Rawai

I'm not sure what exactly made me stopped/ take way too long doing these posts. Might be the immense amount of effort needed; sorting and deleting photos, editing them, coming up with a bunch of words to describe the sights and sounds of the trips and falling short due to my very limited vocabulary. Might be that adulting got in the way. Adulting does get in the way of many things you know.

Thought I will finish writing about Rawai since I'm already half way through it before starting on my more recent trips but seeing that it's been awhile - almost 9 months! *gasp* where have all the time gone? - I am a little hazy on where we went and the sequence of things so this post will have pictures from all over.













Everyone looked so adorable in their helmets I just had to post these! The remaining of the trip was spent mostly biking down the same routes everyday trying to get to the different beaches lining the southern end of Phuket armed with Wilson's trusty old frisbee. I rarely travel without an itinerary so it was quite a new experience, googling for nearby places we can visit and setting off 10 minutes later in search of these places.







I barely edited these photos at all, they're all golden because of the rays from the setting sun! I would love to relieve those days again, playing frisbee by the sea under such a dreamy setting.





Not having an itinerary also meant settling down at any restaurants along the street that caught our eyes and I exceptionally loved the place we chose to have our dinner at one night. It was situated right beside the sea and we had to sit on cushions! Anyone who knows me knows I absolutely adore dinner places with cushions. The tables were adorned with cute little pineapple tissue holders and candles. Dinner consisted of the usual must orders for any Thai meal - Tom yum goong, fried squid and the likes, shared over endless chatters and laughters. It was a great night!













We found the most amazing beach on the last hours of our trip. Nai Harn beach was tucked well beneath the trees. After parking the bikes on the narrow road leading to the beach, we made our way past a canal and some greenery before being greeted by the whitest sand and clearest sea we'd seen for the entire trip. The sails dotting the sea made for such picturesque view, we spent a good few minutes just standing there taking in the view.

It would seem that this beach was mostly frequented by the Caucasians as we were the only Asians there. Naturally, Nai Harn was a lot less rowdier than other parts of Phuket which seem to have been taken over by the PRC, its almost as if we were out of Asia! The guys played a couple rounds of frisbee while Jess and I soaked our feet in the water and it was only too soon before we had to leave to head back to our airbnb to wash up and prepare to leave for the airport.

I would definitely recommend anyone who've already been to the busier parts of Phuket to give Rawai a try. You'll find a completely different side to the otherwise overcrowded and overhyped Patong with lots to see if you're only a little bit more adventurous. ;)

Promthep Cape/ Windmill Viewpoint

Most evenings in Phuket saw us chasing after sunsets on our rented bikes. There are quite a number of sunset viewing points situated at the southern most of Rawai and most of them were only about a 10 - 15 minutes ride away from our villa but because we were only there for 3 nights, we only managed to visit two.

The most popular of the lot gotta be Promthep Cape and even though the panoramic view definitely lived up to its hype I couldn't help but feel that the experience was dampened by the massive crowd.













Riding your bike for another 5 minutes from Promthep Cape will bring you to the windmill viewpoint. As the road is narrower, not many tour buses can reach here, probably explaining why this place is mostly only frequented by the locals. Be very careful though if you decide to travel here by bike because you have to go pass some really steep roads, both uphill and downhill, but I can assure you it will be worth it!





At the top of the hill sits a pavilion. While we were there, a group of locals were sitting around strumming their guitars and singing along to the tunes and we got to enjoy the acoustics while waiting for the sun to set. How very lucky!





The sunsets we saw on both days weren't the best (so far nowhere else can beat the ones I saw in Bali, really) but still the view was stunning. I especially loved the boats that were dotting the sea!





I have a dream that is to watch the sun set beyond the horizon everyday but until Wilson and I can afford a house by the sea, it shall remain what it is. A dream. This way, I can have an excuse for a beach getaway once every couple months!

Back

Hola! It's been two years. Crazy how time flies.

With Wilson's sparkly new 50mm lens and my rather new Olympus we're likely to be taking a lot more photos and the Dayre app, albeit convenient, felt too casual for those. So I've decided that I should reserve Dayre for random everyday musings and keep my trusty old blogger for more proper updates.

In the last post, I mentioned that I was going to Bali for Christmas. Since then two more Christmases have came and gone. I've also travelled to Bali another time and flown to a few other places in between. Today, I'll be sharing some visuals from day 1 of my latest escapade to Rawai with my decade old friends!

















The bulk of the day was spent getting the administrative kinks out of the way. The boys went out to rent the bikes which was our main mode of transportation for the few days we were there. At only 250 baht a day it really made moving around so much easier especially since getting a cab in Rawai is rather inconvenient and uneconomical since the beaches and night market we wanted to visit were only about a 10 to 15 minutes ride away. We also spent some time getting to know the area around our accommodation and finished most of our groceries shopping at a nearby supermarket before riding down to the jetty to catch the sunset.

The Rawai trip being our first overseas trip together after 10 years probably explained the surreality of being in a foreign land with this bunch and the feeling that I'm on vacation hadn't really kicked in yet at that point but the night market we went to later that night did the trick! Being in Thailand naturally meant mouthwatering street food and I managed to get my banana pancake and mango sticky rice cravings satisfied. There was also a whole stretch of restaurants opposite a line of roadside vendors selling fresh produce from the sea where you could get your dinner ingredients and bring to the restaurants to have them cooked and served. We skipped it though as it was only the first day and we didn't want to overspend but I thought it'd be cool to try!

I'm still sorting out the remaining photos but I'll be back really soon with more.

Till then!