Hoot Holidays coughet

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Bronnie

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Oct 9, 2013
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We jumped on a Hoot Holidays deal advertised in the paper for 8 nights in coughet staying at the 5 star Le Meridien Resort which included all meals, transfers to and from the airport plus 2 x 1 hour massages.

We flew Thai Airways BNE BKK in a 777 and BKK HKT in an Airbus. It’s an hour or a little more to drive the opposite end of the island to our resort. Le Meridien is a huge resort with its own private beach, tennis courts, several swimming pools, conference centre, water sport area and several restaurants – Thai, Japanese, Italian, buffet restaurant and coffee shop cough restaurant. It is a 10 minute trip into Patong where there is a major shopping mall, night markets and regular street shops as well as a long beach. The hotel had a transfer service to Patong for BHT100 per person each way or taxis are BHT300 each way. The shops in the mall are expensive and the street shops are full of souvenirs, surf gear, tattoo shops, massage shops etc.

We booked two day trips via Destination Holidays who are connected to Hoot Holidays. One trip was via catamaran to Phi Phi Island, Monkey Bay and another island. We wanted to see Maya Lake but it’s closed now. While we did some snorkelling at Monkey Bay (everything provided – snorkel, mask, flippers) the coral was mostly dead, some pretty fish and many sea urchins – nothing like the Barrier Reef. Phi Phi Island is very commercialised, lots of cafes, restaurants and market shops. Lunch was provided buffet style but was disappointing.

The second day trip was to James Bond Island by speedboat stopping for two canoe trips paddling around other small islands, caves etc, sighting monkeys and bats in one cave. On James Bond Island we walked up and down steps to the viewing points and around to another beach and small village. Lunch was buffet style again at a restaurant on a floating village, again disappointing food. We really enjoyed this day trip, much better than the first.

Both day trips were expensive, about A$150.00 each person each trip, both left from coughet town which is at least a 40 minute drive from our resort depending on the traffic. The traffic around the island was heavier than I imagined but the roads are good.

We were there during the monsoon season but were lucky to have both day trips on fine days. Later we had some days where it rained or storms but it wasn’t for the whole day so still possible to get out and about.

We flew Thai HKT BKK on a 747 and BKK BNE on a 787. All flights were good – ample leg room and meals were better than some airlines. Ex BNE on the 777 the TV screen was small and the quality of the picture was terrible plus the choice of movies was terrible. On the 787 the entertainment system was great.

Our resort was so nice we were reluctant to do any more exploring around the island especially with the traffic being so bad and sitting in a car all day did not appeal. However we did venture into Patong but found little we wanted to buy.

For the price we paid it was unbelievable value and the hotel was better than our expectations. We thought, with vouchers, we would be restricted with our free meals in the hotel but we could eat at all the restaurants and could have one entrée, one main and one dessert each, every time, if we wanted. We also were provided with two drink vouchers each day and we used these in the pool bar/restaurant mostly either for beer or the excellent coffee, we could have had wine but wine was not good on the vouchers. Wine in all the restaurants is very expensive, one glass costing almost A$20, a beer is A$10. Of course drinks are much cheaper in the restaurants in Patong.

I thoroughly recommend Hoot Holidays if all their deals are as good as ours.
 
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