The two countries of Thailand are North and South. Part 16 last
Part 16. In which we finally have a rest!
December 7-8-9. Krabi.
Plans:
December 7 – Tesco Lotus store, night market.
December 8 – rest at the hot springs.
December 9 – flight to Doha at 8 am.
Map for clarity:
Everyone had already left the ferry, and only then I, hobbling and leaning on my suitcase, crawled slowly to the exit.
A long gallery is laid among the mangroves. I like mangroves. But here it all looks messy. In the high roots one can see tangled pieces of paper, packages, and a strong ebb exposes the swampy bottom.
When we go out into the world, the majority of tourists have already left, others are just loading onto buses. Taxi drivers push with indecent price offers (400 at once). They do not want to bargain, they snatch from the crowd those who are ready to part with their hard-earned money without bargaining.
We sit down in a cafe. I need to rest my leg, drink a glass of tea, and let the taxi drivers know that they don't have enough customers to hit their incredible prices.
While my husband is choosing drinks, a smart taxi driver comes up to me to bargain. I explain to him that our husband speaks English, and he is now a little busy. The conversation slowly turns into bargaining, I even get serious discounts, and then my husband comes and tries to spoil everything for meto also bargain. So I quickly and loudly say 120 and we shake hands. My husband looks at me dumbfounded - "What, it was possible like that? ".
We send the taxi driver to fatten up while we drink our tea.
I bargained so desperately because I knew that the hotel was very close, about 3-4 kilometers. We drive for a long time, on the way we still stop near a pharmacy, my husband buys an elastic bandage for me.
In the hotel, it turns out that we live on the 3rd floor, but there is no elevator. We have 2 suitcases and at least one of them is very light, I can’t lift it, I would lift myself to the 3rd floor. I ask: who can carry our luggage to the room? The girl at the reception replies: "I am. " My husband is a hussar, he cannot allow a woman to carry his luggage and drags both suitcases himself. I trudge behind, blood dripping on my heart from how tense my husband is. He still can't do it. It is useless to tambourine that it was possible to raise them at least one at a time, it is not clear why to be a hero. Finally we get to the room. The room is lovely, especially considering how much it costs.
I am very pleased with the balcony, even though the view from the window is desecrated by the construction site. But if you look not forward, but a little to the side, then what a beauty!
After my shower, I put a tight bandage on my injured ankle. It immediately becomes easier to live. I give my husband an order to run to the nearest Tesco Lotus and buy some interesting things to take home. I promise to send the list by WhatsApp. But my husband resists, asking me to strain once in my life and go with him to the store for moral support. You can also sit on the couch, in a cafe, and manage the process from a closer distance. I accept this as the best idea of the year. Between the sadness of lying in the room and the fun of sitting in the store, the store is undoubtedly the best. The nearest Tesco Lotus is one and a half kilometers away. But I can't walk, so let's go.
The husband goes out to catch a taxi, agrees for 150. And so we go, we go . . We have already left the city. I understand that we are going to a distant store, the one not far from the airport. It's bigger, so I'm driving silently) Apparently, the taxi driver got it mixed up or the husband slurred it.
In Tesco Lotus, the first thing we do is find a cafe, eat egg cakes there, get ready for shopping, I write lists. And then kaaak spun! I forgot that my leg hurts.
At first we bought various trifles in the form of toothpaste and face masks, and then we broke away in a big way and began to take frying pans and knives) When all this ceased to fit in the cart, the question arose of how to transport it home. Assessing the scale of the tragedy, we chose a huge plastic box. They put their purchases in it, closed the lid with difficulty. Everything, the program is at least completed.
We went outside - it was already getting dark.
We started looking for a taxi. The previous taxi driver gave us his phone number, but we couldn't get through to him. My leg hurt, but my husband still can't find anything. And just at the exit they sell sneakers. I ask the seller to allow me to sit on his chair, he kindly allows.
It was getting dark…
Husband is missing. The leg hurts even in a sitting position, the adrenaline subsided from it completely. Apparently, my face was so sad, or maybe I had been sitting for too long, that the seller came up to me to chat. During the conversation (in the blink of an eye, I speak English in a very meager amount), the seller volunteered to help me find the car. Well, yes, you can imagine: at night, an aunt with a bandaged leg, with a huge box, is sitting and is clearly going to spend the night in your chair. Would you help? )
After a few minutes, someone was found willing to take me to the city for 350 baht. It seemed to me shameless robbery and I refused. The seller understands that it will not be so easy to get rid of me, he begins to bargain with the driver, and since the driver does not yield, he begins to bargain with me. I call my husband, I say, they want to take us here for 350, my husband happily runs to us, because he cannot find even for 500, although he has already run even to the highway. But while he is running towards us, I am thinking about his words, keeping an intrigue, and suddenly the driver agrees for 300. Apparently, the seller paid him his own, so that only he would take us away from his eyes)
Pricing is strange, of course: either the first driver sold cheap, or with the advent of darkness, prices increase three times. In any case, even if we are both bargaining geniuses, it was better to rent a car for two days. In Krabi, we ran into a taxi 1670 baht. And then we did not get where we intended to go - to Ao Nang beach and blue lakes with a hot waterfall. And if we had gone there, it would have been one and a half thousand more.
