{"id":36370,"date":"2025-03-06T22:28:32","date_gmt":"2025-03-06T11:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/?p=36370"},"modified":"2025-04-27T08:12:10","modified_gmt":"2025-04-26T22:12:10","slug":"phuket-thailand-%f0%9f%87%b9%f0%9f%87%ad-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/?p=36370","title":{"rendered":"Phuket, Thailand \ud83c\uddf9\ud83c\udded 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Date : 4th March 2025 <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Travelled : 190 NM from Langkawi, Malaysia to Phuket in Thailand  <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Visited : Phuket\u2019s Old Town  <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stayed : Holland America\u2019s Zuiderdam<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Another wonderful 3 courses in the dining room last night, mind you we normally share a desert. The food is excellent and it\u2019s nice to dress for dinner. Most evening we go for a shared table so you sit with whoever and chat about the day. Haven\u2019t sat with anyone wearing a MAG baseball cap yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another tour today \u2018Phuket, the Old Town\u2019 but we have plenty of time for coffee our usual few laps and breakfast. We have been to Thailand before staying in Bangkok for a few days but never Phuket. Phuket<\/a> is an island off the southern coast of Thailand, there are 32 other smaller islands surrounding it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a tender ride to the pier (certainly not Pam\u2019s favourite way of getting anywhere) we find ourselves next to Ian and Barb from Victor Harbour (pictured below. They are friends of neighbours of friends, very complex but we enjoyed the chat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Phuket is a very popular destination for Australians, but to be frank it has never been on our must visit list. Our tour bus takes some 30 minutes to reach the \u2018old town\u2019. The outer suburbs are a little underwhelming as we pass through them. The tour guide takes us for a lap around the old town before dropping us off at the meeting point, a small shopping centre with clean facilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Wat Mongkol Nimit Burmese Temple<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Wat Mongkol Nimit Burmese Temple<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Wat Mongkol Nimit Burmese Temple<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Our first stop which is only a couple of blocks away is the Wat Mongkol Nimit Burmese Temple pictured above. Cannot tell you more except it was closed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Damn it\u2019s hot today in Phuket, it\u2019s a shade hunt. We continue walking but always on the shady side of whatever street where on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The tour guide describes the old town\u2019s architecture as Chinese colonial. Generally speaking there are just so many shops selling tourist clothing you loose count, then there are numerous bars, tattoo parlours and massage places. It repeats on every street.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The high point was finding a Starbucks. It\u2019s air-conditioned and has wifi, bad coffee aside. We have a long coffee break before going out for round two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It\u2019s not getting any cooler as we continue our walk however we stumble upon Sang Tham Shrine or the Shrine of the Serene Light. From the road we notice a mural and walk up the alley to have a look, finding a traditional gate, then the temple pictured below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Google tells us it was built in 1889 by a wealthy Chinese family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Sang Tham Shrine<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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We eventually find ourselves back at the pick-up point at the shopping centre. It\u2019s still 2 hours till the bus returns so we splash US$10 on a cab back to the Zuiderdam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its was nice to get off the ship and do some exploring but Phuket\u2019s not drawing us back for a second visit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a Brazilian Mardi Gras theme tonight so an afternoon nap is in order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Michael + Pam<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Date : 4th March 2025  Travelled : 190 NM from Langkawi, Malaysia to Phuket in Thailand   Visited : Phuket\u2019s Old Town   Stayed : Holland America\u2019s Zuiderdam Another wonderful 3 courses in the dining room last night, mind you we normally share a desert. The food is excellent and it\u2019s nice to dress for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":36391,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[67],"class_list":{"0":"post-36370","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-thailand","8":"tag-cruising","9":"czr-hentry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=36370"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36397,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36370\/revisions\/36397"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/36391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=36370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=36370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelandpamstravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=36370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}