Отзыв об отдыхе Review of the holiday

I'll start in order. My wife and I are from Ukraine, Zaporozhye. We bought a tour from Tez-Tour, departure from Moscow, price for 11 days with a flight, 3-star hotel + breakfast = 1680 USD for two. Ukrainians need a visa - on arrival approx $30 + you need to get to Moscow. Transaero flew from Dnepropetrovsk, 1.5 hour flight to Moscow, Domodedovo. Since the flight to Thailand was only for tomorrow at 22-40 we stopped for 1 night in Moscow (we had not been before), 1700 rubles for a room at Serpukhovskaya metro station. Very acceptable. Walked, walked. Moscow is a city that never sleeps : ) So, I turn to the description of the actual tour from Thailand.
1. Flight. Flying Transaero. Departure from Domodedovo, at 22-40 Moscow time, the plane is a Boeing 747-400. Fed 2 times. Departure minute-by-minute. In the morning we sat down on Phuket. The first impression - yes, it's ALUSHTA !! ! To be honest, I wasn't impressed right away. You can’t see paradise palms, turquoise beaches and other things from pictures about Thailand. We got out and went to passport control. There is no exchanger, there is nowhere to buy baht. I went to the window "Visa on arrival", asked how much it costs and where to buy baht? The Thai showed a sign - the price of visas in different currencies. $40 Speculation, but nothing to do. There is nowhere to buy baht at Phuket airport until you leave passport control. I had pre-filled forms with photographs. I gave him forms, money, and immediately the visas were pasted into the passport, they passed control, customs. We are already in Thailand. Changed $200 at the airport exchange office. The course is 29.6 baht for 1 dollar. I give courses for a correct understanding of the order of prices in Thailand. So, 1 UAH - 3.7 baht. Or 1 Russian rub. = 1 baht.
2. Hotel. I chose it not only by the reviews of tourists, but mainly by looking through the hotels offered by TezTour in my price range using Google Map. I made no mistake in my choice. The hotel is great in every way! Small, clean, cozy, homely or something. Clean warm swimming pool, very polite staff (just arrived, all cocktails with ice, cold fragrant towels, etc. , room cleaning, every day water and tea-coffee bags for free, no deposits for a mini-bar in the room, at the reception free safe-cells, hairdryer, kettle in the room. !!!! ). And it's 3 stars. To the sea 160 meters. Cross the road and you're on the beach. Tropical garden, not a hotel. Choose - it's the best of inexpensive. I know what I am saying !

3. Nutrition. The hotel had breakfasts - rice, potatoes, vermicelli, rice soup, fruits (pineapples, papayas, watermelons, grapefruits, small bananas), omelettes, scrambled eggs, bacon, stewed beef, fried fish fillets, salads, croissants, etc.
I didn't want to have lunch - it was very hot. We went to a cafe for dinner. Attention - the order of prices! Myth one - Thailand is not a cheap country at all! The average salary of an employee is 15.000 baht. Compare with Ukraine. Prices match - for example, dinner will cost as follows: rice with 4 shrimp - 120 baht, juice or beer - 80 baht. Those. for two you need to spend approx 400-500 baht. This is 108 - 135 UAH. It's in a street cafe. I'm talking about seafood. Prices per 100 grams: lobster - 210 baht, king and tiger prawns - 180-190 baht. Crabs - 60 baht, but there is nothing to eat, one shell. So eat your seafood at home. For example, a live lobster in the "Metro" costs 350 UAH per 1 kg !! ! It seems that lobsters are brought to Thailand from Ukaina.
4. Sea. Every day I told myself how great it was that we didn't go to Pattaya. In Phuket, I have repeatedly heard how dirty the sea is in Pattaya. Our hotel was in the south of Karon beach, 10 min walk to Kata beach. The first 4-5 days it was sunny, I burned out so that I went lilac from burns, although I hid in the shade. The sun is very active. So, as long as the sea is calm, this is a class. Clean, transparent, the sand sings under your feet when you walk on it. Then a small storm began and the sea began to throw out garbage - plastic glasses, bags, sticks, etc. If this is happening in Phuket, where the sea is essentially an open ocean, then I'm afraid to imagine that in Pattaya. The descent into the sea is very gentle, clean sand. The ebbs and flows are impressive. The water moves away to 40-50 meters. On Katya as well as on Karon. There is no particular difference. Kata is located in a bay, so there are smaller waves, but more garbage, because on the way to this beach there is a stink river, which, I suspect, flows into the sea somewhere between Kata and Corona.
5. Excursions. They took it on the street, there were a lot of agencies. We went to the Similans (2300 baht per person) and rafting + elephants + waterfall (1300 baht). This is despite the fact that Teztour has a price for similans - 4600 !! . After all, the islands are the same. We were transported on a speedboat with 4 motors. Fruit, pepsi, fanta, sprite on board - free of charge. On the island - a hot lunch. White sand, turquoise sea. But still, this is not a Bounty in our understanding. The Bounty is probably somewhere else, maybe in French Polynesia. . . but I haven't gotten there yet, so I can't say for sure. The vegetation in the Similans is the same as in Phuket. I didn’t see palm trees before the water. We got into the rain on the way back, got wet like dogs  . Well, you can’t be offended by nature. There's nothing to be done here. Elephants are also interesting, unusual. + My wife and I really enjoyed rafting. But the waterfall is rather weak - like Dzhur-Dzhur in the Crimea who was.

In general, Phuket is the vegetation of the Crimea + the beach of Israel. 11 days personally tired me. I would have been just 7. It's not a heavenly place like in the pictures, but it doesn't suck either. Something seems to me that this is approximately the case in Turkey, although I personally have not been there yet. So why fly so far if everything is at hand? To see once? Maybe that's the way it is. I saw that I don't regret anything. But once is enough for me. The world is big and life is so short.