Lily Lee: Pattaya 18 to 21 June

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Pattaya 18 to 21 June

Took the Thai Airway to Bangkok and managed to engage http://pttaxiservice.com/ for the taxi transfer from Bangkok airport to Pattaya. Their service is good- waiting way ahead of time and the driver was holding a board with my name at exit 3. I bought the 4 sets of the 7 day tourist 3G sim card (unlimited data with 100 baht call value) at 299 baht from dtac at the airport for our phones and tablets. We managed to reach Pullman Pattaya Hotel G at 1130 am. We were given an executive club room on the 9th floor - breathtaking view of the sea facing the gulf of Siam.

We took a taxi to the Santuary of Truth (Prasat Sut-Ja-Tum) and was awed by the architecture - all using wood carvings. It cost us 650 baht each with the horse carriage from the entrance to the Sanctuary as well as 2 rounds around the sanctuary. We had our lunch at the sanctuary - love the prawn omelette and steam fish!

the carvings on the ceilings

A true sanctuary - not crowded with tourists.

love the horse carriage ride

I love the fish and the omelette!

After that we proceeded to the Art in Paradise - a 3D interactive museum. We had so much fun taking photos there with all the 3D drawings. The admission was 500 baht each. We went to Health cruise which was just next to the museum for a 2-hr body massage. The massage was super cheap at 500 baht (around $21) per person for 2hr. After the massage we went for dinner at the nearby night market. Local delights such as Phai Thai, Fried oyster, Mango rice and bee hoon soup with coagulated pig blood. We walked down to Central Festival Mall (Big C) at 2nd road and did not find anything we wanted so we decided to go to Walking Street. We took a taxi and there was a bad jam at Beach road near to walking Street. It suddenly poured and we decided to take shelter at a Russian restaurant. Love the sauce for the beef fillet and the Lobster Thermidor with rice. Though it was our first try at Russian food.. I must say it isn't bad at all. Lee managed to find the bug cart which was at the extreme end of the Walking Street when we were looking for taxi to bring us back to the hotel. He bought the scorpion, beatle, cricket, locust and other bugs.... he said that the scorpion taste nice like fried prawn but the beatle is the worst as it is acidic. We didn't see any taxi around so we took the tuk tuk back to the hotel. We realised that the taxi was just a bit further down the road! The wind was so strong and the waves plunges against the beach... we could hear the wind howling even when we closed the windows.

Art in Paradise (Pattaya) - had fun with the 3D interactive paintings in the museum.

the bugs which my husband sampled...

The breakfast on 19 June was at the sunset lounge. They even have champaign and smoked salmon for breakfast. The coffee was strong and omelette was served rather that having to queue for it in most hotels. After that we walked down the beach as I have booked a 4-hand massage at the Aisawan Spa in the hotel where we are staying at 10am and there was still some time. The ambience was good though the price is still steep at 3700 baht (though the promotion was buy 1 get 1 free)

We have decided to engaged Mr Toy's taxi service as we find him very friendly and honest - he is prepared to bring us to 3 places from 1130am to 7pm for a price of 500baht. His email is wiboon53@hotmail.com and no. 0832392378. However as he was so nice - we gave him 1000 baht ($42). Our first destination was the floating market and luckily we got him as it was quite a distance away from our hotel. I found a lot of local food there. After that we went to Royal Garden Plaza where we visited Ripley's Believe it or not, Lord Tussaud's Wax work, Infinity Maze at a package price of 600baht each. We had cold feet at the infinity maze as it was so dark and came out the moment we entered! We had tea at the food court above it and the view of Pattaya Beach was amazing from the food court.

Hubby forgot to take off his shoes when he went up the platform to try the local dishes at the floating market.

Free cultural performance at the floating market - more like them flirting with each other.

Can't believe anyone would take a boat ride under the hot sun... all parts of the floating market are accessible by foot as they are linked by bridges on the artificial lake.

Lord Tussaud's Wax work

After that we went to Mini Siam and took many photos. Personally I prefer this than the one in Taiwan. I was pleasantly surprised that there was a night market next to Mini Siam - more shopping and food. We went back to our hotel at 7pm as I have already made a reservation for dinner Bodego Fever (Spanish) at Beach Bar.

Not all are miniature size!

night market next to Mini Siam

nice cream local pancake

excellent performance by Santos @ Bodega night- he even sang us a Chinese song

cold soup - interesting idea

We decided to just relax on the 3rd day - we had a 2 hr massage with a foot scrub at the Savanna Spa nearby at only a total of 1400 baht for the 2 of us. We also decided to walk to the Dolphin Roundabout and do some window shopping. We saw the JJ night market and decided to visit it in the evening. We went back to the hotel after visiting the World Gem and the souvenir shop.We went back to the hotel and got the cabana bed near the beach and had our lunch- oyster and seafood platter there. The current was too strong for swimming and hubby went over to the pool. We went to the night market but did not find much.. I bought a watch and hubby bought 2 spectacle case. We had dinner at a Korean restaurant - the building did not look impressive but the food is good!