Thailand Trip Overview + What We Learned

Here is a breakdown:

Sunday, Dec 22nd- 2:30pm Flew from Okinawa to Hong Kong, then Hong Kong to Bangkok and arrived at our hotel at 3am on Dec 23rd

Monday, Dec 23rd- Spent the day in Bangkok and walked around Chinatown. We caught the sleeper train to Surat Thani at 5:30 pm(12 hour train ride)

Tuesday, Dec 24th- Arrived in Surat Thani at 6am. Took bus to port and rode ferry to Koh Samui. Checked-in at our resort, laid by the pool, attended a Christmas Eve Gala.

Dec 25th, 26th, and 27th- These days we did pretty much the exact same thing. We ate at the delicious breakfast buffet, laid by the pool, walked on the beach, ate pad thai for lunch, got massages on the beach, explored the markets at night.

Our spot for 4 straight days

Saturday, Dec 28th- Flew from Koh Samui to Chiang Mai at 10am. Arrived at the hotel in Chiang Mai at 1pm. Got settled in and walked around to check out the temples in the old city.

Sunday, Dec 29th- We attended an all day cooking class where we learned about shopping at the market and made an entire meal. That night we walked around the Sunday night walking market.

Monday, Dec 30th- Ate breakfast and watched the Cowboys game in a local pub and then walked around town. We took a nap and then went out to dinner.

Tuesday, Dec 31st- Got picked up and driven out into the countryside. Spent the morning riding elephants and then eating a lunch and going back to the hotel. We took a nap and then went out to the New Year's Eve festivities and ate street food. We walked around and hung out until midnight and sent off our wishing lantern then went home.

Wednesday, Jan 1st- Spent the entire morning at the airport with a delayed flight. 1pm, we finally flew to Bangkok and went to our hotel. We took a nap and then ate at the delicious international buffet at our hotel.

Thursday, Jan 2nd- Took a tour to the floating markets and then some temples in Bangkok. Then we went out to dinner, visited a rooftop bar and hung out for awhile.

Floating Market

Bangkok at night

Friday, Jan 3rd- Slept in really, really late and then hung out at the hotel for awhile. We walked around the incredible mall across from our hotel and got ramen for dinner (couldn't wait until we got home). We left for the airport at 8pm only to find out we couldn't check in until 11:30pm. Flew to Hong Kong at 2am. 

Saturday, Jan 4th- Flew from Hong Kong to Okinawa and got in at 2:30pm

Things we learned:

-Okinawans are by far the nicest culture we have come across. Not that the Thais weren't nice, but I think our expectations have grown due to our experience in Okinawa. 

-We are really bad at figuring out conversion rates

-Thailand is very touristy, but not to the extent where you can't enjoy the culture

-So many of the locals spoke English. I thought more people spoke English than in Okinawa, but Jake disagrees

-American Airlines are so cheap(not in a good way) compared to other airlines. We got entire meals on flights that were less than 2 hours on our Asian Airlines.

-The majority of the tourists in Thailand were Europeans

-There are hardly any garbage cans in Asia. We can never find anywhere to throw away our trash

-Jake is a paranoid traveler and I am easy-going. He was a huge fan of the under your clothes money belt

-Chiang Mai was EXTREMELY hippie. It was also our favorite city

-We always thought we were the kind of travelers that liked to have a plan, but we found ourselves deciding things on the spur of the moment on this trip, especially restaurants

-We are not good at traveling cheap

It was a fun and exciting trip and we feel like we were able to see all we wanted to see in Thailand in the two weeks.