The opposite of the Thanyapura Sports Hotel...

Although it was the start of tourist season in Thailand, most of the hotels were only half full.  Many people attributed this to the country's military coup earlier this year that may have scared away potential tourists.

Thailand is already very affordable but the lack of tourists seemed to drop prices even further, making even the most luxurious hotels feel like a great bargain.

As such, we booked our final few days at a stunning and remote boutique hotel.

The Phuket Pavilions is set up in the hills of Phuket, overlooking the sea.  We had splurged and gotten our own villa, complete with an infinity pool that looked down on the surrounding area.  Our private villa was about five times the size of our flat in London earlier this year.

Relaxing with a spa treatment

We hardly left the villa during our stay.  We are not sure whether this was caused by the very steep hill we had to climb to go to and from the dining room, gym and reception area OR the fact there was a beautiful "360" bar just steps from our villa OR because the hotel makes it so easy to remain sedentary (sending dinners and spa treatments right to your room!) but, whatever the reason, we certainly took advantage of it, opting to work and relax within our beautiful home base.

We were remarkably relaxed by the end of our short visit.  The only small anxiety or stress we felt was wondering how we would ever be able to return to "reality"!

Unwanted off-roading...

Since Beth really enjoyed the bicycle ride we took when we were in Hua Hin, we decided to book another bike tour to explore Phuket.

Unfortunately, this one did not turn out quite so well...

We were picked up the next morning for our "easy" ride to learn that the three other people on the tour with us were expert riders, far more advanced than the "beginner" classification that was promoted on the website.  One of the men had gone for a 24 hour bike ride around the island just two days prior and another one went mountain biking twice a week in Germany and often raced competitively.

Beth shook off this concern, confident that her bike ride in Hua Hin prepared her for the "simple and flat" trails that has been described.  But things quickly took a turn for the worse as the tour, within minutes of starting our ride, veered dramatically off the main road and into the forest.

Beth had never bicycled off-road before.

To make matters worse, Phuket had suffered a torrential downpour the night before.  It had stormed for about 6 hours throughout the night, making the terrain very soft and very muddy.  It was too wet for even the locals to work the rubber trees that day!   As we wove in and out of the rubber trees, Beth fell further and further behind the group, growing increasingly frustrated with every bump and turn.  What she lacked in speed, however, she made up for in messiness, somehow getting much more filthy with mud than everyone else.

She didn't take in much of the educational part of the tour, learning only that the workers tap rubber trees in much the same way that people tap maple syrup trees, and that the rubbery substance is very stretchy and very durable and has yet to be duplicated by a man made alternative that is a durable.

Relief came when we ended up at the Gibbons Project, a charitable organization that works to save the endangered gibbons.  These monkeys are often stolen for the tourism industry and, even though "monkey tourism" is outlawed, you can often find these small monkeys in bars performing tricks for the patrons such as drinking beer and smoking and posing for photo ops.  As gibbons are very protective, when kidnappers steal a baby gibbon they will actually kill the rest of its family (often 10 or 15 at a time) to make sure that they can take the baby without any consequence.  Between this and people who steal them to keep them as pets, the gibbon population has shrunk dramatically and is now on the verge of extinction.

We were impressed to learn that the centre does its best to both save these animals and actually help them to integrate back into the wild.

After an informative tour of the Project and a quick walk to a nearby waterfall, we were back on our bikes and back into the forest to make our way through some more rubber trees and some pineapple plantations.  Beth learned the hard way that pineapple bushes have very prickly leaves!

As we finally made it to the harbor dock where we ended the ride, Beth couldn't wait to get off her bike and poor Geoff (who had taken on the role of Beth's babysitter when even the "following" guide found her too slow to ride behind) was probably just happy that this painful experience had finally come to an end.

On our ride back to the hotel we decided resolutely that next time we would only do private bike tours where we could help pick the bike route...and the bike pace!

Under the sea...

Phuket is considered one of the top ten places in the world to scuba dive. So, although Beth had only been scuba diving once before - an experience she found both terrifying and exhilarating - we decided to book a diving trip to see this incredible underworld.

In order to best prepare and increase the chance of Beth feeling comfortable during the dive, we organized to do a practice "dive" at the diving company's pool.  This would allow us to practice taking out and replacing our regulator and filling/clearing our masks in the safety of a controlled pool environment.  Although the pool may have been safe in that it was shallower than the sea, we were somewhat alarmed to arrive at the diving center to learn that they used the local community pool and that the pool's filter and cleaning system had broken several weeks ago.  They assured us that the pool was cleaned about 5 days ago and that there instructors were in the pool all the time and no one had suffered any problems.  Shallow comfort.

Nonetheless, we braved the murky and very green water and passed the safety tests with flying colours, likely motivated to work quickly and effectively to minimize our time in the pool and thus our chance of catching some kind of fungal infection from the dirty water.

We were picked up early the next morning and driven down to Phuket town to board the boat and head to Racha Yai for two dives.  The boat, an old clunker with a few cockroaches running around seemed pretty upscale after our pool experience the day prior and we sat down nervously but excitedly to talk to our guide, Andre, about what to expect.

