Phuket Bike Week 2015 and Songkran Festival 2558

It has been a while since I jot down about my travelling experiences in this blog due to my busy schedule.

April 2015

Syimy a.k.a. Surd and I have been discussing about our getaway holidays in Thailand since early of this year. We planned for a trip as we love the adventure of going to foreign places where we have never been before.

For the introduction, Surd and I were buddies since we were in form one during secondary school in the Penang Free School, 29 years ago. We went to school via the public bus i.e. the MPPP bus. The MPPP bus had ceased its operations many years ago. We were in the same school army cadets (PKBM) and we represented our school in the rugby tournament. Surd was one of my Props and I was the Hooker. The other Prop was Man Gajah. Everyone had their own nickname during those days. Mine was E.G. or sometimes they called me Pak Lang. hehehe

We decided to go in April 2015 which coincides with the Phuket Bike Week 2015 and Songkran festival. It was our first experience to see and experience them from up close and personal.

All packed up and ready to go.

11 April 2015

Surd arrived at Butterworth from KL in the wee hours by bus.

6.30am

After we have had our breakfast at Seberang Jaya, we drove off from Butterworth to Bukit Kayu Hitam.

8.00am

Upon reaching Changlun, we stopped at the Petronas station to fill the tank to the max. This was our last petrol station in Malaysia before crossing the border.

Unfortunately, there was a massive traffic jam at Bukit Kayu Hitam with lots of vehicles heading towards the border. We were stuck in the traffic jam only less than a kilometer from the Malaysian CIQ complex. I have never expected that the Songkran festival is a BIG festival for Thais. It was like a scene where everyone was on their way to 'balik kampung' in Thailand.

The one kilometer traffic jam took 2 hours to reach the Malaysian CIQ complex.

10.00am

We reached the Thai CIQ complex, parked my car and queued to stamp our passports and to get the vehicle permit from Thai Customs Dept. The process took another 2 hours.

A Thai police with water gun, ready for Songkran.

12noon

Finally it was done. It took us 4 hours to cross the border. The normal time taken to get across the border was usually between fifteen minutes to half and hour only but due to the Songkran festival, the crowd was overwhelming.

We went by foot to Dannk to change the currency. Ringgit value had dropped quite steeply at that time. The exchange rate was RM1 = 8.75Baht.

I bought a Thai prepaid SIM card just to get the data plan as I'll be using the Waze app on my smartphone for GPS directions. The cost for a prepaid SIM pack was 100Baht plus 370Baht for 1GB unlimited data plan for 1 week. Total 470Baht.

We had our heavy lunch at Dannok as we intend to drive straight to Phuket and the estimated travelling time is 7 hours.

1.00pm

The journey in the Land of Smiles begins. Traffic in Dannok was quite heavy as the were maintenance works on some parts of the road. They are replacing the road from tarmac to concrete due to the huge number of heavy vehicles that had caused damage to the tarmac.

The route that we took: Dannok - Hatyai - Phatthalung - Trang - Krabi - Phuket.

The highway in Thailand was nice and without any tolls to pay.

A normal scene on Thai roads.

We stopped at a petrol station somewhere in Trang, not to refill the car tank but to unload our 'tanks'. hehehe

Another stop was at a petrol station Krabi town for toilet break and some refreshments. It was raining from Krabi to Phuket. The road was slippery when wet and we came across one or two road accidents.

Along the way, we saw many bikers from Malaysia and Singapore travelling to attend the Phuket Bike Week. They rode all types of bikes, from big bikes to small bikes and from new bikes to old classic bikes i.e. kapcais, scooters, vintage Vespas and other classic bikes.

8.00pm

We reached the bridge to enter Phuket island. From there to our hotel in Patong area took another one hour as there was a road closure due to maintenance near the Central Festival Mall. We had to take a longer route to our destination.

9.00pm

We finally reached our hotel. A budget hotel with RM50/night (the rate was in RM because I booked online through Agoda.com).

The room was cozy, spacious, clean and with all the basic facilities including free wi-fi. It's worth more than its value. I didn't mean to undermine the hotels in Malaysia but for RM50/night, you can only get a "hotel ayam" in Malaysia.

