One week in Phuket is barely an introduction to this lovely Thai island. After two tremendous nights in Phuket Old Town (see 1st Part), Roy and I spent five fabulous days on the popular west coast of Phuket – a good balance of gorgeous beaches, copious cocktails, Soi Banglah girly-bar sleaze, and pukkah Royal Thai cuisine.
When it comes to choosing accommodation, it’s tricky to advise anyone where to stay on their first visit to Phuket. That said, I think you’d be safe choosing any of the western or southern coast beaches.
But which one? – Kalim, Patong, Karon, Kata, Kata Noi? And which hotel? Here’s a map of just the Patong hotels – the choice is mind-boggling.
How much does Roy love a sea view?
As I may have mentioned before, my Roy is no beach bunny. But he does love a sea view. On my first trip with him from South Africa to the UK, back in the nineties, we looked at an apartment for sale in the East Anglian coastal town of Southwold. (He also loves looking at estate agency windows.)
This apartment was all high ceilings, workhouse Gothic red brick and large windows with sweeping views of the leaden and bitterly cold North Sea. And too many fireplaces for my liking. I was repelled; my man was charmed to bits. “I could retire in this place,” he announced, “and just sit here at the fireside with a whiskey, looking at the sea all day.”
Fortunately, I hadn’t yet even thought of marrying Roy, let alone retiring with him. If I had, I might have run off then and there. The trouble is that while he wants to simply sit in his gown and slippers and gaze down at the ocean, I need to leave footprints on its waterline, float in its shallows, catch its waves, lie spreadeagled on its sun-baked rocks, comb it for shells and track its sand back to my house.
That was 30 years ago, and neither of us has changed a bit. He still likes estate agency windows and wants a sea view. So, as a loving wife, it behooved me to find budget-friendly seaside places with phenomenal views for our last five nights in Phuket. It’s true that the best views are often from hotels on steep sites. Luckily, I don’t mind trekking up and down hills.
Three Nights in Kalim and Patong
Kalim Beach is just north of the long Patong Beach stretch. This is where Indochine Resort & Villas is located, hugging the steep hillside.
The Road to Patong
I walked down the beach road, Prabaramee Road, to Patong Beach that first morning (25 minutes), paddled in the shallows and caught a tuk-tuk back to the hotel (300 baht, about A$8).
I did the same the next morning, but more with the aim of buying a knock-off handbag with no spousal interference guidance. Walking along the roadside is a bit hairy at first, especially after suburban Western Australia’s relatively quiet roads and safe pavements, but you get used to it. And it’s worth it for these views.
Review: Indochine Resort & Villas
The view was great. In fact, the view was the best thing about the place.
What you cannot see in this photo is the so-called spa bath at one end of the shallow pool – so shallow that I could pull the lounger into it. No good for swimming, but nice for cooling off. Soap is not allowed, understandably, so the spa is just a bubbly corner.
Sadly, the hotel is long overdue for renovation. Finishes are shabby; floors are scuffed; furnishings are sparse, and the outdoor (and only) shower runs randomly hot and cold. On the plus side, the service staff could not be faulted. The included breakfast was excellent, ice was delivered within three minutes, and the shuttle to Patong Beach ran like clockwork. The place is well staffed and managed, but obviously needs a lot of money spent on it. COVID-19 shut-downs can’t have helped, but I have it on good authority that this is a much longer-standing issue.
Eating and Drinking
On our first night, finding the hotel restaurant direly empty and the still-advertised rooftop bar long defunct, we crossed Prabaramee Road to Pantai Seaview Halal Restaurant for a delicious Thai meal: again, with a splendid view of the Andaman Sea. Fortunately, not so halal as to deny a thirsty diner cocktails or beer.
I had lunch there solo the next day. (Roy had succumbed to the included breakfast, sneaking in just before 10.30am closing to place his breakfast eggs order.) Here’s my scrumptious lunch: salmon sashimi salad, six mighty prawns; and a small Singha beer, not pictured.
Patong by Night
After more than a decade, I couldn’t wait to revisit Patong’s Soi Banglah. Roy has never been a bar guy, and I’m probably keener on the dancing girls than he is; but he humours me.
It’s a good idea to line your stomach before inflicting inferior cocktails on it. So, having caught the 8pm hotel shuttle into Patong, we had dinner at The Savoey, as we’d done several times in the distant past. It was exactly as we remembered it.
We ordered a huge green mango salad, green chicken curry, and a platter of three whole charcoal-grilled squid that Roy had to run off and choose from a slippery heap. All washed down with a delicious rambutan margarita and a couple of Singhas.
Dancing Girls in Soi Banglah
Though there was plenty of touting for kinky sex-shows, we saw no evidence of the glamorous transvestite or drag queens of yore. Ironic that all of that has been cleaned up, considering the all-out promotion of LGBT and its accompanying alphabet soup in the woke West.
I didn’t photograph the bar-counter dancing girls wiggling their bottoms, but couldn’t resist this spectacular pole-performer.
Royal Thai at Baan Rim Pa
On our last night, we turned right at the Indochine gates for a seven-minute walk to Baan Rim Pa, traditional Royal Thai restaurant with the obligatory stunning views over the Andaman Sea. It’s one of those beautifully burnished wood-from-head-to-foot places. It’s spread over two-and-a-half floors, every table with a sea view.
Against the odds, Anne had reserved for us a “front-line” table, meaning located at the favourable edge of the terrace. Slick, friendly service and a pianist tinkling old favourites made it nicely romantic.