Our two dives that day went smoothly and well and the wildlife we saw (and captured on our Go-Pro - thanks Fred and El!) was awesome.  We saw an eagle ray, manta ray, blue damsels, parrot fish, a moray eel, sea urchins and schools of colourful fish.  It felt like a completely different world down there. 

So excited about our experience that day, we decided to book another dive a little closer to our hotel that would allow us to get out again but require less of a time commitment.  Upon meeting Michael at Sea Bees, a scuba diving centre right on our hotel's property, we learned that we could actually try for a scuba diving certification with just one additional pool session. 

Feeling comforted by the idea of a pool session in the hotel pool, which seemed far less toxic than our previous experience, and not realizing just how extensive the pool session would be, we decided to take the plunge.

The next day, we spent three hours in the pool, repeating all of the tests from the previous dive day and then learning new ones.  At one point, we had to sit at the bottom of the pool, remove our mask entirely while continuing to breathe underwater and then put the mask back on and blow all the air out.  For some reason, Beth found this easier than actually finding a mask that would fit on her face because of all of her crazy hair!

Our actual dives started out a little shaky as Beth took some time to get reacquainted with being underwater.  But Michael, our German instructor (and owner of the dive school) was incredibly calm and reassuring and somehow, in the face of any panic moments, would always seem to find a school of fish to turn Beth towards so she was distracted from her nerves.  In the end, Beth (and Geoff too!) really enjoyed both dives and completed all of the required tasks under the water.

We are pleased to report that after two pool sessions and 4 open water dives, we not only managed to avoid any pesky infections from the nasty pool water but we also became Certified Scuba Divers!

A solid hit...

Recognizing that Geoff had been very accommodating of Beth's desire to visit many a night market during our trip, Beth agreed to indulge Geoff in one of his travel requests - to go to a Thai Boxing Match.

The Bangla Boxing Stadium in Patong is one of the biggest Thai Boxing stadiums in Thailand. The stadium itself is large and tacky, glowing multiple strobe lights while blasting loud music and boxing announcements to the surrounding crowds.

Likely one of the few people ever to actually order these boxing tickets online (it turns out that everyone just buys them at the door), we were unexpectedly greeted at the entrance by the event organizer, Sak, who personally walked us into the stadium and actually tried to upgrade our seats to VIP.  Knowing that the closeness of the VIP seats to the actual ring can frequently mean being hit by flying sweat or blood from the boxers, we politely declined his generous offer and made our way up the stairs to our bench located at a much safer distance away.

Thai boxers are wildly talented - physically and mentally strong.  You could see the concentration, strategy, flexibility and power in every round.

Every child takes Thai boxing at school and, as such, the evening started off the evening with a couple of teenage fights.  Worried that one of the kids would suffer a life-changing concussion, or worse, Beth spent most of the match with her eyes shielded from the ring. Geoff watched studiously but clearly hadn't read enough about the rules and guessed incorrectly (but with confidence) the expected winner of each match.

Clearly not a lucrative sport for teenage boxers, two of the boxers actually shared a pair of boxing shorts -  stripping down to their underwear and trading off shorts to one another between their matches!

For the male boxers, they generally used the first round to get their bearings and then got more intense as the rounds continued, ratcheting up to full force by the 5th and final round.  In each round, they are brought back to their corners and washed down with ice and cold water.  Many of the fights ended with someone being knocked to the ground, but luckily they seemed to recover quite quickly.

The exception to all of this was the one woman's fight, which saw a match up of a woman from Germany versus one from Australia.  After the Australian woman did an odd and uncomfortable self-promotional hippie-type dance for about 5 minutes before the fight started, we were sure that the match was going to be a one-sided knockout. Until they started fighting.  These women were vicious and, unlike the men who spent the first couple of rounds playing defence, these women went for the kill from the first moment of the match. Clearly spent by the end of five rounds, the Australian woman actually won the match and naturally concluded the event by completing another few minutes of a dance routine.

Thai boxing is the national sport here and people are obsessed.  You can strike up a conversation with any local and they all know the most intimate details about the sport and its latest happenings.  Whether you walk into one of the thousands of 7-11 convenience stores around the country or talk to a local cab driver, everyone is watching the matches whenever they have a free moment.

A national sport that blends power with precision and focus -there could be worse hits!

Sailing away from our troubles...

We were so disappointed with our current lodgings that we found an alternate hotel, checked out of the awful one at 6am and brought all of our luggage (ie. everything that we own) with us on our full-day kayaking trip just so we wouldn't have to go back to that horrible place at the end of our day.

We were lucky to be met by a fantastic crew who helpfully locked away all of our bags for the day and made us quickly forget our unfortunate hotel stay.  

