So, where’s my favorite beach?

Beaches are pretty much my favorite places to be when it’s warm, and I’m lucky enough to have been to a few of them. I love clear, blue water, gentle surf, and plenty of people to watch. I haven’t been to all of these beaches with Carolyn, but the best ones always involved her on a towel next to mine reading a book. Let’s have a look at my favorite 10 beaches in the world and wish we were at one (or all) of them instead of in a cold office in Korea.

Haeundae Beach, South Korea

Haeundae Beach, Busan, South Korea

This might be my favorite beach for cold weather, because there’s no shortage of places to get a nice hot coffee. The water is a beautiful blue green. On a clear day you can see Tsushima Island, Japan. Unfortunately, Haeundae beach is nuts in the summer, with about a bajillion people crowding up shoulder to shoulder under umbrellas to avoid the sun. Why anyone would avoid the sun on a beautiful beach defies my logic, but what the hell? When in Rome Busan, right?

Magic Sands Beach, Hawaii

Magic Sands Beach, Big Island, Hawaii

Magic Sands beach on Hawaii’s Big Island was the only beach I visited very often when I lived on the island. The beach is beautiful in the summer with it’s white sand and surf ranging from lapping waves to big rollers. Its also situated next to one of the best shore diving spots on the island. You gotta bring your own snacks, though, and parking is okay if you get there early, but you gotta be careful or else your car could get broken into. It’s a good beach, but not the perfect beach.

Daecheon Beach, South Korea

Daecheon Beach, Boryeong, South Korea

Daecheon Beach is definitely worth visiting during the Boryeong Mudfest in July. It’s a beautiful beach nestled next to the East China Sea with nice, shell laced sand, and a plethora of convenience stores nearby for snacks. During the mudfest there’s also great people watching and festival food.

Jeongdongjin, South Korea

Jeongdongjin, South Korea

The last beach in Korea on this list is Jeongdongjin. Jeongdongjin is just about as far north as you can go in the Republic of Korea before you enter the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. So close that there are guard towers, barbed wire, and machine gun nests on the cliffs. For real. The population density here is pretty low though, especially for this country, and the ocean is clear, blue, and beautiful. There’s not a hell of a lot to eat though. Be ready for a weekend of supermarket food and the same variety of fish at every restaurant at this one.

  by  kimubert 

Waikiki Beach, O’ahu, Hawaii

Waikiki is probably the perfect urban beach. There is no shortage of snacks, restaurants, drinks, or people watching on Waikiki. The water is clear, beautiful, and filled with decent snorkeling if you’re into that kind of thing. Want to eat a stereotypical Hawaiian meal (in the tourist way, meaning pineapple and macadamia nuts) while being serenaded by some ukulele wielding locals? You can do that on Waikiki. It’s an easy beach. You don’t have to pack beforehand, think about things like sunscreen or lunch, or anything. It’s all easily purchased right there on the beach (at a premium, of course.)

Double-Six Beach, Bali, Indonesia

Double-Six Beach, Bali, Indonesia

Double-Six Beach is what I imagine Waikiki was like 50 years ago or more. None of the buildings rise above the tree-line, the easy to access shops and restaurants are hidden behind a beautiful row of trees and sea wall, and there’s a lot of people to watch. There’s really not a whole lot of downside to this beach. It’s not great for swimming, but that means you get to watch the surfers. There’s a lot of hawkers, but you can chalk that up to local color. It’s Bali, dude. It’s beautiful, good food is everywhere, and once you’re there it’s all pretty cheap.

  by  J. Stephen Conn 

Honokohau Beach, Big Island, Hawaii

Right next to Keahole International Airport is a little national historical site with a great beach. This beach features a reconstructed traditional style Hawaiian hut, a temple, fish pond, and I’m pretty sure an outrigger living in the hut. The water is blue and calm, and I’m pretty sure you could swim out to some great dive sites if you like. Additionally, it’s a short trek (maybe 100m or so) across a lava floe to get here, so it’s not going to be chock full of people at any given time. Sometimes you want quiet, right? Bring your snacks and drinks with you, because there’s nowhere to grab one once you’re here.

