Day 37:

We arrived in Phuket in the evening around 8 PM. By the time we got our car and hit the road, we were travel weary. We headed to the hotel and crashed. The end. See you next blog…just kidding.

Day 38:

We took things super easy the first day in Phuket. Oh, yes, I should make this note. It will be relevant a couple of times. The Ph sound in the name is pronounced as a “P”. There may be a subtle voice thing for the “h” but I couldn’t hear it. So, the name sounds like Pookette. I had been calling it Fukette (long u sound like Luke). And I had jokingly saying, “Ah, fukette!” until Faith got sufficiently annoyed with me that I stopped. Not a wise man or I wouldn’t poke the bear. But not foolish enough to slather myself with honey and then take a nap in her den when she’s hungry.

We spent a few hours in downtown Phuket hanging out in the old part of town. As I noted in our last blog, we had done our share of wats and were looking for a more relaxing time. We snacked. We ate. We walked. We snacked some more. We walked. We ate. We snacked some more. Are you seeing a theme here, yet? It was a nice and relaxing day after the craziness that was happening continuously over the past several weeks.

We had one all-important thing to do on our first full day in Phuket. You know what it was. You can guess. You’ve heard me talk about it enough times. Ah, come on now, you shouldn’t need more of a hint than that. What? Another hint? Fine, but just one more. It is related to our collection. Our travel collection to be specific. So, guess………. Spot on!!!! Hard Rock Café. I think this was the last one we will get for our 81-day trip. The Cafés in Australia and New Zealand have closed. Defunct. No more. Sorry. And there isn’t one in Maui. Too small, I would guess.

We got our shirts. They were decent, but they didn’t compare with what they had in Chiang Mai and Bangkok. It’s all good. They were still good, and I’ll be happy to wear mine until it has holes in it as I’ve done for years. Since Hard Rock Café was in Patong Beach, we decided to take a walk through town that evening. We just got a couple of pictures of the brightly lit sign that says Patong Beach. Patong Beach is…how shall I say it…not a family friendly sort of place. However, if you are a lonely swabbie in port with your pirate mates, I’m sure you would feel right at home. Downright welcome. In fact, you would have no end of offers for….various services. ‘Nuff said about that.

Day 39:

Life’s a beach. Actually, Kata is a beach. So is Kata Noi. Just a smaller beach. I think that’s what the Noi part means. Little Kata Beach. We slathered on some sunscreen and hit the beach. We rented an umbrella and a pair of chairs for the day for 200 Baht. That’s a bit over $5.75. Yes, highway robbery. Or…beachway robbery (snarky smile).

Faith hung out under the umbrella mostly and enjoyed her Kindle. I did that in between snorkels. Okay, maybe it is between snorkeling activities or something like that. But that’s just too much to say. So, in between snorkels it is. I snorked every time on the north side of the beach (snorked—not a word, I know—snorked sounds more fun than snorkeled although they both make me think of Snuffleupagaus from Sesame Street).

The water near the beach was super cloudy because of the huge number of boats and people that day. Turns out the king and queen of Thailand were hanging out at the south end of the beach. That must have been why there were a couple of navy war ships patrolling a kilometer or two offshore.

The snorkeling got better as I swam further out until it was quite pleasant. There was no coral, but a good variety of sea life among the boulders. I would show you. I would. I had a camera. It had nice pictures on it. Even a video or two. They were nice. Fun. Super. Did I mention that I had a camera? Up to a point. And then I didn’t. I decided to donate my camera to Kata Beach.

It was a generous gesture on my part. I’m just that way. It’s just so natural for me to be generous (HEY! I haven’t got to the punchline yet, quit that laughing!), it’s so natural that sometimes I give without even knowing that I’m giving. I just give and give and give UNTIL IT FREAKING HURTS!!! DO YOU HEAR ME UNIVERSE?!?!?!

Now where did I put that pill? Ah, there it is. So, I happily (gritting my teeth) donated my brand-spanking new (that’s not a fist, my hand is cramping) underwater camera (choking as I type) to the beachside community (curses… leaking… out… of… ‘Piece of Sh’… leaking… out… of… ‘Bloody da’… leaking… ’Blasted dirty b’… leaking out of my mouth like a dark cloudy vapor).

Thank God the tightwad in me (FRUGAL! THRIFTY!) that part of me that has a tough time buying premium, that’s the part that won the day I bought the camera. It was a decent camera. It wasn’t a GoPro, and I didn’t mortgage the house. It was more than I like losing, but then I don’t like losing $0.25.

