Beach Town Hua Hin

Riding the train from Bangkok to the beach town Hua Hin is adventure. Sitting among dozen of Malaysian in the second class without air conditioning, we feel we were in another country. We purchased the train ticket one day prior to departure, which left us no options of air conditioner seating.

Hua Hin is 400 kilometers from Bangkok, with a population of 66,000 and 3000 foreigners. It takes about 3 hours by car or 4 hours by train with many stops on the way, while passing by beautiful small villages with summer sceneries, coconut trees, temples, farm land with cows and green fields. We departured at Krung Thep Aphiwat Central Terminal Station with hundreds of other local Thai waiting for the train. The large waiting hall provides many convenient shops and stands with cooked food, coffee, snacks and water, clean bathrooms and efficient air conditioning with big fans.

The train tickets have assigned seat numbers and letters for train cars, that helps passenger easily to find where to go. A second Ticket inspection comes during the train ride, uniformed staff cuts the ticket corner after verification, and cleaning crews show up later to sweep the floor and keep the train clean.

Train ride Thailand Railway

While the train ride slowly heading into dawn, farming smock brought insects around light, many beautiful dragon flies sit on your shoulders, arm or chest. Other small insects die or passing out due to smoke. One time the train had to stop and wait for another train from opposite direction to merge into the shared lane.

The second half of the journey seemed fast due to less stop around the beach cost toward south. with 15 minute delay we got off the train at our Hau Hin stop at 8:15. Besides 3 or 4 passengers got off, the rest of majority remain on board and heading further south towards Malaysia boarders.

10 minute walk through the town from the train station, we arrived our beautiful boutique Hotel Charlelearn. This stay is one of our best choices in Thailand. Besides comfy beds with soft clean sheet and high quality bath towels, mini fridge and kettle, cups helps us make our tea during the day. Morning coffee at hotel lobby starts 7am to 11am, which provides verity including latte, cappuccino and espresso, tea and pastry make add up joy for morning pleasure. The swimming pool is on the roof top where gives a great view of the town.

The staff are very friendly with smile and hello when you walk by. They diligently fix problems when we had small issue of power outlet and safe security lock. The cross street of the hotel 7/11 operates 24 hours and other food stands and restaurants offers many options. As we are located the center of the town Hua Hin night market is only 5 minute walk, the beach with pier is also 5 minute away.

Hua Hin beach activities

Surprisingly we found there are food stands on the pier serving evening crowd, from BBQ to fried noodle, papaya salad and sweets. As 3000 foreigners live in this town, many of them choose to not cook, instead the kitchen is everyone with your own chef.

Grocery shopping can be done in the shopping mall or separate on the street, The closest one celled Top is about 8 minute walk, with many western verities such as cheese, bread and cereals and wine. The store full of the interracial couples and families, most common Thai spouse women with Western males. The big chain Lotus is another option where located 20 minute by foot, with wide range of selections and the pricing is competitive for both local and tourists.

Bangkok Post Covid

Departing from Los Angeles, we took the ANA flight from LAX stopping by Tokyo, Japan in November 14, celebrating Peter’s birthday with Japanese udon soup at Haneda airport at 5am.

The airfare cost us about $700 a one way, 14 hour flight. It was made more pleasant as the Japanese crews were very service oriented with pleasant assistant, beautiful smile, gentle postures and good meal services and wide selections of international movies and documentaries. It was an impressive service that was above and beyond, comparing with the hospitality industry which still remains stuck in the post covid symptoms with its lagging performance.

Upon arrival at Suvarnabhumi international airport, we are among several hundred tourists to check in at customs and immigration. Visa exemption were given for 45 days without fee (as of October 2023 visa exemption for tourists is 30 days only).

Worth of mentioning while you exit the airport, it is a good idea to purchase a sim card for your mobile phone. Airports offers the best data plan with minimum spend that would make life easier when you touring in the cities. We needed to print out document and could not verify security code as we did not hold local Thai numbers.

The ride to our Hostel took us almost an hour due to traffic, and we arrived tired at Issara Hostel, which is very close to the Thai Royal Palace. It costs $20 a night for a private room with AC and shared bath room. The stay was very pleasant and included complimentary breakfast, that come with fresh fruits, omelet, Pai Thai, curry chicken and coffee/tea. The area along a swimming pool and fish pond, open sitting area with fans. The down side of the room is that we were in the room on the busy street, the traffic could interrupt peace of sleep.

As the G20 summit took place during our visit, there were major streets patrolled by police force. In the meanwhile the metro system blocked the stop of Queen Sirikit station for passengers passing.