West Railay Beach, Thailand

West Railay Beach, Railay, Thailand

The Railay peninsula in Krabi Province, Thailand is the most beautiful place I’ve ever been in my life. There. I said it. Nestled in beautiful Phang Nga Bay (Ao Phang Nga), the Railay Peninsula is an otherworldly landscape dominated by towering limestone cliffs topped with lush jungle, a beautiful turquoise-blue sea dotted with limestone karsts called Mr. Hong’s Secret Kung Fu Island “hongs.” West Railay Beach is cordoned off at the north and south by tall limestone cliffs with low lying hotels, shops, and restaurants scattered along a dirt road behind the beach. It’s beautiful. There’s a ton of people to watch, and it’s easy to get a kayak and head straight out into the bay to really feel like you’re away from everything.

Kata Beach, Phuket, Thailand

Kata Beach, Phuket, Thailand

Kata Beach is beautiful. It’s not as chaotic as nearby Patong Beach, the water is clear and blue, and there’s a nice little island just offshore that makes a great counterpoint to a wonderful sunset. The Andaman Sea stretches out in front of you, and behind you a great enclave of restaurants, bars, and shops. While some might prefer the night life of Patong, it’s pretty nice to be able to get a cheap place to stay where you can stretch out and not be bothered by bedbugs or other critters. Kata is a great, great beach that really showcases Thailand’s natural beauty while also allowing you every modern convenience you might need.

Phra Nang Beach, Railay, Thailand

Phra Nang Beach, Railay, Thailand

Phra Nang Beach is certainly the most beautiful place I’ve ever laid eyes on. The water is a beautiful turquoise blue, the beach is framed by a gorgeous limestone cave, monkeys come out of the woods to feast on garbage and people’s bags of chips and unattended items at dusk, and the sea is dotted with those beautiful green little hongs as far as you can see. In the morning before the boats of tourists arrive, this beach is absolutely 100%, perfect.

Tasty Thailand: Part IX – We’re living here in Phuket Town

After the obscenely hilarious “bus” ride (read: one longtail boat, one golf cart, three minibuses, and two tuk-tuks) from Railay to Phuket Town we checked into the Lub Sbuy Guesthouse. It’s a nice enough guesthouse with rooms that look more comfortable than they actually are, air conditioning, and located close enough to Old Town Phuket to easily walk to all of the sights and tasty treats waiting for the person who is willing to stay a little farther from the beach for a day or two. Honestly, considering how little we paid for the place, it was really, really nice. Once we checked in, we headed directly to the restaurant behind the guesthouse for lunch. The restaurant served Thai and Vietnamese fare, and it tasted good enough. I tried to order durian on sticky rice with coconut milk, but they were out. So yeah, even after writing that post about fruits I wanted to try I still struck out on durian.

Baba architecture in Phuket Town.

Baba cookies in Phuket Town, a savory sweet.

After lunch we headed to Old Town to find that just about everything was closed. I think it might have been the Queen’s birthday or something, but there was plenty of architecture to enjoy. As the sun quickly set behind the more urban horizon we walked among the old Sino-Portuguese buildings watching the shadows get longer. We stumbled upon a lady selling cookies, and as we had read up on the area, our eyes lit up when she pointed to a bag and said “Baba.” Baba culture is the mix of Chinese, Dutch, Portuguese, Indian, Malay, and Thai that settled in Phuket to work in the tin mines (or something like that). They’re famed for their food, which is something similar to Peranakan cuisine from Indonesia and Singapore. Anyhow, this bag of cookies was pretty interesting. They were strongly flavored with ginger and black pepper, not sweet. They definitely were something special.

The colors coming out of the Shrine of Serene Light are a stark, stark, Ned Stark’s Head on a stick contrast to its surroundings.

Shrine of the Serene Light

Shrine of the Serene Light, interior.

After sunset it seemed that the town pretty much shut down, so we took our tired butts back to the room  and called it a day. The next morning we woke up nice and early, and immediately hit the road. We made a first stop for coffee and breakfast before heading to the Shrine of the Serene Light. This is apparently one of the biggest Chinese Taoist shrines on the island, and although it was diminutive in size it was absolutely gigantic in terms of color, rich detail, and even sounds and smells. The smell of sandalwood was quite thick in the air, and the morning heat and bright rays of the sun were cast somewhat violently upwards from the white concrete ground right back into the sky, which was a pretty dazzling color of blue that morning.

