I got myself up that morning and checked out of the Furama and it was without doubt the best hotel i had ever stayed in, good staff, very clean and well maintained. I gave the concierge a tip when i left and then got my taxi transfer to Bangkok airport to catch my flight to Phuket. The flight was a short one, just over an hour and on arrival the weather was fine and clearly this place was more of a holiday resort than grey Bangkok. I got a taxi to my resort which was called Karon Beach and one of the quieter places in Phuket which suited me fine as i was staying there first and foremost to go to James Bond island and secondly for a bit of a rest from the madness of Bangkok. I arrived at my hotel the Baan Karonburi in the mid afternoon, the hotel was just over the road from the beach and it had a nice pool and poolside bar. The reception area and staff were good too and my room was also of high quality with a nice balcony, the only downside i had no sea view but that's only a very minor gripe. All in all Ryo had booked me in to a really nice hotel and i was chuffed to bits with it and what i had seen of Phuket so far.
I went out at about 5pm for a wander and the main street was only a 5 minute stroll down the road. It wasn't long before i found an english bar "The bar with no name" and settled down for a few Singhas and a few games of pool with the staff/customers (cheers, Nat, Noi, Keith and Shaggy). This was a great bar with loads of tv's and sport on constantly, the only downside was that there were street vendors who kept coming into the bar trying to sell bangles, trinkets and other assorted tat. I also noticed a very attractive lady who was working behind the bar and broke the ice with her by getting her to teach me how to say "one more bottle please". Then as i usually the case when you're on holiday you usually meet someone who lives about 5 minutes away from you and this was no exception when i had a couple of beers with a guy called Mike. Mike showed me a couple of bars and in the first we were besieged by female attention as we walked off the street. Within minutes i found myself playing connect 4 with a couple of bar girls, surreal, but they love it over there. Anyway we moved on and went to the "Gun" bar. Mike suggested i try a massage there as he had heard good things about it and a lady called Mina who worked there. I met Mina and she led me to a bathroom that was tiled top to bottom and wall to wall, there was a bath in the corner into which a frothy lather was prepared and a lilo on the floor which i lay face down on. Ill leave the rest to your imagination but needless to say i had probably the most relaxing pleasurable experience of my life on that lilo. Unfortunately this pleasure was short lived as after this i had a quick lay down on a large tiled surfae in the bathroom, probably about 4 feet wide, 6 feet long and 4 feet high. I went to turn over and you've guessed it, fell off onto the floor right on my hip, shortly after this i made my excuses and left with my head hung low, what a plonker! By this time Mike had gone, he must've got sick of waiting for me or maybe was having a masage of his own, either way he had paid the bar tab, cheers Mike.
Following this i returned to "Bar with no name" where i had a couple of beers with co-owner an ex-pat called Andy with who i shared my recent catastrophe. I made my way back to the hotel by way of tuk-tuk at about 11pm as i needed an early night. The tuk-tuk was not like the ones in Bangkok it was a Daihatsu Carry van with benches for seats in the back, the back had been enlarged slightly to enable passengers to sit in and the whole thing ended up looking a scaled down version of Scooby Doo's "Mystery Machine. Still it was a nice feeling being driven home in what was essentially a "Sooty van". The early return was necessary as in the morning i was going to fulfil another life long dream. I was going to visit James Bond island.
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