Hat Yai Trip 2007: Day 4

The final day and a final look at the hotel.

And the transport to the airport (with the same chatty driver again).

And the airport once again.

Finally, home sweet home... :)

Hat Yai Trip 2007: Day 3

The day started with breakfast at the hotel. And once again the food is the same for the second day in a row, which wasn't surprising. We asked from the hotel staff where we can go shopping as we went to most of the places that we've researched on. They gave us a map and told us about a market near the Clock Tower and an Asian Trade Market which opens in the evening.

Judging from the map that the Clock Tower is within walking distance, we made our way down to the place. Passed by Kim Yong Market along the way.

The Clock Tower is just within 10 minutes walk down the road. The goods sold at street market here was not as good as those in BKK, though the variety is there.

The market here looks like those old style markets in Singapore, like old Tiong Bahru or People's Park.

From the map, it seemed like Big C was not so far away, so we decided to go there on foot. Along the way, we passed by the fountain circus.

And the Jiranakorn Stadium.

However, the shopping mall was nowhere in sight after about 30minutes of walking. On a closer look at the map, then I found that there was an indication on the map which marked "long way" (the map was not drawn to scale). Wanted to take taxi but persevered on, and finally arrived at our destination.

The building was just a 2-storey shopping mall, and Big C was just like Carrefour. Went for a 1-hour foot massage session in the mall, which felt very shiok after such a long walk. Nothing much here though.

And so we took a (shared) tuk tuk back to the hotel for a short rest before going to the night market recommended by the hotel staff.

This night market is quite big compared to the others here in Hat Yai. There were quite a few stalls organized into different lanes. It took us slightly more than an hour to complete walking through all the stalls. Though we didn't get anything here.

After this, we went for dinner at a Japanese restaurant called Fuji Restaurant at Lee Gardens Plaza.

Finally went to a pub called The Pubb for a drink. They offered a 1-for-1 Tiger Beers at ฿80. And there was a band performance here as well.

Hat Yai Trip 2007: Day 2

An early morning view from the hotel room.

Signed up for a half-day tour at a nearby agency, as we didn't have any plans for the day.

First stop, went to look at the 4-faced Buddha up the hill of Hat Yai City Municipal Park. Then the Buddha statue at Brahman Shrine.

Next is the Kuan Im Temple just down the hill

Then we went to look at the reclining Buddha at Wat Hat Yai Nai, passing by the Khlong U Taphao Bridge. This place looks like under maintenance and the guide said people seldom come here anymore

After this, we traveled for about 15 ~ 20 miniutes before reaching Samila Beach.

Here we saw the Mermaid statue

And a rat and cat statue. There is a legend here which says that a dog, a cat, and a mouse, on a Chinese sampan stole the merchant’s magic crystal and tried to swim ashore but drowned and lost their lives. The cat and the mouse became the islands in the Songkhla Lake, which is called into Rat and Cat Island in English.

The tour ended with a visit to a local product shop in Hat Yai City.

After that, it was lunch at a place called Daothiam, just opposite of Odeon Shopping Mall. We ordered some local dish.

After lunch, it was further shopping again. We went to Odeon Shopping Mall and Robinson Department Store.

Then we walked all the way to Diana Department Store which took about 20 minutes...

Took a tuk tuk back to our hotel after the shopping spree. One thing unique about the tuk tuk here is that it was shared with other passengers. And the shared transport costs ฿20 per person. Then had a massage at our hotel before going to Tian Chwu Restaurant to da bao dinner. And that was the end of the day.

Hat Yai Trip 2007: Day 1

My first trip to Hat Yai. Now that there is budget airline flying there, gone are the days of 10+ hours of bus journey there I suppose.

And there is this spin to win game at the Budget Terminal. But we didn't win anything.

After a 1 hour 20 minutes journey, we arrived at the Hat Yai International Airport.

And waiting to clear the custom.

Took a 10-seater vehicle from the Airport to the hotel at Lee Gardens Plaza. The price is the same for up to 10 people at ฿250, so the more people, the less costly the transfer becomes (although its not very costly lah). The hotel is a 33-storey building and the first 7 floors is a shopping mall.

After checking into the hotel, walked around the vicinity of the hotel. Central shopping mall was just opposite of Lee Gardens Plaza. There is a local street market just down the road as well.

Dinner was at a nearby seafood restaurant.

By the time we finished our dinner, it was pretty late already and there weren't much shops or stalls that was still opened. So we went back to our hotel to rest for the day.