When we entered the shrine itself, I was even more impressed. It smelled of old, old sandalwood smoke. The walls were covered with drawings, and there were probably two or three hundred figurines in the shrine. I made a donation of 200 baht out of respect, and we obviously took plenty of photographs. It was a completely different experience from any other type of religious structure I’ve ever been to, since people don’t pray to a deity here but rather to their deceased ancestors. I actually said out loud that this was more of what I had hoped Chinatown in New York would be like, with the dust  of old burned incense covering every surface and old ancestral figurines and such. It was basically a critical mass of cool religious iconography in a small, small place.

Carolyn at Wat Putta Mongkon

Carolyn caught me exploring Wat Putta Mongkon.

Penang Curry with Duck

After our visit to the Shrine of the Serene Light we grabbed a cold water and a fruit smoothie before heading towards Wat Putta Mongkon where we took a few pictures before going to another much-written-about sight for lunch, the China Inn. China Inn is pretty widely written about as a great restaurant serving Thai Cuisine with a gallery of traditional Chinese art and handicrafts in the front. Carolyn ordered a sweet and sour dish, and I ordered a Penang curry with duck. The food was really, really good, although Carolyn’s dish was far more sweet than sour and the Penang curry was basically the Thai version of gluttony on a plate. It was so rich that I couldn’t finish it, but the flavors were singing together so loudly that it was hard to hear over them, you know? Stuffed to the brim with food, we headed back to our room to cool off for the afternoon. Without a sea breeze, it was hot.

After cooling off a bit, we went out to pick up some souvenirs. This process is pretty simple in Thailand, walk into a shop, let the shopkeeper make an offer on what you’re looking at, return with a lower offer, rinse, and repeat. We ended up with a few items we really liked, and somehow after the lunch we enjoyed at China Inn, became hungry again. At this point we were pretty tired. The trip was basically at an end, and we were ready to call it a raging success. We had dinner at the same Thai/Vietnamese restaurant behind our guesthouse and called it a night.

The next day was pretty short (but also really long) as we woke up, had breakfast, picked up some more Baba sweets for our friends in Korea, and boarded the airport bus. It’s always fun to meet new people, and we met an English teacher who lived in Northern Thailand on the airport bus. He was a Burmese-American and had a lot of really cool insight from the frame of reference of someone who lived in Thailand for a while. It was interesting to compare notes on things like food, Thailand, and Korea. He even showed us a Thai-pop video that he thought was particularly great, and we liked it pretty well. Once we arrived at the airport it was a quick check-in, purchase some magazines, get on a plane and go. We had a long layover in Kuala Lumpur, but ended up back in Seoul at about 8:00 the next morning. Two trains, a subway, and about three hours later we arrived back in our apartment.

What a great trip. I didn’t ever think that I would see such vibrant greens and blues as I did in Thailand. I’ve never seen people who have so little smile so much. I’ve seen the true impact of our actions on land under water, and also seen one of the most beautiful demonstrations of natural beauty I could ever imagine. Thailand wasn’t just about seeing beautiful places and eating delicious food though. We actually learned a lot. We learned what those mysterious flavors we love so much actually are, and what they look like before they end up in a great dish. I think I also learned what it means to really relax. I knew I liked to do nothing every once in a while, but I never really knew the depths of how relaxed I could be. Most of all I enjoyed being somewhere friendly, magical, and beautiful with my lovely lady. It’s always a pleasure to travel with her, but damn, traveling somewhere so beautiful and filled with great food with her? Please sir, may I have another?

I’m sure that we’ll be back in Thailand again one day, I just hope it’s not too long!

Tasty Thailand: Part IV – Alotta Wats!

So far, the trip to Thailand had already been pretty magical. The trip to Phuket from Korea was easy and even enjoyable, the beaches were stunning, and the cooking class had provided us an entirely new frame of reference for Thai food. We were already about 80% of the way to a completely fulfilling and enjoyable experience in Thailand, but something was missing. While we love the beach, enjoy food more than most things, and were enjoying the easy travel experiences we were having we wanted to go a bit deeper. We wanted culture.

