Arrival in Phuket

After a 1 1/2 hour flight, we arrived in Phuket the day before yesterday. We quickly got our backpacks and only had to wait a short moment for our driver, who took us to the hotel. The drive to the hotel took an hour. Our mood was cheerful. We listened to music, sang along, and looked forward to the upcoming time.

The welcome at the hotel was anything but friendly. While the man at the reception was looking for our booking, the phone rang. He answered the call and we had to wait for a while. After we finally had our room key, another hotel employee came. Without saying 'hello' or a nice greeting, she listed everything we had to pay for. The taxi, the room, and a deposit for the room key. Of course, we paid for everything. When we arrived in our room, we found that the bed linen was stained. Besides, there were hair and lint in the bed and in the bathroom. We went back down and complained about the room. The two employees at the reception were shocked and didn't want to believe us. The lady sent her colleague with us to the room to check our descriptions. After he had confirmed the truthfulness of our statements, we were shown another room. Unfortunately, this room was in the same condition as the first room and the third room they showed us was not clean either. It was almost 7 pm and our mood was at an all-time low. After we had looked at three dirty rooms, we made the decision to leave. We immediately got our deposit for the room key back. But we didn't get a refund for the room fee. Luckily, we quickly found another accommodation. Here we were warmly welcomed. After we had put our backpacks in the room, we went to dinner unsuspectingly. On the way back, we bought some water. When we returned to the room, we were horrified to find that it was even dirtier than the previous one. We don't even know why we didn't check the cleanliness right after our arrival. There were still urine stains in the toilet from the previous guests, the refrigerator was completely moldy, and the toilet brush was just disgusting 🤮🤮🤮. It was already 11 pm, so we had to stay. At least the bed linen was clean. We informed the hotel owner about the condition and found a new hotel for the next day. Luckily, we received a booking confirmation within a very short time and even the joyful news that we could check in from 10 am in the morning. It was 1 am when our spirits had somewhat calmed down. Madlin was so disgusted that she could hardly sleep at night. To top it all off, yesterday morning at just before 9 am, we were awakened by two complete strangers who suddenly stood in our room. Of course, we had locked the door, but the ladies had a key...

Yesterday at just before 10 am, we arrived at our new accommodation - all good things come in threes. We were warmly welcomed. This time we had the room shown to us first and checked if it was clean. Only then did we check in. We even had breakfast 😊. After breakfast, we felt the need for a shower to wash off the disgust from our skin. Unfortunately, we didn't have hot water - never mind! We took a cold shower🙄. After two hours of unsuccessful attempts to repair it, we changed rooms. Hard to believe, but true - this room met our standards: clean, hot water, and air conditioning 🥳🥳🥳. Are we too demanding???? Since it started raining after breakfast, we stayed in bed and planned our onward journey. We were completely fed up with Thailand!!!

Today we slept in and had a delicious breakfast. After that, we applied for our e-visas for Sri Lanka and then went to the beach. Turquoise blue water and white sandy beach - that's how we imagined Thailand 😍. At lunchtime, we found a small shop that offers whole grain bread, among other things. Here we had a small meal for lunch (or rather afternoon 😉) - whole grain bread with smoked salmon, avocado, egg, and gherkins (for those not from Hesse: gherkins are pickles 😜) 😍. Whole grain bread, salmon, and gherkins for the first time in 13 weeks. We enjoyed it soooo much! After that, we went to the hotel pool for a short while. Chris' highlight of the day: he was able to watch the Bayern test match ⚽️. Today the world looks better again and we are happy to be in Phuket. We don't know exactly how long we will stay. Our hotel room is available and we can stay as long as we want 😁.

Tomorrow we're doing something very special. We're spending the whole day in an elephant park. Here, elephants that have been trained to work or for tourists are taken in and kept in an animal-friendly way. Among other things, we will prepare breakfast for the elephants and observe them from a distance. We are looking forward to the day and will report back.