This is one of the reasons why I like to travel in Thailand.

After checking-in and refreshing ourselves, we went out for dinner, We went by foot. It was drizzling lightly but it didn't bother us as we were really hungry after a long drive.

After walking for about 900 meters, we found a halal restaurant. We ordered a green curry, omelette and some veggie. The food was great, or perhaps we were hungry at that time. hehehe

There were lots of Malaysian tourists having dinner at that place too.

Thai Green Curry @ kaeng khiao wan.

Fried ice cream.

After we have had our dinner, we decided to have a stroll around Patong. The Bangla Street was lively and lots of entertainment outlets, clubs, bars and so on. That's how Bangla Street got its reputation. We just walk and walk and walk along the streets and Patong beach until we got really tired and decided to go back to the hotel. We took the motorcycle taxi back to the hotel.

12 April 2015

We woke up a bit late in the morning. We rented a scooter from the hotel. The rate was 250Baht per day, We rent it for 2 days. It was a Honda Click 125i. I rode the scooter and Surd on a pillion. The Honda Click had quite a powerful torque considering both Surd and I weigh a lot. I am very impressed with its automatic transmission.

View from our room balcony

We rented a scooter and parked the car here until the day we checked out.

I took us to a halal outlet for breakfast or brunch to be exact. It was located opposite the Patong Central Mosque. We had fried rice and some sticky rice.

After brunch, we went to the Phuket Bike Week venue at Patong Beach. This was my first time attending a Bike Week in Thailand. The Malay movie "Bikers Kental" had given me the inspiration to come this far to see and feel it up close and personal.

The feeling was awesome. There were lots of motorcycles especially from Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. The visitors I could say, came from many parts of the world.

From my observation, the superbikes were not really an attraction to the visitors. People were more keen to take their photographs with the classic and vintage motorcycles. I guess the superbikes are too mainstream. hehehe

After we were done with the motorcycles show, we rode around Patong and we went to buy some t-shirts for souvenirs to be given to our loved ones at home. There was one shop that sells t-shirt for 100Baht per piece. I believe that's the only outlet that sells at that price. The rest of the shops sell their t-shirt for 150Baht and above per piece.

We went back to the hotel to keep the t-shirts that we bought and then we rode to the south, taking the route along the beach. There were some steep hill roads to climb and the Honda Click never fail to impress me. It was a great experience riding a scooter in Phuket, with all the tourists who were also on their rented scooters and mopeds, the scenery, the beach, the hill, the people... you have to be there to experience it for yourself.

Surd was so thirsty. Drink first, pay later. 55555

At last, after several uphill and downhill road, we finally reached the Promthep Cape. The distance was about 20km from our hotel. Promthep Cape is the place where people go to experience the beautiful sunset. We arrived a bit early and had to wait for the sunset. Our waiting was worth it. The sunset was magnificent. Even though I had captured the photos of the sunset and post them here, the real view was far more better than the photos that I had captured.

After the sunset, it was getting dark and off we go. Along the way, we saw a shooting range and tried the AK-47.

At night, we went to the Jungceylon Mall. Phuket has lots of shopping malls but this one is located in Patong. I surveyed some of the items there and concluded that many items' prices were almost the same as in Malaysia. What can you expect from branded items in shopping mall? The cheap items in Thailand are the ones sold at the bazaars and street vendors.

Then we headed back to the Bike Week venue at the beach. There was a live concert performed by local bands. They played some Thai and English songs. The common songs they played were "Born to be wild" and "Highway Star". I guess they feel that those songs were related to motorcycles.

We had our dinner there. I had a spicy salad with instant noodles, I don't know what they called it. We had a bit of communication problem as the Muslim girl at the food stall do not speak English or Malay. I just pointed my finger to the dish that I want. It was really hot & spicy that I had to drink 3 cups of drinks to cool down my tongue. hehehe

We stayed and watched the concert until it was over at around 1.00am. We went back to the hotel and fell sound asleep.

13 April 2015

This is the day. Songkran officially begins on this day. We had our breakfast at a halal restaurant somewhere near our hotel. 

Rise & shine!

Heavy breakfast. 