Good food, too, the highlight being a filleted whole steamed fish in soya sauce (about 650 baht). Papaya salad with dried shrimps (295 baht) came in a spiffily carved half-melon basket; crispy pork with curry paste (365 baht) and fried Southern mushrooms with chilli and minced prawns (345 baht) were all lovely and should have completed the meal.
Hard to believe we still had room for mango and sticky rice (245 baht) plus a scoop of gorgeous durian ice cream (95 baht). Mostly, we enjoyed our server’s amazement at seeing ang mohs / farangs devouring durian ice cream – apparently a first in his experience.
Two Nights in Kata Beach
I love Kata Noi Beach ever since Roy and I reviewed Mom Tri’s Villa Royale, at least 15 years ago. This fabulous hotel was owner-designed by the same Thai architect, Mom Tri, who was responsible for The Boathouse on neighbouring Kata Beach, which I also reviewed, but on a separate occasion. Those reviews were published in Expat Living magazine (Singapore) many years ago. (I’m part of the EL team again, so check us out at expatliving.sg – a good website and still a great mag that I’m proud to be writing for.)
Review: The Sea Galleri by Katathani, Kata Noi Beach
It’s a bit cheeky to describe this hotel as being on Kata Noi Beach, though it is certainly the closest, and just 350m away. But that’s a jolly steep 350m, and by no means as the seagull flies.
This trendy, young-vibe hotel has whimsical architecture and stunning sea views. Nice shady areas around the restaurant offer places with good WiFi to sit and work, if you have to. (I did.)
Our Vintage Sea View Room was perfect for our needs. Though the style was nominally vintage, it was all brand-spanking-new, and included two of my favourite things: a balcony and a bathtub. It cost around 6,500 baht for two nights – that’s less than A$140 a night, including the usual generous buffet breakfast. Excellent value.
You don’t get sea views without a hike – that was the case at Indochine, and even more so at The Sea Galleri. On our first morning, I checked out both Kata Noi and Kata beaches by foot: there and back before breakfast.
Yes, Roy dropped the time-restricted eating regime and started doing breakfast again, just temporarily. I understand: he can’t resist fried eggs when they’re free. (Click here for my Living Long & Strong with Verne and Roy blog-post that explains how Roy lost 35kg between 36 and 18 months ago, and continues to keep it off, partly by eating only in an eight-hour window.)
As mentioned, it’s a steep hike down the hill to Koktanode Road (seven minutes) and an even steeper one back up (eight minutes); but I didn’t want to wimp out and pay 200 baht for a taxi.
Like IndoChine’s shuttle to Patong, The Sea Galleri offers an hourly shuttle during the main part of the day to Kata Noi and Kata beaches. This worked beautifully on our second day, which we spent mostly at the hotel, enjoying the fabulous pools. I took the 1.45pm shuttle to Kata, found a massage parlour, which is not difficult (300 baht plus 100 baht tip), returned to where I’d been dropped and waited just five minutes to be picked up.
Review: Dinner at The Boathouse
Roy booked ahead, which is necessary at this iconic restaurant; you need to pay a substantial booking fee, too.
There’s no way I’m going to give The Boathouse a bad review. We go back too far, for one thing. For another, there’s that great setting, right on Kata Beach. The restaurant is on a wide sweep of verandah looking straight out across sand and sea.
Designed by architect Mom Tri (also responsible for establishing Mom Tri’s Kitchen and Villa Royale on neighbouring Kata Noi Beach), The Boathouse is vastly different now from what it was when we first stayed here around 20 years ago. For one thing, the 2004 tsunami ripped through the ground floor, but due to clever design, the foundations and supports managed to hold. It has been rebuilt at least once since then. Roy would like it to have remained as it was, all nautical wood and yo, ho ho. (I know because he told the staff so, several times.)
To be honest, I was disappointed by my prawn coconut soup: it was too blandly creamy and completely devoid of chilli. The green curry chicken that followed was rather ordinary; also a bit bland, possibly for the tourist market that may constitute a majority of the restaurant’s trade. Roy chose better: green papaya salad topped with grilled tiger prawns, followed by spicy lamb shank that was an inspired East-West fusion of flavours. Dessert options did not tempt: no mango and sticky rice, and most definitely no durian anything.
Last-Night Dinner, Sea Galleri
On our second night at the hotel, our final night in Phuket, we stayed in for a Western tapas-style dinner. A jolly Filipino musical duo played, it was Saturday night, and it was all quite festive. Again, the view was spectacular. Imagine this table and this outlook, but in the glow of evening.
Actually, you don’t have to imagine it. Here are a couple of pics, dredged up from the depths of my iPhone:
I don’t remember what we ordered, but I do recall that it was surprisingly good. It was also a nice change to have bread brought to the table. That doesn’t even happen in Australia, where you generally have to pay anything from A$9 upwards for a couple of chunks of sourdough, a drizzle of EVOO and a sprinkle of dukkah. But why am I complaining, when we no longer eat bread?
Speaking of which, we’re heading for France in late April for three weeks, and I can’t help wondering how long this no-bread policy is going to last there. No doubt we’ll find out, and so will you in due course.
Before I sign off, how much did we really enjoy our week in Phuket? Hugely! Do we plan to go back? Definitely! And next time, we’ll rent an apartment for at least a month, hire a car and really get reacquainted with this amazingly varied, sometimes magical and always intriguing island.
