Thailand

A big draw for moving to Asia for a while was getting to explore this region of the world for much less $. So, when Chad's mom volunteered to watch the girls for a while during her stay in Macau, we thought we better jump on the chance. We headed to Phuket, Thailand, which is a gorgeous place at Thailand's southwestern tip.

Chad had a work meeting the morning we were supposed to leave, and I got a kick out of him changing into his "vacation clothes" in the airport parking lot.

We brought Claire with us and it was so fun to get to treat her as an only child and to go back to the "simple" days of only having one child! What a gorgeous little smile.

Viewing clouds from above never gets old.

Here's what we saw when we were coming into Phuket (it was much clearer than it looks):

After landing we rented a car (they drive on the left like in Macau BTW). We drove 1/2 hour to Patong and got there at about 10pm and found out that our hotel reservation wasn't honored and there were no rooms (NO ROOMS!) in any of the nearby hotels. We said a prayer and started driving and were relieved to find a nice little room that was available for the night. We got online and Chad found a new hotel for the rest of our trip that was on the other side of Phuket, in an area called Panwa. It ended up being such a GREAT place. It was right on a quiet beach and was so beautiful and clean and even smelled like Jasmine all the time. I was in heaven. :)

Our room had a little tub out back that Claire adored.

It also had a few awesome little spots to rest and watch the ocean. Claire's schedule was pretty off and we ended up there in the very early morning one day. It was so rad to watch the stars and stare up at a gorgeous crescent moon while the world woke up.

In the morning we'd go to the outdoor breakfast buffet and listen to nice music and watch the ocean. It was marvelous.

Here we are after exploring Panwa's little town area. Claire was crazy for this ice cream cone.

We ate at a really amazing resort in that area on another night. It was dark and hard to get a picture of it, but our table was out on the very edge of the resort, way up above the ocean. Individual table areas were sunk down in a pool of water so to get in and out you went up some little stairs and walked on pathways which bridged across the water. Hard to explain but totally neat. Except that it made Claire crazy because all she wanted to do was play in the water the whole time. :)

This is fried morning glory with a really good sauce. The pizza was awesome too.

We rode a Tuk Tuk back down the hill to our resort.

Snorkeling was a big part of our trip. This is at Ya Nui Beach:

One day we took a boat over to Man Island and Bon Island for snorkeling.

Claire and I got a kick out of throwing bread to the fish, who would swarm super fast and fight for it.

Here's Claire with our awesome boat driver.

There were a few shops right across the street from our hotel, including ones giving massages. They weren't super great but they were really cheap. I liked chatting with this lady about Thailand. It was really fun during this whole trip to learn more about Thailand and its people - I've always been kind of fascinated with it (probably thanks to "The King and I," and some fantastic food).

We loved getting to eat Thai food in Thailand and were super glad that it's just as good in Thailand as it is in the States.

These are my two favorite Thai dishes - coconut soup (Tom Kha Gai) and Pad Thai.

This restaurant was awesome. It was right at the top of Promthep Cape overlooking a beautiful part of Phuket. For some reason we were the only customers there. That made us a little nervous but the food was good.

The view:

The restaurant had neat little gardens including some flowered bonsai trees.

All over Phuket we would come across these little houses for worship (for some size perspective, they're just a bit larger than a really nice birdfeeder):

This is a neat temple that was under construction near one of the beaches we visited:

Inside:

I loved checking out the written Thai language - doesn't it look cool with all its squigglies?

This was interesting too - lots of these propaganda pictures of the king were placed at street corners:

Just a cool picture of a rubber tree grove:

One day we were out at the beach on low tide. It was so gorgeous and fascinating to explore the sand crabs and starfish that were out.

The starfish were moving in the shallow water:

 And I adore these pictures: