Krabi - Day 3

This post is way overdue, I know. Haha. But anyways, will just share some pictures from my Krabi trip for Day 3.

I remembered choosing to go to Koh Phi Phi and Maya Bay for my island hopping package. We did go to other islands but I could only remember visiting the famous Maya Bay and snorkeling around other islands.

Look at the clear water. 

Snorkeling was fun!

Us in Maya Bay.

Maya Bay.

We went to Krabi in March 2016 and it was hot and packed with tourists. If you want to know how much we have spent on this trip, check out my previous post for Day 1 and Day 2. 

Krabi Itinerary - Day 1 & Day 2

3 months ago, I went to Krabi and had a blast there. It was my birthday trip! :) So, I thought of sharing my itinerary here and also the total cost incurred throughout the trip. Hehe. Firstly, let me state down the summary of the cost for this trip.

Note:- All costs stated below are for 2 pax.

• Air Asia return flight ticket (KL-Krabi) - RM248.00 (we did not add-on baggage)
• Hotel (3 nights) - RM635.42
• Cash (RM to Thai Baht) - RM800 (can't really remember the exact rate but I think it was approximately RM12 to 100Baht)
• 1/2 Day Kayak, 1/2 Day ATV Ride & 1 Day Island Hopping - 5,459Baht
• Hilltop Restaurant (for dinner) - 1,749Baht

TOTAL EXPENSES FOR 4D3N (2 PAX): RM2,548.30NETT

Day 1 - 06/03/2016

Was feeling extremely excited for the trip! :) Our flight was at 1.30PM so our plan was just to chill at the hotel until about 6 something before we head down to the night market. Upon reaching the airport, we went to board the airport shuttle bus. The fare was 150baht/pax and the shuttle bus would literally drop you off at your hotel. After long hours of research, this is the cheapest way to get to Krabi Town or Ao Nang from the airport. However, the downside is that it would take a longer time to reach your hotel as the bus driver goes from hotel to hotel to drop off passengers before it's your turn to be dropped off.

Areetara Resort. Image taken from Agoda.com

We stayed at Areetara Resort at Ao Nang, where I got injured in the bathtub. :( It was a terrible experience and I'll elaborate on that later. Anyways, back to the going-to-the-night-market story. Initially, we didn't expect it to be sooooo difficult to catch a tuk-tuk or a minivan to go to the night market from Ao Nang so we waited until the very last minute i.e. 6.00PM local time, to go down to the hotel reception desk and ask for a tuk-tuk. They quoted 400baht round trip for 1 pax. Wth. Of course we rejected. To cut the story short, we went to the tourist information centre to ask for a tuk-tuk and they provided us with an offer price if we were to take their island hopping package. After negotiation, we took their kayak + ATV + island hopping package and we agreed at 300baht/pax for return trip from our hotel to the night market.

The minivan driver picked us up from our hotel lobby at 6.30PM and I thought we would head straight to the night market. Apparently when they tell you "Wait at the lobby and our driver will pick you up between 6.30PM-7.00PM", they meant it literally. So yeah, the driver came at 6.45PM and we reached the night market at about 7.30PM as the driver continued picking up people from various hotels after we got on the minivan. We were then given about 1.5-2 hours at the night market before heading back to the hotel again.

At Krabi Town Walking Street Weekend Market

This is insanely good!

The night market operates from Friday-Sunday, 5.00PM-10.00PM.

Day 2 - 07/03/2016

It's my birthday! :) Happy birthday to me! Hehe. The second day was both fun and tiring at the same time. I couldn't really remember what time they came to the hotel to pick us up in the morning for the 1/2 day kayak trip. I think we went to Ao Thalane for kayak. This is my first time going on a kayak-ing trip and it was very exciting. My bf on the other hand, was exhausted because he did all the kayak-ing. Haha. All I did was being a small little kid who was very excited and took pictures whenever I could.

Baby. <3



 

 

Love this picture! The tour guide took this picture for us. :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Kayak-ing was really fun and I'd do it again next time! :) However, it was very packed with tourists as some of the routes were quite narrow.

We met a pair of German couple and friends from Philliphines and India. :) Had fun sharing stories from our countries at the end of our kayak trip.

We went back to our hotel for a quick lunch as lunch was not included in this 1/2 day kayak package. At about 2.00PM, the driver came to pick us up for our ATV ride session. It was something different and both of us were excited to gain this experience. The ATV session was about 1-1.5 hours. I was feeling really scared at first and I was afraid that the boiling hot engine motor would burn my legs. HAHA. Yes, I'm a scaredy cat. BUT I SURVIVED THE ENTIRE SESSION although I had blisters on my palms after that. Haha.

The tour guide kept taking photos of us. Hahaha.

We reached hotel at about 4.30PM and we quickly get ready for the most important event of the day: MY BIRTHDAY DINNER! :)

We went to The Hilltop Ao Nang Restaurant for the dinner. I just love the view there because I get to see the sun set and it was so romantic to be there with your beloved one. So, I just want to say that I'm lucky to be there with him. :) I booked a table via their official website a few weeks in advance to reserve a table with sunset view. The restaurant provides free shuttle service from your hotel to the restaurant which is a plus point. :) Krabi is so nice, right? Haha.

Us while waiting for our food & enjoying the sunset view.

The beautiful sunset.

 

 

Next up, pictures of food! :)

 



Hilltop Duck - 290Baht

 

Mussels - 290Baht



Hilltop Seafood Tom Yum - 250Baht

 

Cucumber with egg - 180Baht
 

Young Coconut - 95Baht

 

 

Hilltop Smoothie - 140Baht

 

The food there tasted okay and it's reasonably priced in my opinion. What I don't like about the food is that it was served too quickly and some of the dishes were cold. :( Maybe they pre-cooked most of the food. Sigh. But it's okay because the ambiance won me over. We also ordered a glass of cocktail and a bottle of Chang beer after our meal which costed 220Baht and 90Baht respectively. White rice was charged at 35Baht per bowl. We wanted to try as much dishes as we could so we shared one bowl of white rice. The total damage of the night was 1,749Baht inclusive of 10% service tax.

Went back to the hotel after our dinner and spent almost 1 hour in the lobby because the wi-fi in our hotel room SUCKS. He played games while I browsed and posted photos online. Haha. He wanted to go to some nearby cafe to buy me a slice of cake but then I declined his offer. Thinking back now, I should've accepted the cake offer. :( That was the 3rd time we celebrated my birthday together but he did not personally bought me a cake / slice of cake before. :( He said he would buy me a cake next year. :)

Speaking of our hotel room, I stepped on a piece of glass inside the bathtub and my feet was bleeding nonstop. Zzz. Bf went down to take first aid from the receptionist and informed them what happened. They didn't apologise and instead they said "You should be more careful". Wtf? SHOULD? Hello? Your hotel's bathtub has a piece of GLASS in it and instead of taking up the responsibility you said I should be more careful? Who would have thought that there would be glass inside a bathtub? Not forgetting to mention that there were ants on the table. So much for being a 4-star hotel.

That's all for Day 2! Will blog about Day 3 in another post.

P.S. Didn't check the spelling and grammar before I click publish because I'm too lazy. Haha.

Bangkok Trip 2015 (Day 3 & Day 4)

Day 3 (4/5/15)

We left the hotel at about 10 something and went to Erawan Shrine (4-Faced Buddha). It is said that praying there makes your wishes come true. I'm not sure how true that myth is but I did not pray because I was having my period. You shouldn't pray or step into the temple if you're having your period. You have to be pure and clean in order to enter any sacred place.

We traveled from On Nut Station to Chit Lom Station using our One-Day BTS Pass. (We bought a new One-Day Pass) It was easy to find Erawan Shrine as it was always crowded with people. So the boyfriend and the brother prayed there while both of us girls waited. (The bro's gf didn't pray because she's a Christian)

The crowd at Erawan Shrine.

We spent about less than 30 minutes there and went over to Central World Plaza which was located diagonally opposite Erawan Shrine. We literally spent only 15 minutes there because there was nothing to shop there. The whole mall was very quiet and slow; I could barely see any shoppers there. We left Central World Plaza and went to Terminal 21 after that.

Terminal 21 has 9 levels and each floor has a different country theme. Be sure to visit the toilet at every floor! I only visited Japan's and New York's. Haha. I like the fact that you can find almost anything there and I personally like the Japan floor. One more thing is that the food court, Pier 21, on the 5th floor, is a must-visit if you're at Terminal 21. You can find cheap and tasty food there. A plate of chicken rice costs only 300baht. I'm serious. We really enjoyed the food there. Both of us spent only 180baht in total for our food! How cheap is that?

To get to Terminal 21, take BTS to Asok Station and then take Exit 1 or 3 to get to the skybridge to the mall.

We left Terminal 21 at around 1.30P.M. and took a BTS to Siam Station. Next stop was After You at Siam Paragon! :) I was looking forward to this because I'm a huge dessert lover. After You is a famous dessert cafe in Bangkok and it's located at the basement level of Siam Paragon. 

Yes, there's always room for dessert. :)

The queue was horrible. But luckily we only waited for about 30 minutes for a table. The staffs were very efficient in cleaning up the tables.

We took a number and waited for our turn.

I was afraid that the cafe would be overrated because it was so popular and highly recommended by so many people. However, I was convinced after trying their green tea toast. IT WAS SO DARN GOOD.

Green tea toast.

The boyfriend ordered this because the name of this drink was 'World's Best Iced Chocolate"

It was really tasty :D

Mini banana crumble! So cuteeeee.

I can't remember the exact price for each dessert but I think the average price of a dessert is around 170-260baht, regular price of a dessert at a cafe in KL so I think it was quite reasonable.

After dessert, we took BTS to Saphan Taksin Station (Silom Line), and waited for Asiatique's free shuttle boat at Sathorn Pier. There's a shuttle boat to and from Asiatique every 15 minutes so we didn't have to wait too long for the shuttle boat.

Asiatique at night.

Image from Google.

Asiatique has 10 warehouses and every warehouse has different things to offer. There are many things to shop at Asiatique but the prices there are a lot steeper as compared to the prices in Chatuchak Market.

Due to the lack of time there, we didn't manage to explore all 10 warehouses. We linger aimlessly around Warehouse 4 and 6 and finally went to Naraya in Warehouse 1 to get souvenirs for my mum and his mum. The price of Naraya goods were so much cheaper there so the dearest bought me a bag too! :)

<3 Favourite photo of us of the entire trip! *we were wearing our new couple T-shirts that we bought from Chatuchak Market!*

Next up - Asiatique Sky a.k.a. Ferris wheel! I have no idea why but I fancy Ferris Wheels very much. :) We paid 300baht per person for the tickets. You can find out more about it here.

 

#nofilter

Then we met up with the bro and the gf for dinner. There were too many restaurants to choose from but we ended up choosing Fire & Dine! So glad that we have chosen that restaurant because I love the ambiance there and the food were so good and of reasonable prices too! The live band there played music which lifted up the mood of the whole place. :) A really good way to end our day!

Now, let the pictures of food do the talking.

Satay! Yums.

Their signature grilled chicken!

Chang Beers for the ladies. :D

I only managed to take photos of 2 of the dishes because I was too hungry. Hehe. We left Asiatique quite early as we were already exhausted by 8.30P.M. We wanted to go for another round of massage that day but by the time we reached our hotel, it was already 10P.M. However, we still managed to shop a bit at the night market near our hotel though.

The next morning, we woke up early and took a taxi to Don Muang Airport at 5A.M. because the genius receptionist told us that it could take up to 2 hours to reach the airport if the traffic is heavy. It's always better to reach early rather than to miss our flight, so yeah, no complaints. And for Laneige fans, please stock up your skincare at their Duty Free Shop! So much cheaper as compared to the price of Laneige in Malaysia. :)

That's all for my short getaway! I hope that this post would help those who are interested to visit Bangkok in the near future! :)

Additional information:-

• Erawan Shrine (4 faced Buddha) – Take BTS to Chit Lom. It's located in front of Grand Hyatt Erawan Hotel, corner of Ploenchit and Ratchadamri Road.
• Operating hours for Asiatique - 5P.M. till midnight 

Bangkok Trip 2015 (Day 1 & Day 2)

I finally have the time to blog about my Bangkok Trip! I'm going to split it up into a few posts because I have a lot to say about this trip. Everything went well, better than expected. However, the draft itinerary that I wrote earlier on wasn't followed entirely. Here's my draft itinerary.


Day 1 (2/5/15)

Flight at 4.25P.M. and landed in BKK at 5.35P.M. (local time). Thailand is one hour behind Malaysia. 2 hours flight from KLIA2 to Don Muang Airport.

Bangkok Transit System (BTS) Map

We took A1 bus from Don Muang Airport to Mo Chit Station. You don't need to buy the bus ticket beforehand. Just follow the signage of 'Bus/Taxi' and wait for the A1 bus. A1 buses operate from 8.30A.M. to 11.30P.M. everyday and it runs about 1-2 times per hour. The fare was 30baht. It took us 30 minutes to reach Mo Chit Station from Don Muang Airport and another 30 minutes to reach On Nut Station from Mo Chit Station. One-way journey from Mo Chit to On Nut costs 42baht. Our hotel was just a few steps away from On Nut BTS so it was really convenient. I was unsure where the exact location of our hotel was so we took a taxi from the BTS Station. The taxi driver just drove straight for about 10 seconds and made a left turning. TADA. We had reached our destination. Damn. 35baht gone just like that. We took a metered taxi and the meter didn't even jump. The starting fare was 35baht for every taxi. One gentle reminder - you have to insist on paying according to the meter BEFORE you get onto the taxi because taxi drivers in Bangkok would usually scam you into paying a ridiculous amount for a really short journey.

I was surprised when we reached the hotel because it was rather modern. The only thing I hate about that hotel was the attitude of the staffs at front desk. Imagine being greeted with scornful faces after having a long day. That was exactly how we felt upon our arrival. Didn't manage to take photos of the hotel though. We stayed at At Mind Executive Suites in Sukhumvit. On Nut Station was rather far from all the other stations so I would probably stay at somewhere near Asok or Siam next time. Didn't really have the time to explore Sukhumvit though.

Anyways, we went to Tesco Lotus for our dinner on the first night as we were too tired to travel to any other places. Food sucks at the food court so yeah. JH and I spent 85baht on our dinner. His fish rice was 65baht and I had 4 pieces of sushi (disgusting sushi), each piece costing 5baht. Don't even remind me about the sushi.

Day 2 (3/5/15)

Breakfast at the hotel was terrible too. Disappointing.. But we didn't let bad food ruin our mood that day!

Chatuchak Market. Love the blue sky and the clouds that day.

We went to Chatuchak Weekend Market after breakfast. One thing I learned from this trip was to spend the entire day at Chatuchak instead of just 2-3 hours because you can literally shop till you drop at Chatuchak. I'm not saying that the goods there are cheap (okay, maybe cheap but not dirt cheap), it's because Chatuchak is too big so you need at least a minimum of 4 hours there. That's just my opinion though. Some people might not like it there because the weather in Bangkok is scorching hot.  But you can always buy some fresh coconuts there! It would give you an instant relief. Btw, coconuts in Thailand are really yummy. I don't know why but it's a fact. We had at least 4-5 coconuts throughout our trip. :D

We spent only about 3 hours there and it wasn't enough. Spent about 1870baht there.

This freshly squeezed orange juice was tasty too!

Us at Chatuchak Market

We bought one-day BTS pass on our second day. A one-day pass costs 130baht and you can ride to as many stations as you want until midnight. So it was quite worth it as we traveled a lot via BTS on our second day.

Okay, now the directions there. We traveled from On Nut Station to Mo Chit Station. The journey was 30 minutes. Take Exit 1 when you reach Mo Chit Station then just follow the crowd. Haha. I am serious. Just go down from the sky bridge and follow the crowd. You would pass by Chatuchak Park on your right hand side. Walk straight for 3-5 minutes.

Next up was MBK. Regretted going there because it was a let down after going to Chatuchak Market. We took BTS from Mo Chit Station to Siam (CEN) Station. MBK is somewhere near one of the exits of National Stadium Station. We went to Fifth Avenue on the 5th floor to have our lunch in MBK. It's an international food court so they charge you international price for their food. HAHA. JH spent 263baht there and I shared tomyam with JH's bro's gf.

After that we took a taxi to Chocolate Ville. We booked a table there and our reservation was at 5P.M. so we started our journey at 4P.M. Let me tell you this, it was so difficult to find a metered taxi to Chocolate Ville that we almost gave up going there. In the end we negotiated with one of the taxi drivers who offered to take us to and fro for 700baht. We had no choice but to accept that offer. Normal flat rate charged by taxi drivers to Chocolate Ville is 400baht per trip. So 700baht was already a bargain.

In my opinion, you can really scrape off Chocolate Ville from your itinerary if you're don't like to take photos. Because all you do at Chocolate Ville is eat and take photo. There's only one restaurant there so you either dine there after taking photos or leave after taking photos. HAHA. See how much I emphasized on TAKING PHOTOS? Because honestly that is what you do there. Nothing much.

Btw, it's better to make a reservation if you decide to dine there. I made a reservation via their Facebook page and my reservation was cancelled because I was 10 minutes late. They only hold your table for 5 minutes max. So remember to be punctual.

 

I love light house!

 

 Now time for some food photos.

Salad. HAHA. I know it's obvious. I just want to state the obvious. Hahaha.

This was chicken gordon bleu. I think.

Pineapple fried rice.

Their signature pork ribs. And my finger.

Can't remember the exact price of every dish but it was about 200-400baht per dish on average. Now, photos of us! :D

 

I had to tip-toe because I was too short. HAHA.

Group photo of the day!

We left Chocolate Ville at 8P.M. The taxi driver was waiting for us. He dropped us back to Mo Chit Station and we took BTS to On Nut. 

Then we went for a massage! The massage parlour was very near to our hotel so we went back to the hotel to take a quick shower first. Full body massage for one hour was 250baht and foot massage for one hour was 300baht. JH and I went for the full body massage package and the bro and the gf went for foot massage. We were placed in the same room on the second floor for body massage. I laughed so hard when the massage therapist tried an 'aeroplane act' on him. I call it the aeroplane act because you have to spread your arms wide apart and the therapist would hold you from behind and both of you would be 'flying' like an aeroplane. HAHAHAHAHA. Omg what did I just type. What the hell. Now the images of that night came flooding into my mind and I'm sitting here laughing like an idiot again. HAHAHA. I was also mistaken for JH's wife and he just smiled and said no, not yet, just gf. NOT YET. Deep inside I was smiling like an idiot. HAHA. Okay, end of our massage story.

That's all for my first and second day in Bangkok. Shall continue my Day 3 some other time. Extra information are stated below.

• Hotel room per night - RM157.50 (tax included)   

• Return flight via Air Asia - RM628 for 2 pax (price inclusive of tax, 20KG baggage to BKK and 25KG baggage from BKK)

• Operating hours

1. BTS - 6A.M.-12A.M.
2. A1 Bus - 8.30A.M. - 11.30A.M.
3. Chocolate Ville - 4P.M.-12A.M.
4. Chatuchak Market - 6A.M.-6P.M.