Sweet and sour, this is the taste from the most popular resort of Thailand. Be prepared before you ever come here.

Phuket is not the tropical paradise you imagine thanks to the photoshoped pictures displayed on hundreds of tour agencies around the world. This is the capital of package tourism in Thailand. Don’t expect to find serene beaches on this island that is no more an island. This is the Rimini or the Benidorm of Sout East Asia. Costa del sol at its worst. It is not even an island as it is connected to the mainland by a motorway bridge but most people don’t know this as they come directly from Bangkok by plane. What is the meaning of package tourism? In Patong – the most popular beach of the island - it means hundreds of hotels, from simple rooms to let for 500 baht (10 euros) to luxury, five star resorts with spa and breathtaking swimming pools. In the middle, there are thousands restaurants, go-go bars, clubs and massage centers that work as hidden brothels with girls offering all kind of services to hungry for sex lonely men. It is not like Pattaya, but you can find everything eve here but from the other side you can walk with your wife without her being disturbed by the local “butterflies”.
As you realize, we don’t like Patong style vacations. That’s why stayed only for one night here. We slept in our tent at Kamala(?), the scenic beach north of Patong and today we left. Most interesting was the fact we found a Greek guy, Nikos from Thessaloniki, who owns a cool bar-restaurant behind the scenes of Patong. The name is Bellair and this is a nice meeting place mostly for Greek tourists who come to Phuket. Nikos has printed a fabulous Thai-Greek phrasebook that we enjoy reading now in the car. Incredible Greeks…_A.Temperidis