This was my room at the fab Indigo Pearl in Nai Yang, Phuket, Thailand. Yes, I had my own salt water dipping pool and a huge private patio. I spent 3 days here before joining up with my CELTA course at the British International School. This hotel is on the northern tip of Phuket which is two big national parks and a huge expanse of beach that goes for miles and miles. It is really lovely part of the island. I didn't expect to find anything so natural on Phuket.
Do check out the new videos posted to the right. That storm in Nai Harn on the southern tip of Phuket was really amazing. I listened to those videos again myself and decided I sound a bit...well...out of it or something. Anyway, it was 7 a.m. and I had just gotten up. I woke must faster than usual when I turned over only to see a gigantic spider in my bed. Thankfully, it was dead but who knows how that happened. Nevermind, I don't want to know. That was the weekend of July 12th and the storm lasted the whole weekend. The next two weekends were fabulous and I took full advantage by driving back to the southern tip of the island and the lovely Nai Harn beach.
Here is a view of Nai Harn from the viewing point above. It is such a nice little hideaway. I've realized there are some excellent benefits to excess tourism in certain places. Most of all I found I didn't have to see Patong at all and I didn't miss a thing. At the same time the island is full of diversity and is quite mature in what is available. I was able to rent a car (right hand drive, manual transmission) for a month without a hitch and return it to the airport on my way out. The Tesco, about 10 minutes drive from the school, was a huge asset for everything from club soda to magic markers to document covers. There is a huge variety of food including many great ethnic restaurants in every price range. We had an exceptional meal at Da Vinci, a lovely Italian eatery owned by a Brit who hasn't lived in the UK in 25 years. I actually lost track of all the places he lived but remember that he went to cooking school in France. The food was delicious!
A bit more about the CELTA course. We had 24 teacher trainees divided into two groups. It was actually two separate courses so we didn't get to know the other group nearly as well. At our award ceremony on the last
day, I found out that we had 3 PhDs among us, one of whom I had become quite close to, the lovely Mary Carey, a doctor of Eng Lit. Check out her blog at aboutamherst.blogspot.com. She is a journalist and teaches at U.Mass - Amherst. Here she is enjoying the lovely Nai Harn beach without the monsoon storm.
Mary and I became quite attached to this beach community on the southern tip of Phuket. It was just fab. Plenty of restaurants, shops, pharmacies (I am still endlessly fascinated with them), massage, and a wide range of hotels. We stayed in options from $12 to $100 and there are many more. I had the best massage of my life there for $15 for 2 hours and supplemented by a wonderful herbal steam bath which is traditional in Thailand. Our last weekend we had a 3 bedroom house in a lovely lush garden about 1 km from the beach.
Here is a view of Nai Harn from the viewing point above. It is such a nice little hideaway. I've realized there are some excellent benefits to excess tourism in certain places. Most of all I found I didn't have to see Patong at all and I didn't miss a thing. At the same time the island is full of diversity and is quite mature in what is available. I was able to rent a car (right hand drive, manual transmission) for a month without a hitch and return it to the airport on my way out. The Tesco, about 10 minutes drive from the school, was a huge asset for everything from club soda to magic markers to document covers. There is a huge variety of food including many great ethnic restaurants in every price range. We had an exceptional meal at Da Vinci, a lovely Italian eatery owned by a Brit who hasn't lived in the UK in 25 years. I actually lost track of all the places he lived but remember that he went to cooking school in France. The food was delicious!The best thing about the school was a tie between the 50 meter pool and campus cats. Both FANTASTIC!!!
We had one kitty who became a bit of a permanent resident in Karon House, our dorm for the duration of the course. The room was adequate and I was thrilled to have my own bathroom. The freezing cold air conditioning blowing on my head every night was not as pleasant. I tried going without the air cond and that wouldn't work either. I think that is part of the deal at these intensive courses, it is a bit of everything thrown together. Could you make it through living with 24 strangers for a month in a boarding school style? Getting away on the weekends made it all worthwhile for me and I cannot understand how some of the folks did the course without ever leaving the school.
I had another wonderful night of sleep in my huge bed in Taipei and am starting to realize I'm done with the intense training stuff and now it is travel, travel, travel. Today I am going in search of a lovely yoga teacher I met in Kuala Lumpur who lives in Taipei. Turns out she teaches at a studio not too far from where I am staying. I'm anxious for her to give me some tips on what to do in Taiwan. Did you know there are big mountains on the island and it has the most natural hot springs in the world after Japan? Some people say it is the most underrated Asia destination. Finally, the internet speed is FANTASTIC and I can upload my pics and videos to keep in touch and keep my own record of my big adventure!
Happy Monday!!!
Hot springs -- fantastic! How fun reading your account of our adventures.
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