Karon Beach, Thailand (for Mar.15)

We had a great buffet breakfast before meeting our tour representative at 10:30. Our itinerary said we had a tour today, but it didn’t occur to me until late last night that this meeting likely wasn’t it. Sure enough, there had been some confusion and we were not placed on the tour. We will have to sort it out when we get back. In a way I am sorry to have missed out seeing some of the sites, but in another way, I am glad to have the day off to chill. Well, maybe chill isn’t the right word in this weather.



Our meeting was for him to set up our pick up for the airport and to try to sell us some other tours. With our limited time, there was only one that would fit and we decided to pass on it. Meeting concluded, we decided to head for the beach. We got there at noon and stayed until 3. We critiqued all the saggy old topless ladies, the misbehaving kids, the vendors on the beach, and the parasailing operation. The whole beach is lined with umbrellas and loungers that rent for $3. There was hardly a vacant one on the whole beach. The water was clear and almost bathwater warm. It was very calm, but there was a swell that wasn’t noticeable until you were in it. It was actually fairly strong drawing you in and back out with each swell, even though waves seldom broke on the beach.


We finally tired of the beach and sought a change of scenery at the hotel pool. They had a very neat little quiet, private grotto for relaxing away from all the action.












Luckily we were just in time for happy hour which ended at 4. We stayed a while longer, and then returned to our room to clean up for supper. I also had to repack my suitcase which I had emptied looking unsuccessfully for documentation of our missed tour. I finally realized that I had tossed out the tour company book when I was trying to lighten my bag out of Cairns because we were finished with them except for the Bali and Thailand stops which seemed to be so well documented in our itinerary.



We went for supper in the hotel restaurant at 6:30. Ron Sprung be warned: real Thai food is twice as spicy as at home! After supper I took Celeste on a tour of the sights I had seen last night. Then we walked to Kata, about a hundred metres from our hotel. We strolled down the main street soaking up the atmosphere and picking up a couple of souvenirs. In one place a guy had a mature and a juvenile elephant. He was charging people to buy feed from him that they then fed to the elephants. He attracted quite a crowd. Several places had live entertainment on a Wednesday night, all performing western music. One place had a Thai Elvis impersonator who had a crowd up dancing.

As we were finishing up our shopping in our last store there were a few sprinkles of rain. Celeste was feeling the heat and wanted to head back. We started back and the rain became a little heavier. I suggested we wait it out, but she insisted, with predictable results. We ended up walking back through heavy rain with rivers running in the streets and all the sheltering people pointing and laughing. We were totally drenched. I am not sure how we are going to pack these wet clothes for our departure tomorrow.

When we got back, Celeste set about wringing out and hanging up the clothes while I finished blogging. She fell asleep around 10. I called the front desk to arrange what we understood was a wireless connection. Next thing I knew there was a technician at the door to set up a modem for us. That was a bit of a surprise! I continued bloggine, emailing, etc. until 1.

There sure are a lot of Europeans here – probably more so than English speakers. It is probably closer here for them than it is for us, although they come from the other direction.