Bangkok Trip 2007: Day 4

Final day of the trip liao, and feeling a bit sian at this point... Wished can spent more time here... Took a bus to Pratunam Market for more shopping, then went to Platinum Fashion Mall to continue the shops that we didn't go the previous day.

Only finish exploring the building by around lunch time, and we went to the food court here for lunch. The Pad Thai was pretty nice, but not the Tom Yum Gung.

Ordered a papaya salad also (does it look appetizing?!).

And this is a "cashless" food court, i.e. all the food are paid using a stored value card instead of cash.

As we were feeling full after lunch, decided to walk to MBK from here. Along the way, stopped by the Naraya retail outlet @ Central World Plaza (ladies should be familiar with this brand I suppose). Spent quite some time here and gotten quite a lot of stuff.

Continue walking to MBK after that, passing by Siam Paragon, Siam Center and Siam Discovery Center along the way. Bought some more local food product from Sing Thang Yeng, a place where we patronize everytime we came BKK.

Stopped for another tea break at the above... (that shouldn't be too difficult to guess).

Finally its about time to go to the airport and it took us some 1.5 hours and ฿280 to get to the airport (this is only the meter fare, no surcharge or toll).

As usual need to queue quite long to check in.

And this was our flight back from BKK. Finally this marks the end of our BKK trip.

Bangkok Trip 2007: Day 3

Day 3 was not much different from the Day 2, i.e. more shopping and walking... :P. First stop of the day was Central World Plaza. They had just completed some renovation and think there are more shop spaces now. There are 2 bigger department store in the building, and this is one of them.

Walked down to Central Chit Lom Department Store afterwards and stayed for around an hour. The department store here is the same as the one in Central World Plaza. Then took the BTS to Thong Lor station, and made our way to Playground on foot. This is not an actual playground but a shopping complex, or an "inspiration" store as they called it.

The stretch of road contains quite a number of Japanese restaurants. And along the way saw another shopping complex but didn't go in.

But we did break for lunch at a coffeeshop just opposite of Playground. The food was cheap here but wasn't that fantastic.

The playground was just a 3-storey complex, so didn't take long to finish exploring the place (less than half an hour). Took a taxi to Platinum Fashion Mall but got stucked in a traffic jam for about 45 minutes.

Spent about 2 hours shopping at the mall but still couldn't complete exploring the whole building. Went for another massage afterwards at the same parlour, this time a traditional Thai massage. By the end of the session, it was almost time for dinner already...

Went to the Stella Palace Restaurant on the 79th floor of the Baiyoke Sky Hotel. The dinner was a buffet with Chinese, Western and Japanese food.

The variety was quite limited but the taste was not so bad, especially the desserts which was some kuehs.

Went up to the revolving roof deck and the observation gallery after the dinner. Enjoyed the view of Bangkok city at night. Wonder how it would look like during the day though...

Bangkok Trip 2007: Day 2

The second day was whole day shop, shop and shop as we went to the Chatuchak Weekend market. And no we didn't take the bus to Chatuchak, but took the BTS to Mo Chit station instead.

After 3.5 hours of non-stop shopping (although most of the time, I'm not the one buying things), finally settled down for a rest. Grabbed a small portion fried noodles and some pork ribs as snacks.

Then had lunch at a local restaurant within the weekend market, where we ordered a Tom Yum Gung with kuay teow, and a fried catfish with spicy mango salad

Continued Shopping for another hour or so after lunch. As we were about to leave, saw someone performing ball juggling. There was quite a substantial crowd watching.

Went back to the hotel after that to put down the stuffs that we bought and had a quick shower and break. Then made our way to Pantip Plaza (BKK's equivalent of Sim Lim Square). This was the first time I came to the building in all my visits to BKK. And it looks very much like SLS as well.

And saw these soft toys at the A & W outlet. But they were not for sale.

Wanted to go Platinum Fahsion Mall after that but the building was closed for the day. Then went to Baiyoke Sky Hotel area, where there was a little street night market.

And after a long day full of walking, whats better than to have a nice little foot massage session. This was where we had a massage. The parlour is in Pratunum opposite of Indra Hotel and a little down the road.

Finally went for dinner at an outdoor local food stall just outside of Pratunum Complex. The auntie who took our orders recommended us some dishes and told us not to order so much food when we had wanted to. I was glad she did, cos in the end the food was just about enough.