Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year was in February this year and it gave us 2 days off work and a four day weekend.  So, we made plans to go back to Phuket, Thailand with Charlie and Ruth.  We really enjoyed ourselves the first time we were here and were looking forward to our return trip.  Unlike the last time we visited, when we stayed on the west coast near Patong, this time we stayed on the east coast near Phuket Town.  The hotel we picked was the Westin Siray Bay, a new hotel that opened just a few months earlier.  Built on a hillside overlooking the water and a beautiful beach, we were immediately impressed.

After enjoying a welcome drink in the lobby we made our way to our rooms, which thanks to the rather steep hillside, we negotiated by golf cart.  Our room overlooked the water and also had an overhead view of one of the pools which was located directly below our room.  After leaving our bags in our room,  we made our way up to the highest point on the property, where we enjoyed a nice lunch and went swimming in the glass sided infinity pool.  And talk about hot!   If we were craving the sun and the heat, we certainly found it.

We spent the next couple of days lazing around the hotel  and enjoying all the amenities it had to offer.  Lisa and I would use the gym each morning and then we would spend the afternoons lounging at one of the two pools or we would head down to the beach.   At the beach, we went kayaking and I did some windsurfing.

After that we napped in hammocks.  What a rough life!  

After enjoying the delicious, but expensive hotel food, we decided to go into Phuket Town for dinner each night.  Although somewhat intimidated by the hustle and bustle on the streets, we enjoyed ourselves nonetheless and found some good places to eat.  We also did a little bit of shopping at a local mall and bought some stuff from street vendors who were selling knockoffs of most designer brands including Gucci, Coach, Polo, Lacoste and Quicksilver to name but a few.

Next, we set our eyes on adventure.   Off the east coast of Phuket are a group of islands known as the Phi Phi (pronounced Pee-Pee) Islands,  a group of towering limestone islands that are world renowned for their beauty and as a destination for snorkeling and scuba diving.  We planned a day long excursion out to the islands for a tour of some of the various islands and to do some swimming and snorkeling.  It was the highlight of the trip and I daresay the highlight of all of the experiences we have had here in south-east Asia.  Being out on the crystal clear water in the beautiful sunshine among the islands was truly awe inspiring.

We packed an awful lot into our four day trip and enjoyed our time in Phuket tremendously.   There were beautiful sunsets each night that proved to be the perfect photo op.   In fact, there were so many great photo ops that we took over 250 pics during our short trip.  Check 'em out and we're sure you'll agree that they were all worthwhile.  

Thanks to Charlie and Ruth for the visit and thank you Phuket!

Visitors

We were excited to hear Charlie and Ruth would be coming to visit us in Singapore.  They would be our first visitors and we were quite excited to show them around Singapore.  We would have plenty of time to do it as they would be spending a couple of months with us. 

The trip got off to an interesting start.  Ruth and Charlie were arriving  a couple of days after New Year's at about 5:00 a.m.  Coincidentally, we arrived home from Bali about 6 hours earlier at 11: 00 p.m.  So, instead of going home just in time to return to meet them, we decided to sleep in the airport terminal.  What a mistake.  We couldn't find anywhere comfortable to sleep and once we did, they started doing some renovations on the airport and we had to listen to a jack-hammer all night long.  So. by the time Charlie and Ruth got off the airplane, it was hard to tell who was more tired!   The funniest part of our meeting was seeing Charlie, who arrived in the 30+ degree heat of Singapore dressed looking like the abominable snow man!  I guess he didn't want to wear a winter coat to the airport when he left Saint John so instead, he wore several layers of shirts and sweaters.   That was all well and good but for reasons that no one still quite understands, he wore them on the plane to Toronto, then to Beijing where they spent an entire day on a layover and finally on to Singapore some 36 hours later!  What a guy!

The first thing we did was celebrate Christmas together.  Thanks to a note Haylee had sent to Santa, we had conveniently arranged for the Big Guy to visit us in Singapore in January.  So, on Christmas morning, which was actually about the 5th of January, we awoke to find presents under the tree.  Haylee was quite excited when she received an iPod Touch!

We decided to keep the celebrations going, so the next thing we celebrated was Haylee and Lisa's birthdays, which were in October!  Charlie and Ruth brought a birthday cake from New Brunswick ( Lisa and Haylee's favorite kind) and we enjoyed some good Canadian pound cake with vanilla butter icing.

We had a couple of days to show them around Singapore before we had to return to work, so we did some sightseeing and familiarized them with the public transit system so they could find their way around without us.

We visited some of our favorite places with them like Sentosa, an integrated resort area which is actually a large island (kinda like Toronto Island but with palm trees).  There's a zip line on Sentosa that we had all seen when we were watching the Amazing Race on T.V. back in Canada before we moved to Singapore.

 We had all decided that was something we wanted to do together and we couldn't wait to give it a try. We  made our way up to the departure point and our nervous excitement about our big adventure, turned into a bit of fear once we saw how high up it was.  Lisa, Haylee and myself had done it once before, so we knew what to expect, but Charlie and Ruth were a little more uncertain.  But they were troopers and committed to doing it and took off down the zip line without hesitation......and they loved it!  So, did we!  It was a great experience to do together.

What followed over the next two months was one great experience after another.  Of course, our big adventures tended to be on the weekends while during the week, Charlie and Ruth would preoccupy themselves by doing a little sightseeing, going to the casino, going to the driving range, going to the casino, shopping and going to the casino.   Does someone have a problem?  Don't think so, as they only stayed long enough for Charlie to lose his allocated amount and for Ruth to win it back and then some.  Ruth holds her hand pretty close to the vest, so we're not exactly sure how much money she won, but it's rumored that it may have been enough to pay for their trip to Florida a few months later? But, alas, we'll never know :)

Other highlights of our time together in Singapore included visits to the Jurong Bird Park, the Fish Spa and Underwater World, where Charlie and Haylee went swimming with dolphins! 

We also had time for yet another party when we celebrated Ruth and Charlie's wedding anniversary.

We had a great time together and saw and did a lot of great things together including taking a trip to Phuket together.  Remember how we said we wanted to go back to Phuket?  Well, we got an opportunity to do so sooner than we thought when we spent 4 days there over the Chinese New Year in February.  You can learn more about that experience in a separate post.

When the day came to say goodbye to Ruth and Charlie we were sad to see them go.  We hoped that they enjoyed their time with us and looked forward to seeing them back in Canada in July!