Work To Live

To get us into the Christmas spirit, we booked tickets to Wellington Country Park Illuminova. It was quite expensive at £26 pp which included the train ride, but it was actually a lot of fun even for two adults.  Website: https://wellingtoncountrypark.co.uk/whats-on/wellington-illuminova-2/

We had an amazing time visiting Bangkok, Chiang Mai, and Khao Lak in Thailand, and we picked up some hints and tips along the way that we wanted to share. How we Booked and Organised the Trip Normally, we book our holidays ourselves for more flexibility and to book directly. However, since we hadn’t really been to Asia (except for work trips), we decided to use a travel firm to help us navigate the best areas to stay and arrange transportation. After some research, we chose  eShores , which seemed well-known for multi-location holidays and had received very good feedback on several review sites. We had no clear idea of what we wanted and no specific budget, but after a call with Hannah to discuss the type of holidays we enjoy, she came up with an amazing itinerary. We didn’t change anything from the original quote. We checked all the hotels on TripAdvisor and saw they had good reviews, were centrally located, and had a boutique charm that meant we weren’t staying in standard large ...

 Lee with some tips on speaking Thai

Lee with some tips on Thai money:

We are both active people, and six days of non-stop relaxing was never going to suit us. So, we decided to visit one of the local tour kiosks on the beach to plan some activities.  Our original plan was to visit an elephant sanctuary, but as we looked into the online reviews, we realised many of these “sanctuaries” aren’t what they claim to be. Instead of true sanctuaries, they exploit the elephants and keep them in poor conditions. Instead we opted for a private tour with three stops: a waterfall, a turtle sanctuary, and bamboo rafting. The first stop was the waterfall. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite the majestic scene we’d envisioned—it was more like a puddle of stagnant, smelly water. So much for the “refreshing swim in the pool at the base of the falls” that had been advertised! We had asked the tour operator if the waterfall was flowing, and they assured us it was. Either they were ensuring our business, or something got lost in translation.  Next up was the turtle sanctu...

The flight from Chiang Mai was super simple, and even better, we managed this one without a hangover. A car picked us up from the hotel, and it was a 20-minute drive to the domestic terminal. We went straight through check-in and security and were soon waiting to board our flight. We landed at Phuket Airport, which was extremely busy with tourists. We found our driver, who had a very spacious and extravagant minibus for our 1.5-hour journey to Khao Lak. We had planned six nights in Khao Lak, intending to laze around the pool and the beach, with one activity a day to explore the sights. In hindsight, we spent too long here and probably should have included a couple of nights in Phuket as well. What didn’t help with the lazing was that we couldn’t relax on the beach or in the pool near the beach. We quickly learned upon arriving that Khao Lak was one of the worst-hit areas during the 2004 tsunami, with over 4,000 people killed. Many locals had lost family, friends, businesses, and more. ...

The previous day we booked a group day trip through the hotel to explore some of the sites outside of Chiang Mai. There were many tour options, and we aimed for a mix of hiking, culture, and nature, without spending too much time in the car. We were picked up outside the hotel in a minibus with other travellers and headed out of the city. Shortly after leaving, we stopped at a large, modern service station—the only stop before heading into the jungle. The journey wasn’t particularly comfortable. The vans were fairly old, the air conditioning minimal, and the seats more suited to the smaller Thai locals than the larger Europeans and Americans. It was best not to focus too much on the driving and instead count the many temples we passed. Our first stop was the Wachirathan Waterfall. We were dropped off a few steps from the waterfall and walked along a short path by the stream at the base of the falls, leading to a parking area with a small market selling food and clothes. Our driver wait...

Partying until the early hours when you have a morning flight to catch the next day is not recommended, but we did it and we survived, one of us with a little more composure than the other. It helped that it was a stress-free journey with our transfer arriving on time, we breezed through check-in and security, before finding some seats to chill out in whilst we waited. The journey through Chiang Mai airport was just as simple and we quickly found our driver who took us the short journey to our hotel.  We stayed in  El Barrio Lanna , a small boutique hotel within the ancient city walls with beautiful landscaping, friendly staff, good breakfast, and a lovely pool area although the water was a little bit too cold for us and it could have done with a few more sunbeds.  We did have to have a little sleep to recover from the partying, but it was needed so that we could enjoy the Walking Street Night Market. This market is on every Sunday from 4pm until around midnight, and it i...