The obvious answer for this was to rent a scooter. I’m no n00b when it comes to riding a scooter, and the rental was really cheap at about 200 baht for a whole day. I was a bit reticent to take this option though, because taking my own life in my hands is one thing, but taking Carolyn’s life in my hands was another. Did I mention that they drive on the left side of the road? Did I mention we were in Thailand (aside from all stereotypes about Asian drivers, traffic on this side of the world is a completely different beast than traffic at home!)? Yes? I mentioned all of those things? Good.

The issue was put to bed with these words: “Charlie, quit being a pussy.” The super nice property manager let me take one of the bikes for a spin around the block. You know, riding a scooter is just like riding a bike. It comes right back. This scooter was a bit bigger than the one I had in Hawaii…twice as big, really, so I wasn’t even afraid of riding around with Carolyn on the back because it had plenty of pick-up. So we rented the bike and the property manager told us a few cool places to go. Carolyn held on tight and we blasted out of the parking lot, all 100cc’s of engine blazing away.

It turned out that driving on the left side of the road really wasn’t all that scary after all, and being low-season and after rush hour, the roads weren’t scary at all. Well, they’re not scary if you don’t mind sharing a lane with a lot more motorbikes than you’re accustomed to, or a car, truck, or bus. I quickly became more comfortable with the situation as we made our way towards Chalong, where we were told an old temple was located. After following signs, missing the turn, and finally finding a safe place to turn back around, we made a left turn into Wat Chalong, and our eyes grew to the size of saucers.

Wat Chalong is a stunningly beautiful temple complex

When we first entered the temple complex, we were astounded. Large white temple buildings with bright red tiled roofs and brightly colored  relief carvings adorned with gold were located all over the place. It felt like we had traveled to a completely different place and time, and somehow people had even become friendlier (who knew that was possible?). As we pulled up to park, a tuk-tuk driver leaned out of his tuk-tuk and said “sawasdee, my friend!” which was a welcome change from “tuk-tuk?” We parked, sunscreened up and had a snack, and headed into the temple.

Wat Chalong Complex

Wat Chalong Interior

Firecracker amplifier

The temple was absolutely beautiful with all manner of Buddha statues, beautiful murals on the walls, amazing tile work, and quiet tourists and faithful locals appreciating the serenity. Well, mostly serene. I’m not sure of its religious significance, but there was a large stone oven that they periodically filled with firecrackers. It amplified the sound of the firecrackers greatly, and spewed all of the smoke out of the top in a really pretty way. Aside from that it was pretty serene.

After exploring Wat Chalong, we wanted to see the Big Buddha. We had seen road signs marking the direction, and we could plainly see it on top of one of the mountains, we just needed to get up there and see it for ourselves. After we got back on the road we found a sign and followed it. The road narrowed to two lanes and started climbing. It was beautiful, and you could feel the air get cooler as we went higher and higher. This was one of the most relaxing and best parts of the entire Thailand experience for me, because I convinced Carolyn that she needed to hold on tight (free hug!) and the drive was easy. The road was windy, and about half way up we turned a corner to find ELEPHANTS on the road. Elephant tourism in Thailand is a somewhat controversial subject, and we didn’t stop to take any pictures of them (especially once we saw the chains on their legs) but it was still really cool to encounter elephants on a roadway. Several times the trees near the road opened up to reveal some pretty sweeping views.

They got the name right.

Big Buddha temple and gift shop.

The Big Buddha’s location has some of the most sweeping views of Phuket you could imagine.

Upon reaching the top, we saw a pretty stunning site. The Big Buddha was certainly named well. Construction on this monumental image of the Buddha began in 2007 in honor of the king’s birthday, and judging by the size of the thing I’d imagine that the people of Thailand must really, really love their king. The area was clearly loaded with tourists,  but I think that if you were to ignore a place like this because you don’t like tourists (or are simply one of those people who thinks that everything masses of people flock to must suck) then you’d be cutting off your nose to spite your face.

As expected, entry to and exit from the scenic viewpoint and base of the Buddha was through the gift shop. Inside the shop were three monks in beautiful saffron robes talking to people who would come up for some sort of counseling or blessing. I won’t try to make you believe I understood what was happening, but it was all really serene, calm, and peaceful. We walked around the Buddha, took in the astounding views of Phuket and the surrounding islands, piled back onto the bike and headed back down the mountain. Past the elephants, through the woods, and stop! A cliff-side restaurant!