It's called Phanaeng kai (Penang curry) but doesn't taste anything like Penang curry at all. LOL

After breakfast, we rode up north taking the route along the Kamala beach. Along the way, there were lots of people splashing water towards each other. Some were on the streets with huge water containers, some with water guns, some with water hose and what caught me off-guard was some of the water thrown at us were iced cold water! hahaha

Candid shot - they were holding hands. How lovely.

Along Kamala beach.

It was great fun, everybody was soaking wet. Everybody was involved in the splashing battle. It was not just water splashing but you get powder thrown or being smudged at your face too. What an experience. This is the kind of festival that I like.

Soaking wet & drying-off in the sun.

Unfortunately,  I didn't managed to capture all the water splashing action as my phone-cam is not waterproof.

Layan beach... layan...

We rode up north, along many beaches, up until the Sarasin Bridge that connects Phuket island and the mainland.

After we took some photos there, we went to look for the beach near the airport as we intend to take some photos of the planes landing just above the beach.

It took us quite a while to find the location.

Finally we found the beach where the end of the airports runway is located. It was a secluded beach where not many tourists were seen. A very nice beach indeed.

We waited for a while to get some shots of the aircraft. Unfortunately, the beach is where the aircraft took-off. Hence, we were unable to get a closer shot of the aircraft. If the aircraft was descending towards the airport, then we might get a closer shot as the aircraft would be slowing down to land.

After a few minutes, it began to rain heavily. We were soaking wet. Oh well, we were already wet on this Songkran day. LOL

We really enjoyed ourselves, we just love the beach, the serenity, the rainy weather, the scenery and so on... that's the purpose of vacation.

After we've done at the beach, we rode on, braving the rain. The chill wind made me shivered a bit but it didn't bother me much. We stopped by at a petrol station to fill the scooter's tank. There was a small food court there. We saw a halal stall. There were two Muslim elderly ladies manning the stall and they couldn't speak English. I had to point at the menu of the dish that I would like to order. I ordered a beef noodle soup. Mai pen rai!

Having a hot bowl of beef noodle soup when I was soaking wet after riding in the rain is heaven! LOL

Then we rode on through the main roads of Phuket town. People were seen having fun splashing water on each other. We stopped at a shopping mall, it's called Central Festival. The mall is no different from any malls in Malaysia. We had a hot cup of  cappuccino there. Surd bought a 'pak tongko', some called it 'kuih cakoi'. We were quite surprised that the Thais also called it 'patongo'.

The Thais called 'Pak Tongko' as 'Patongo'.

As it was getting dark, we rode back to our hotel. It was a bit tiring, we took a little nap before we freshen up and went out again for dinner.

We rode around Patong area looking for halal food outlets, we found a few but not to our liking as most of them served seafood and Surd had to avoid seafood due to the uric acid factor.

As we rode in and out the many 'soi' (street), we finally went to one of the halal food stalls located near the Patong Mosque. We had our dinner at one of the halal restaurants located near the area.

Later on, we went back to the Bike Week venue on the beach, enjoying the live band performance on the stage until it was late and we called it a day.

I believe they meant "Angels" 

Phuket cowboys

14 April 2015

7.00am We checked out early as we need to reach the border early.

8.00am

We reached the Sarasin Bridge and left Phuket island. The Waze app that I used for GPS had eventually veered us from the main route. It took us to a rural road through the hilly area. I guess it's part of the national park. In the end, we reached Krabi town and we were back on the normal route.

Sounds like Midgee. hehehe

Many bikers from Malaysia and Singapore were also seen on their way back home. We can see most of them had the watergun used during Songkran strapped on their luggage. 

The road from Trang to Phatthalung.

3.00pm

Reached Danok but the traffic was quite jammed. We changed our route to Padang Besar. 

3.30pm

We reached Padang Besar CIQ complex. Luckily the queue at to stamp the passport was not long. Soon after, the crowd began to increase as many had diverted their route in order to escape from the long queue at the Danok CIQ.  

4.30pm

We had our late lunch at Padang Besar Malaysia shopping arcade and then drove back to Butterworth

6.30pm

We reached Butterworth and Surd bought his express bus ticket to KL. He got the 8.30pm bus.

That's all for this trip. Till then, cheers!