It was still a good day. Any day snorkeling among the blue and yellow fish is a good day. Faith would say any day chilling on the beach with her Kindle is a good day, too.

We walked down the hill from the hotel and had dinner at another hotel with a much higher Google rating. I pay attention to the ratings. More often than not, they are quite accurate when there are more than 200 or so. The food was really good. I went to bed early for Sunday’s forthcoming scuba fest!

Day 40:

December 7, “a date which will live in infamy” as we remembered Pearl Harbor. Our particular Saturday, December 7, was another lazy beach day. This time, we went south instead of north. We went to Kata Noi. It was smaller and way less crowded.

Faith hung out once again under a rented umbrella. She was happy as a lark. I alternated between the umbrella and snorkeling. The water was much clearer than at Kata Beach. I got some pictures with my camera in one of those flexible plastic shields. A couple came out. But the huge cuttlefish…no dice.

It was beautiful. Probably a foot long. And it fluttered along the bottom in about 12 to 15 feet of water. They look sort of like a cross between a short-tentacled squid and a blowfish. Anyway, I snorkeled a couple of times. The weather started to turn on us around 5 PM so we headed back to the hotel.

The storms were light and quick almost every afternoon that we were in Phuket. That day was no different. We took a shuttle from the hotel down to the beach to get some pictures of the sunset. There was a little seafood place a block or two off the beach that wasn't rated too poorly. Most of the beach-front places had great views and terrible reviews. We get the same thing in San Antonio with the Riverwalk. Most of the places on the Walk have mediocre food at best. I'm guessing they get enough foot traffic that they don't need to care about the quality of the eats. The seafood place wasn't bad (definitely not great) and after a lovely day, that was okay.

Day 41:

Just past the halfway point on our 81-day around the world trip.

I stopped scuba diving in 2000, the year I started working at Microsoft. My last dive was with a fellow with whom I had worked at WSIPC. He retired. I was still working at the time. Faith and I were looking for a new house. We were living with my parents in Marysville after selling our house. I was due to dive with Jerry on a Monday. Sunday night, I found the house we would end up buying in Bothell the next day. I cancelled with Jerry early Monday morning. He was super nasty with me—“I reserved this time, blah, blah, blah.” The f***er was retired and pissing about his missed schedule because I was buying our home. Our home! Ugh.

Anyway, the last dive I had until I took a refresher course this past October was in August of 2000 with Jerry. I was nervous but I really wanted to dive in Thailand. I booked a dive tour, and I paid the extra $60 to have a private divemaster dive with just me as my dive buddy. The alternative would have been to dive with a group of 4 to 6 other people I didn’t know and trust. I also hired my divemaster, Kid, to take his fancy-schmancy professional dive camera. He took over 100 pictures for like $20. Good lord, some things in Thailand are so crazy affordable.

It was a spectacular day. We did two dives out at Phi Phi Islands (pronounced pee-pee. No, I didn’t make that up). On both dives we saw black tip sharks. We also saw several moray eels and several huge schools of yellow fish. I remember now why I wanted to learn to dive. The dives were enthralling spectacles. So many different types of fish. Even a green sea turtle. The water was clear throughout the dives with some parts amazingly blue.

The third dive was at Shark Point. Here’s the irony. We saw no sharks at shark point. LOL. We saw another eel or two. That last dive, we dove without the camera. Just the two of us hanging out with the fishes in the bottom of the deep blue sea.

Meanwhile, Faith was hanging out at the hotel pool area and did some shopping downtown. I know how much she loves shopping. I do. But this one…scuba won hands-down!

We ate dinner at our hotel. It was better than the reviews said. I know I said to trust the reviews. And I still do. More often than not, they are correct. The hotel food was almost twice as expensive as any other place we ate, and it was pretty good. Not the best combination, but okay considering how tired I was from my day of diving.

Day 42:

Monday was our last day in Thailand. Our flight was scheduled to leave Phuket Airport at 8:45 PM for Sydney. We spent the morning and early afternoon hanging out at the hotel’s pool. We left around 3 PM to go shopping for underwater cameras. Online, I found a camera store in the town of Phuket.

The store turned out to be inside a mega mall. I wandered around for a while looking for the store. Found it. Shopped. Choked on the sticker. Didn’t buy. It was like three times as much as the camera I lost at Kata Beach. I did, however, get a bite to eat. Faith wasn’t feeling well. She got something bad to eat either that Monday or the evening before. It decided to linger for several days as we would find out later.

We arrived at the airport in time to return the car, eat, relax for a few minutes and board the jet. One full Lunesta for each of us and we were snoozing away the night’s flight.

- See you in Australia –