The driver who brought us to the city was not a taxi driver. It seemed to me that he was not a man either, but, perhaps, I was mistaken. After all, boys in girls in Thailand can change clothes, but in order to vice versa?
The boy/girl didn't know how to use the navigator. And I didn't understand the map. We circled around our area, he tried to get rid of us, but we steadfastly rested where we were with a leg, and a box. Finally, he did find the right turn, and there the right hotel, and even took out the box from the trunk and stuffed it under the reception desk. My husband, of course, was worried about his frying pans, until I convinced him that they definitely wouldn’t be stolen here. So the box spent the night at the reception, do not drag it to the third floor and back.
But it seemed to us that there were few adventures, and the leg just quieted down, so we went to look for a night market. Going to the night market wasn't particularly remarkable to describe, except for the moment when I wanted to buy a lot of rambutans, and my husband didn't like the thai woman who sold them. We compromised, bought a pound and threw everything away at home, because they were hard, germinated.
And what is more interesting, in Krabi there are no scarves - stoles that I wanted to buy home for gifts. It was necessary to take in the north. But I really did not want to carry them all over Thailand.
In general, we bought magnets, colorful pants (their quality deteriorated in Thailand, the previous pants were worn much longer), fruits, some food and went to bed.
This is how we spent a day in Krabi ineptly. Every trip should have at least one day like this. It is clear that I could hardly crawl with my leg, but even if I were healthy, it is possible that the store would have swallowed me up until the evening. I went there and disappeared) Everything you need, everything is cheap, and it's so addictive! )
But the next day promised to be great no matter what! We will finally have a rest! ) We are going to hot springs! For me, this is the best vacation.
In the morning, quickly throwing everything impudently into our suitcases and not quickly having breakfast in a terribly expensive but tasty cafe at the hotel, we went to the hot springs.
Our breakfast, judging by the time spent preparing it and the price, should have consisted of Peking duck, at a minimum, and then if the duck had to be caught. But it was just scrambled eggs with something there, the history did not save the details.
Even though we had breakfast for too long, by eleven we were at the hotel Nattha Waree Hotsprings Resort and Spa.
The hotel is a little further from the airport. A taxi from Krabi town costs 500 baht. But in the morning it was already 600 from the hotel to the airport.
We were immediately given a room, it was great.
Well, that's understandable, it cost $75. It's not cheap for Asia. But the main thing here was not the number, the hot springs were the main ones.
The temperature is indicated on the plates. There are many baths, from 39 to 49 degrees. But all these signs are very conditional. In the pool, on the sign of which it says 39 degrees, it feels like 42; in the pool, where 42 degrees are indicated - generally more than 50; in the pool it was 49 degrees, it was barely 40.
I generally love hot water. But even I couldn't sit in those pools.
There are also cold pools to just swim. In general, I was running around from pool to pool, and my husband was lying on a sun lounger. By the way, there are few sun loungers. And they don't look good.
The whole area is somewhat tired. We went around it, there are signs of decay everywhere. But beautiful!
Such a slightly neglected paradise.
Slight neglect was visible everywhere: there was little water in the canal, the tiles in the pools were broken in places, the cafe was unfinished. . .
It's dirty in the fish pool.
Massage did not work, nor did the private baths.
Elephants, most likely, were conceived as a fountain.
Be that as it may, the area is very interesting and photogenic.
Wherever you look, beauty and relaxation.
There are few people. We, and even a couple of families. True, during the day they brought groups for swimming, but it became even somehow more fun with them. Almost everyone we met at this hotel spoke Russian. Except for the staff, of course) And one small and very quiet Chinese family.
In the photo, my husband, with all his appearance, shows how he loves hot springs))
It was the best vacation spot of the entire trip for both me and my husband. Time dragged on slowly. By noon it began to rain. We went to have lunch at the cafe at the reception. The food was inexpensive, spicy, very authentic. I asked for rice to put out the fire in my mouth. Brought lime)
I think these are the best hot springs in Thailand. The atmosphere is very pleasant. A real tropical paradise.
It's a pity that it gets dark very quickly, and at dusk, and especially in the dark, mosquitoes go on the warpath. Can't you do something about them?
We heard voices at the springs, there were clearly people there late in the evening. Pool lights are on. I suspected that swimming in the evening could be a fun adventure, but I was afraid of mosquitoes, and I had to somehow put all our things together so that nothing would break or spill on the way home.
While I was sorting and packing, my husband got me a bath, sorry, there were no candles.
And now, at night, I'm at the hot springs, lying in the foam (my husband poured all the shampoo he found there)), and this is the last Thai emotion that my brain records for a long memory.
Internet photo
Well, indeed, they refused to take a box in luggage at our airport. "It's impossible, " they say. Can you imagine, we have in the box everything that is acquired by overwork, but it turns out that this is impossible?!
If you refuse to take something in your luggage, they may want you to pack IT in a film.
That's it. We flew from Krabi early in the morning, barely having time to pack the ill-fated box. The most beautiful mountains in the world floated below and I was very sad from this. We managed to see Krabi only from a height.
We will definitely come back here!
And many thanks to you all for being with me and reading to the end, even though it was written very slowly) 
