Thailand, Phuket

July 29^th – August 14^th 2012: Phuket, Thailand

Driven distance on May 29^th 2012: 0km (0 miles)

Driven distance total: 46’290km (28’760 miles)

Here some words in general about India. According to us it really is an absolutely fascinating country. You probably will not find anywhere in the world so many unusual things like in India. The north offers spectacular and stunningly beautiful landscapes, and the authentic Tibetan culture is absolutely unique. Of course, you also get strongly confronted with the heavy poverty all over India. Most people in the countryside have nothing and are working very hard just to survive. Really obvious is the poverty also in the cities. Countless people are living on the streets or in slums. Sometimes it is quite oppressive to see all the misery and not being able to anything against it...

After we packed the Landrover in Kolkata into the Container, we flew to Phuket, Thailand to recover from the “exhausting” 2 ½ respectively 3 ½ months in India ;-). We spent the 2 weeks at the Nai Yang beach, approx.. 40km (25 miles) away from the main tourist place Patong. There were only few tourists at this beach since it was off-season, and also in general it was a rather quite place. Of course we also had our kite-surfing stuff with us and had in the first week actually some wind. Since it was a rather weak breeze we bought a new bigger kite (11.5) at our friend Bob (www.kiteschoolphuket.com). And once again our travel budget got over-stressed ;-). In the second week we had unfortunately no wind anymore L. We rented for two days a scooter and explored the surrounding sights of the island. On the first day we cruised along the coastline and visited some of the many beaches. There are some very nice and quiet (in the off season) beaches. The main place Patong was not really our thing. Crowded beach, overpriced restaurants, and too many all inclusive tourists ;-). Well we actually didn’t expect anything else from Phuket... :-). Also the coastline has many many buildings and villas, and many resorts are interrupting the idyllic landscape. On the second day we visited two smaller waterfalls, the Buddhist chalong temple and the “Big Buddha“ which thrones on a hill from where you have a great view onto the Chalong bay.