Thursday, January 10, 2013

Phuket Adventures: Phuket Town

Our adventures continued one day to Phuket Town, which was about an hour away from the resort by shuttle. We stopped there because a) it was one of the stops the shuttle made, and b) it looked like it might be interesting. Unfortunately, only a) was true.

No, actually, it wasn't all bad and had a very nice temple, which ended up being the only one we saw due to "the tailor story" which is coming up in a later post.

When we got off the shuttle, a guy from a taxi company suggested we take a tour of the 'old town' and the temple. We hadn't yet checked things out and couldn't tell if we were potentially getting ripped off so decided to walk around a bit first and come back if interested.

So we walked around, found a little bit of shopping (horrible) and a nice little place for lunch (yummy and cheap) and then decided to take the tour as it didn't look like there was much else to do in Phuket town. Our only requirement was that we see the sights by Tuk Tuk.
It cost us $3 for the 30-45 minute tour in our Tuk Tuk. And yes, it was uncomfortable, smelly and hot, but it was part of the adventure.
The tour of 'old town' was a bit of a bust. It was one street and the only building the driver pointed out was the one above - some kind of government building, we guessed as we couldn't really understand what he was telling us. Well, really, what do you expect for $3?
More interesting were the variety of transportation options we saw on the streets. lots and Lots and LOTS of scooters (much cheaper than cars) and then all kinds of souped up motorcycles like the two in these photos.

The tuk tuk also took us to a temple, but I'm sorry to say I didn't catch the name. It was a small area next to a school. The photo above includes some signs of advice that were posted on the trees outside the temple.
We weren't allowed in the temple - it was locked up, which someone later told us was a bit strange as the temples all over Phuket are open to the public like most religious building around the world. Maybe it had something to do with the proximity to what looked like a high school?
In any case, the exterior was beautiful enough, although I'm sorry we didn't get a chance to see more and go inside a few. They look gorgeous.
Here's a good view of the whole area. Pretty small, actually. I don't really know anything about the religion of the area so not sure if it's for a small congregation or maybe people come individually so it doesn't need to be bigger. Definitely something to research before a return trip to Thailand.
So, we're walking around town and there really just isn't anything going on. Not many people about and a pretty quiet afternoon. And then we look across the street and see this woman hauling a huge cart of stuffed toys. I had to get a photo. Where was she going?

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