Our next stay was at Home16 hostel, and cost the same with less value. The room we stayed at was a bare minimum. The walls were made of cardboard separating the rooms, so we could hear snoring from next room packed with many guests and stay late with loud conversations.

So we moved on to a muslim hotel Al Meroz which was a 10 minute walk to the Ramkhamhaeng train station, which is on the airport train route and gives access to the city center. This hotel is our favor choice after all, it costs about $30 and $40 with breakfast for two. The staff are friendly and helpful, the room is spacious and clean (except stain on the carpet). The breakfast offers muslim diet with many variety of Asian cuisines like noodle soup, Pai Thai, chicken masala, as well as fresh cooked omelet. Other good options of fruits, desert and Chinese donut and soy milk.

Regarding options of accommodations, recently we prefer choose hotels over AirBnB for simple reasons. First of all hotels offer the most competitive pricing without hidden fees and charges, vs. AirBnB today with additional service fee, cleaning fee and tax. Secondly, we do enjoy the room service and other perks such as complementary coffee or breakfast, some hotel even with free shuttle services. Lastly it is no headache for checking in and checking out and professional logistic. If you ever have to book rooms via AirBnB, make sure you check the final total after all, and if you check in late night, the place is not in hidden block.

Train and metro cost is as low as 0.50 cents, depending on distance. When come to transportations, we highly recommend metro, train skytrain. They all connect to any points of the country, short and long distance. Grab, taxi or tuk-tuk are not recommended due to heavy traffic during the day. However if you are single traveler, hoping on motorcycle or scooter will make your trip efficient while the ride can easily navigate heavy traffic.

After 30 year since my first visit of Thailand, I feel that the country maintain the friendliness in the same way, and the prices for hotels, food and transportations have been convenient and affordable. Many local streets seem as as poor as 30 years ago, while many commercial buildings and condos are arising in the city centers.

In contrast with US cities, we found the thai people are extremely calm and peaceful. During the morning traffic, people standing by the line of train platform with no stress nor aggression. Trains are usually packed this time, people are calmly waiting without rush or push into the train. Every Thai was wearing mask except tourists. With older passengers on board, seats will be offered by others.

While Western food and drinks are widely offered, we are still enthusiastic about local Thai food, especially street food. About a 10 minute walk from the hotel Al Meroz, there is a small but nice market offering delicious cooked food, vegetables, meat and other merchandise such as clothing. It costs about $2-4 for a good typical meal. For example, egg fried clear noodle costs $0.70 and papaya salad costs $1.80. Most of dishes are under $2.

Siam Paragon is a major shopping mall in Bangkok metropolitan area, with the most famous American and International brands, it offers luxury goods, clothes and verity of international fast foods and fine dining experience. Besides KFC, McDonald, Starbucks and Diary Queen, there are many Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Italian cuisines among Thai food, the price range from $4 to $10. The food court presents clean fresh dishes with public shared tables, while sitting a big crowd of worldly languages, characters and charms.

Panama – A Metropolitan City

Departure from Golfito, Costa Rica, Providencia has arrived at Puerto Armuelles in the evening, the first check-in port of Panama. The second day in the morning we just crossed the pier to the beach where the port captain located.

As described in the cruising guide, the Port Captain was waiting on the shore to give us a hand for dingy landing. The strong built, around 40 year man seemed know we would pay a visit at that moment, with his welcoming gesture.

Dinghy landing to Port Captain in Puerto Armuelles, Panama checking in

The checking process made easy as all the departments of immigration, agriculture are connected to the same building. As we all thought we got everything done after all, the computer made a joke on us, the officers couldn’t complete the final navigation permit, we would have to go to Flamingo in Panama City to obtain.

Glance from flamingo

The first impression of Panama City is Hong Kong alike international metropolitan, sky high rise buildings on blue clear water, busy crowd hurry in and out through metro system. With American heavy influence the city reshaped the business, infastrucure and culture, along with the canal revenue, Panama makes $70 Billions GDP, vs. HongKong $400 Billions.

Panama is the country captures every desire for cruisers, tourists, and young backpackers, whether you search tropical nature and adventure or settle for leisure with sipping cappuccino in metropolitan venue. As Panama is well known as canal infrastructure, it overrides its own natural beauty.

There are over 1400 island and exotic cost lines presenting white sand beaches, ocean rock with unique bird spices, and popular surfing bays. 76 National parks offer tropical plantations and lavish rainforests, many precious living spices like Jaguar, Iguana, monkeys, slars and are living among in this paradise.

Canal official Carlos on board for vessel measure