which give Phuket its magic.

Upon clearing customs, we set off to find the minibus which was to take us to our hotel. Prices seem to have gone up by a fair bit since the Lonely Planet was last published, as the published rates were 120B but had gone up to 180B when we were there (all the booths were selling tix at this price). Well, we had no choice but to fork out the money.

We arrive at Sugar Palm Resort, Kata almost an hour and a half later, and checked into our rooms. We were delighted by our deluxe pool access room (we made reservations 2 months earlier), where we could jump into the swimming pool from our balcony (on the ground floor of course!), and also amused by the bathroom, which had sliding windows which provides an unobstructed view of the bathroom from the bed (for the voyeuristic, we think).

As it was almost lunch time, we walked out to the town where we tried to a place to fill our grumbling stomachs. Street food we did not find, instead, we found numerous posh restaurants, serving everything from Japanese to European to Mexican food - everything but Thai food that is. How ironic. We eventually managed to find a decent Thai restaurant (notice the use of the word restaurant and not stall/kopitiam), where I ordered Pad Thai, and Esther had Tom Yum Goong, the quintessential Thai dishes to have. They tasted good, though not quite value-for-money for the 300B (S$12) we forked out. The restaurant did, however, offer excellent views of the beach, and sea, and I was excited to see the surfers out on the waves.

On our way back to our hotel, we stopped by a travel agent, where we forked out (I suppose "splurged" will be a most suitable word) money for "Simon Cabaret" (transvestite, aka "ah-gua" show), a half-day tour of the Kai islands for the next day, and for our return taxi to the airport. The damage done at the travel agent amounted to some 3900B (or S$160)! Well, at least we got most of the big ticket spendings out of the way.

When we got back to the hotel, we were so exhausted for our short sleep the night before that we took an afternoon nap (also to escape the immense afternoon heat), and woke at 3pm, in time to laze around in the swimming pool. I must say it's quite a nice feeling to be able to step into the pool from the balcony - makes me feel like one of the super-rich! ;p We then proceeded to the beach, where I rented a surfboard, but soon found the red-flagged conditions a little too rough for a beginner surfer that I am. (there were still hordes of surfers out there though) We lazed on the beach before heading back for a shower.

-pause-

I have to go off for MPS now, so I'll only be able to continue writing later, whenever that might be! ;p