This will be part 1 out of FIVE recaps from this trip. Yes, there is a lot.
If you’re interested in all the entry requirements and how much it all cost – click here.
The first leg of this lengthy trip was going from Toronto to Vancouver to Singapore to Phuket.
The trip started kind of wild because our flight from Toronto to Vancouver ended up being delayed two hours and had to be de-iced? This was slightly concerning since I think our layover between landing in Vancouver and taking off for Singapore was only 2.5 hours.
I spoke to the flight attendant on the Toronto to Vancouver flight and my boyfriend and I got lucky, apparently there was a group of ELEVEN that also had to make the flight to Singapore. They were definitely going to hold the next flight for thirteen people. Not so sure it would have been held for just us two.
Did not miss flight, thank goodness.
The food on the 16.5 hour flight from Vancouver to Singapore was terrible. Air Canada should be ashamed of themselves. Thank goodness I know to purchase snacks at the airport before I board. Otherwise I may have starved. What do you mean the ‘snack’ option is a tuna sandwich and that is the only option? I don’t eat tuna.
Then by the time it was breakfast all they had was pork noodles. I just wanted some damn eggs and bread. No surprise, Air Canada just doing Air Canada things.
Sunday, December 22nd
We left Toronto on Friday and arrived in Singapore airport on Sunday. Damn time difference will really have you fucked up.
Thankfully, we arrived in my favourite airport in the whole damn world – Changi. I love this place. We were able to have some food and they had these great chairs we could lay down on during our layover.
After the short layover we flew with Singapore Airlines from Singapore to Phuket, Thailand.
I want to tell you, this short flight had THE BEST FOOD I have ever had on an airplane. Wowzers.
I chose the spicy seafood noodles. 10000/10
The dessert was a mango panna cotta as well, literally one of my favourite desserts. So impressed. If I can ever afford a lengthier flight with Singapore Airlines, I will be taking is ASAP.
We landed in Phuket just fine, there was a long customs line, but it moved fast.
FYI – when you land, try to follow the directions for Grab more carefully than we did. There is a designated pick up area, you can’t get the Grab anywhere else.
There is no Uber, we used Grab throughout our entire trip for getting around and for food deliveries. Make sure you download Grab and/or Bolt on your phone while you’re still at home.
The drive from Phuket airport to Patong Beach was pretty long, I think we were in the car just a little over an hour.
Our first hotel was the Ibis Phuket Patong.
The room was quite small, but the staff were wonderful, there was a pool and the location was SUPERB. Loved it.
We trapsed over to the nearby 7/11 because I had seen on TikTok these Toastee things. I wanted to try them so bad.
I really liked the cheese one! Get the cheese one.
Then we walked over to Patong Beach to watch the sunset.
The beach is busy, but it is really beautiful. I love that you can get so many varieties of food and have them in real plates and bowls on the beach. Wonderful experience, make sure to not miss this.
Oh, and if you are someone who partakes in cannabis, you’d quite like this area as well. There are as many dispensaries as there are 7/11’s. Enjoy.
Monday, December 23rd
We had an early morning today. Booked a trip to the famous Phi Phi Islands.
Our car picked us up at 7am and again, a lengthy drive ahead of us.
We arrived for our speedboat at 8am. I will say I read about the speedboat ride being unpleasant, especially for people with back issues. I am someone with chronic back issues, I did well! It was just fine for me, my back didn’t hurt and I didn’t get any motion sickness. The ride was almost an hour to Phi Phi Don.
The entry fee for Phi Phi Don is 20 Baht ($0.83 CAD) per person. Nothing too crazy, make sure you have the cash on you to pay.
We walked around Phi Phi Don for a bit before the captain for our private longtail boat met up with us. I liked Phi Phi Don, for a small place, it is quite busy. There is a lot going on.
If you see in the pictures below – the company we booked this excursion with was SUPER DUPER organized. The day before they sent us this detailed PDF of everything we would be doing, the times, the rules etc. Amazing. I love organized and orderly, and this company as most definitely that. All day, everything was on time.
The name of the company is Discover Phi Phi – click here if interested.
As beautiful as the water and surroundings were, we were totally enamored by the rock formations. These little islands in the area, so freaking cool. You just float by and wonder how they got to look like that and what happened to make them.
The first stop was monkey beach. We saw a family of monkeys, maybe seven of them all together. Very cute. Don’t try to feed them or touch them. The beach is very nice as well.
As we were floating by all these other islands, I was so happy we chose to go for a pricier tour that included this longboat just being for us two + captain. The super crammed big tour boats? No thank you. Made the right choice.