I thought the food would be terrible, but with such a great view you don’t really care too much about food quality. I ordered the chicken with cashew nuts, and Carolyn had phad siew. The food was pretty great. Hunger is the best sauce and all that, but I think that the view we had made for the best seasoning. We enjoyed our lunch, climbed right back on the bike, and headed for Chalong pier, which we heard was a colorful place.

Somehow we managed to get lost along the way and found ourselves on the main road into Phuket Town. Traffic congested. Things got scary. We were being passed on the left and right. Cars were riding our ass. I found a turn-around lane after being completely unnerved and headed back towards the traffic circle that would give us some options. At this point I thought we might head for Rawai beach in the south. We reached the traffic circle, which was like a spinning vortex of car exhaust and body parts hanging off of motorbikes. I gunned the throttle and did my best impression of a Korean delivery driver weaving way too close between the bumpers of vehicles that seemed to be headed in all different directions. We safely escaped the deathtrap  traffic circle and found that we were on the road to Kata. As we weren’t about to head back through that shit-show, we decided to go north to Karon beach, where we heard there was a brand spanking new Wat (Wat Karon) to check out.

Wat Karon, a new temple in Karon.

Upon reaching Wat Karon we were overwhelmed. The temple grounds were basically a bazaar of people selling Chang and Singha shirts, cheaply made handicrafts, and banana pancakes. Having recently scared the living crap out of myself on a motorbike, the banana pancake didn’t sound so great. We walked around and took in the sights for a bit and headed back to Kata. It took two or three tries to find a road that would lead down to Kata, but we found our way back to the Jinta Andaman and took a deep breath. What an adventure.

Obviously, as there were a couple hours of daylight left, we changed into our bathing suits and hit the beach. Once again we found ourselves frolicking around like two crabs in love (literally, we frolicked like crabs. Don’t judge us. You don’t know our story.) We headed out for dinner after that, had a banana pancake, bought some fruit, and called it a night. That’s what you do when a) you’re old and b) you’re going scuba diving in the Andaman Sea the next morning.

Fly Away Friday: Phuket!

Flying away today!

This is a very special Fly Away Friday! Why is it so special, Charlie? I’m so happy you asked. This week’s edition of Fly Away Friday isn’t about a place that I’m dreaming about flying off to, but rather about a place that I am flying off to. Well, almost kinda sorta all today. Let me tell you about how this day is going to go.

I’m going to sit here at my desk until my workday ends (I think a little early today), and then go home to work out and finish packing up all my stuff for the trip. At about 10:30 or 11:00 tonight, we’ll leave the house and catch the subway before it closes to take us to the express bus terminal. We’ll probably rent a DVD room or something because our bus doesn’t leave until 2:00am tomorrow morning.  Once we’re on the bus we’ve got 4 hours to get some sleep before we arrive at the Incheon International Airport.

We’ll have about six hours to kill or so before we can check in at that point, but as soon as possible we’ll get our documents checked and make our way to our gate. A beautiful red and white Air Asia jet will take us to Kuala Lumpur, where we’ll sit on our asses for a few hours before taking the shorter flight from Kuala Lumpur to Phuket.

Once we’re in Phuket we’re probably going to need to take a taxi to our accommodation for the night, and hopefully find some delicious  Thai food before bed. Basically, what is actually 12 hours in the air becomes a 24 hour travel day because of the need to get to Seoul  first. Who cares?

I like Air Asia. The flight attendants wear these cool super modern looking takes on traditional Malay clothing, and the food isn’t half bad. For a budget airline it’s quite nice, too. They certainly put the major U.S. carriers like American, United, and Delta to shame.

Anyhow, rather than continuing this completely disjointed post (I’m overcaffienated and quite excited) I’m going to leave it at this. I’m flying away today on a trip to Phuket. There probably won’t be a full post written on the blog until I return, so be sure to follow me on Facebook and tumblr for short little snapshots of where I am, what I’m doing, and perhaps most importantly, what I’m eating!