We grabbed a tuk tuk from our hotel, to the Jodd Fairs night market. This market is located next to the Central Rama 9 Department Store (top tip - we used the toilets in the Department store which were free and incredibly nice). The market is huge and literally had anything you could have wanted to eat, drink or purchase. Sam even had her nails redone at one of the stalls, whilst Lee struggled to choose one of the many local beers to try. It is open daily from 4pm until 12am.  Lee decided to barter the tuk tuk home, and the driver decided to take us for the ride of our lives. We were doing wheelies, banging out tunes, and lit up with so much neon, even the space station could see us. It was a lot of fun, if a little scary, but he made up for the bartered rate with a very big tip. We asked the driver to drop us off at our favourite bar, Orange Bar for one last night cap. The employees had remembered it was Sam's birthday and had organised a special surprise, as you'll see from o...

We had 2 full days in Bangkok and our strategy was to bash out as many of the cultural sites as we could on the first day, so that our final day could be a little more chilled.  After a good breakfast at the hotel, which did include Thai curries, rice and noodles, we walked to the nearest MRT station, grabbed a train and headed to our first stop, the Grand Palace.  The Grand Palace is actually a large complex of very ornate buildings, temples, statues, relics, and other historical items. Despite the name, the royal family no longer live here, and good thing too given the buses of tourists who visit each day. As with many sacred sites and temples in Thailand, you can not visit unless your shoulders and legs are covered. We came prepared with our own clothes to avoid having to either hire from the temple or panic buy the classic elephant pants.  The Grand Palace is a huge complex with no air-conditioning and little protection from the sun. We enjoyed walking around the...

Bangkok is a large city and there is just so much to do, we had to really squeeze it into the 3 nights we were there.  We landed late afternoon, found the transfer company, and headed to our hotel,  Maitria Mode Sukhumvit 15 . The rooms in the hotel were modern, and it had a very funky roof top bar, perfect for chilling out on and recovering from the jet lag.  We spent out first night exploring the bars within walking distance of our hotel. This included: Sukhumvit 11 - a street lined with bars and clubs which has a chilled out vibe during the day, but quickly becomes a party in the evening. Brewski - a craft beer roof top bar on top of the Radisson Blu Plaza Hotel. There was a DJ here but it had a chilled vibe with great views of the local area and some local craft beers! Soi Cowboy - the notorious party road.. We stubbled onto this road on our way back to the hotel. We were drawn in by the neon lights and thought we should check it out. As you walk down the road, it is ...

We thought it would be useful to share some of the lessons we learnt when using ferries to hop between the Cyclades Islands: 1) Pre Book We pre-booked all our ferries, using Ferry Hopper  before we left the UK. Ferries quickly get full up, especially the fast ones and buying tickets on the day, or even a couple of days before, can be a lot more expensive that buying in advance.   2)  Ferry Hopper App  We downloaded the Ferry Hopper App and used this to manage our tickets, but also to track where the ferry is, you'll see why this is important below! 3) They're not like German Trains Don't expect them to be on time. All our ferries were late and from what we heard, this is not unusual. We used the Ferry Hopper app to track exactly were the ferry was so we knew what time we had left. The app was very accurate at tracking and it stopped us getting stressed out about what's going on and how much time we had to grab one (or two) drinks.  4) Find a Bar  All t...

The ferry arrived into Mykonos and the entire port area was absolute chaos, more than the normal Greek Ferry chaos we had come to love. The port is also the location the cruise ship passengers come on land and we had just arrived at a key offloading (or maybe onloading, I couldn't tell between the craziness) time. It took us a good 20 minutes to find our driver, get out of the port, and head to our hotel. Mykonos Town is a car free area and our hotel, the Andromeda Residence , was right in the heart of the no car zone. The taxi dropped us as close as he could, and then we had a short but challenging walk trying to find the entrance, but it was worth it. We chose the hotel for two reasons. Firstly, it had a pool. A mandatory requirement from us for any sun holiday. Secondly, it was super close to the action. It was going to be a massive struggle to stay awake beyond midnight so we needed all the help we could get to minimise the distance to our beds after partying. The hotel was a l...

We arrived into Naxos, found our driver and headed to our hotel, Galaxy Hotel . The hotel was perfectly situated with a short walk to Agios Georgios Beach and about 10 minutes to the bars, restaurants and harbour in Chora (the capital of Naxos).  We spent the first night exploring Chora and we found a couple of gems! Our favourite bar was Funky Hops and not just because it allowed Lee to get his fix of craft beer. The owners were welcoming, it was something different from the cocktails and mass produced mainland beer available in other bars, and it was a great spot for people watching. We also enjoyed balcony and unique décor at Swing bar .  We were drawn into  Naxos Cheese Koufopoulos , a shop specialising in local produce. It looked and smelt so good, we took a seat in the backroom surrounded my maturing cheeses, and enjoyed a platter with local produce including a glass of wine. The cheeses were excellent and there was so much of it, we didn't need any Gyros on ...