The second stop for us was the famous Maya Bay. If you are of a certain age, you will remember this location from the Leo DiCaprio movie ‘The Beach‘. I have wanted to go here FOREVER. This famous beautiful beach.
The entry when you arrive is 400 Baht ($16.66 CAD) per person. Again, make sure you have the cash ready because you will be pulling up in your boat and hopping off REAL quick. Also, make sure you have your sandals/shoes ready when you hop off the boat onto the pier because the sun makes the ground unbearably hot. I touched my bare foot on it for like 15 seconds and I paid for it. Very painful.
Well, the lines are crazy long, and you can’t swim on this gorgeous beach. I think I may have been the only person who didn’t know that? The disappointment was HEAVY and imminent. There was this beutiful water and sand, no swimming. And if you try to go in the water even past your knee? The men working on the beach will sound a horn at you telling you to get back out. So, don’t do it.
After 45-minutes or so, we left the beach and hopped back on our longtail boat. There was a quick 10-minute ride around the island and stopped to have lunch aboard. By this time, my boyfriend and I were pretty exhausted. I have to say I was pretty happy this was the last stop for the day.
Sat back at Phi Phi Don and had some ice cream waiting on our speedboat back to Phuket. Again, easy ride back and another one hour in the car back to Patong Beach.
This was the best time ever for a nap. Listen. After the crazy weekend of travel and now a whole day tour? Yes, naptime.
Once we woke up we walked over to Sugar Club, located on the infamous Bangla Road.
I had contacted a promoter at the club weeks before to secure a VIP booth for us two. This worked out well, I hate being in large crowds. I rather have all the space to myself.
The minimum spend for the booth was 6000 Baht ($249.85 CAD). This was easy peasy for me, because one bottle of my favourite rum pretty much came to that in the nightclub.
I’d recommend going here to party if you like hip hop and like dancing. You will be doing a lot of dancing. Had an absolute BALL. We left the club at 4am, that’s how much fun we had.
Tuesday, December 24th
Yep, got up at 1pm today.
Hangovers are not so fantastic. I will pretty much tell you about hangovers on all my trips I swear.
The perfect hangover cure was eating some soup. Which soup? Tom Yum soup. This was one of the best cures EVER. This soup hit the spot and it felt like I was a brand new person suddenly.
Walked back to the hotel and opted for a one-hour massage by the pool. My body was so messed up from the flying and the tour and dancing? Gosh. Needed this, got it. Helped a lot.
Took another nap, of course. Then we decided to walk back over to Bangla road and bring in Christmas amongst all the debauchery.
Wednesday, December 25th
Today we were heading to spend our Christmas somewhere pretty fucking dandy.
(sorry, cursing, Christmas, bad, I know)
The World’s First Floating Beach Club – Yona Beach Club.
At 2pm we took a Grab over to the Patong Jetty Dock. This is where we would catch a small speed boat over to the main boat for the day. We were greeted with nice little drinks and thankfully had booked our sunbed on the boat a very long time ago, they were letting everyone know the place was sold out. Shout out to me, doing everything super early.
It was only 10 minutes to the main boat and wow. The only feeling you have is WOW.
It is pricy, I will admit. But this is one of those places you should go party once in your life. Especially if you’re in Phuket? Hell yeah.
Very fancy pants. The food was good, the drinks were flowing. We somehow didn’t even use our entire minimum spend, pretty shocked by this. But it was so hot and we were just busy having a good time. Food and liquor and dancing? Made some awesome friends from South Africa too. Amazing Christmas. Make sure you get the French fries! I know it’s something simple, but SO YUM.
We were on the boat form 2:30pm until 9:00pm. Great.
Unfortunately as we were about to leave, people had way too much to drink, as you would expect. Some jerk vomited on the counter and it got on my nice sarong, had to throw that out immediately. Gross.
Otherwise, it was an amazing experience.
Went back to the hotel, packed up our stuff and went to sleep. End of the Thai portion of this trip.
WE LOVED THAILAND. I would go back to Patong Beach immediately, and would recommend it to everyone. Yes, I will say, the place can get a bit tawdry. I was slightly surprised to see that other tourists were out on Bangla road with their infants / toddlers? Not sure I’d bring a child there. But I don’t have kids, so. Who cares?
One more thing before we departed from Phuket, I must tell you to eat at this place (see photo below) at the airport. The ramen was sooooo good. You need it in your stomach, you need it in your life. We regularly talked about this specific ramen dish during our trip, that’s how good it was.
Moving on to Ho Chi Minh next!
- Mirna