After Geoff sent some emergency work emails, we boarded a "fast" longtail boat to take off to the islands to do some kayaking. A scenic boat ride introduced us to the large number of Thai islands in Phuket before we arrived at the "bat caves" to start our paddle.    To see the cave's interior - including the multitude of bats on the cave's ceiling - Geoff paddled our tandem kayak through the very narrow surroundings while Beth controlled our one headlamp and tried to highlight the different points on interest.  After a dark ride, we emerged on the other side of the cave to see some glorious towering rock formations that dropped right into the shallow water.

The 12 hour time change in Thailand has made for some unusual work habits and, after the cave, Beth took over paddling the tandem kayak while Geoff took a last-minute conference call.  As he strolled back and forth along the island beach where we parked the kayak, it was a little surreal to realize that this incredible scenario had become our life!

Calls complete and back in kayaking mode, we paddled around the island, stumbling into numerous monkeys sitting at the water's edge.

We arrived at our next island for a quick hike (with lots of group photos!) to see the mangrove trees and fruit bats.  Fruit bats are much larger than regular bats, likely because of the large fruit buffet they enjoy.  And these bats are loud.  They "chirp" away all day.   No wonder the island is so free of people! The mangrove trees are also a sight to see -  long and lean with lots of different roots, they have an amazing reproduction technique where they shed pointy branches from up high which dig and root into the ground and start anew.

For the next leg of the trip our young boat hand, Musa, joined team leader, Sod, in showing us around.  This included both of them piling into a single person kayak and Musa taking on the role of paddler - which Geoff explained to him was the "the raw end of the deal".  We arrived at a third island to find a large group of Chinese tourists snapping photos of themselves wearing lifejackets and poking their toes into the water.  They seemed like they were having a marvelous time!

Because it was too cloudy for snorkelling, we went to a much quieter (and sandier!) beach to go for a swim instead.  On this island, we met just one gentleman who was lying on a towel and reading his book.  He had actually hired a boat to take him to this remote island so that he could escape the buzz of the nearby town. He seemed to succeed in his solitude, except for one pesky monkey who actually swam across from the other island and snuck up on him, likely looking to steal his sandwich lunch!

Getting late, we headed by Krabi towards Kon Koo Yai for lunch at a now sleepy restaurant on the water. This seafood restaurant definitely did not understand the concept of vegetarian options so we munched on pad thai and rice while sipping coconut juice and watching our crew get unbelievably excited about finding a snapper fish hovering under the water by the dock.

For the hour long boat ride home, we lay on the front of the boat, with heads perched on lifejackets, smiling about our awesome day and excited to get to our new hotel, Indigo Pearl, to settle in!

Keeping it real - Thanyapura Sports Hotel

After such a wonderful stay at Asara Hua Hin, we were very excited to get to Thanyapura, which pitches itself as a paradise for lovers of sport, health and fitness.

Unfortunately for us, their execution fell very far short of the concept's potential.

Geoff has been to sport camps/lodges before, so we were expecting a spartan accomodation experience. What we were not expecting was for our room to reek of mold and mildew. Unfortunately the hotel was fully booked and we had arrived late in the evening, so we had to stick it out for the night confident the hotel could solve our problem in the morning.

The next morning we were told that the hotel was fully booked and we were stuck with our room - too bad! After some debate they managed to find a room for us to switch to. Thankfully we were wise enough to ask to view the room before moving our stuff over. The mold was so bad the bellboy wouldnt even enter it! 2 rooms later (where are all these rooms coming from?) we found one that was acceptable, though probably only in comparison to the horrorshow first alternate room. Unfortunately we discovered that the lock on the sliding glass door to the room didnt work, so every time we left we had to pack valuables and electronics up in locked suitcases and hope for the best.

Safe air? X (think Family Feud noise in your head). Secure room? X What next? Safe water? X. Unlike Asara, who gave us 6 litres of water per day (with more just a call away), what does Thanyapura give you? 2 x 350ml bottles. Really? I am supposed to replenish all of my sweated-from-exercise water and brush my teeth with 350ml of water? 

We could look past the room and drive to Tesco-Lotus for water if everything else was as awesome as we hoped. Next issue was the food. After eating way too much rice, noodles and fried things, we couldnt wait to try the vaunted, award winning, vegetarian-friendly, organic health food on offer. Problem one was that one of the 2 restaurants was closed for renos - a problem when you are in the middle of nowhere. The next problem was that the menu was neither healthy nor vegetarian friendly! Fried spring rolls? Pad Thai? Pizza? Really? For breakfast too? At least they had vegetable juices and protein shakes - they comprised about 2/3 of Geoff's meals.

The next fun problem was when we went to book tennis lessons. A call when we booked the room and email to the tennis pro Roger before we arrived assured us (even recommended it!) that we did not need to book lessons in advance. Of course, when we got there, we were told that there was only 1 lesson slot available the whole week of our stay - Friday night at 22:00-23:00! Messages and emails to Roger the tennis pro resulted in exactly no responses. Very professional.

This of course was the final straw for us. We had never expected a luxurious resort experience, but we did expect that the room would be safe and not damaging to our health. The food we could overlook and survive on veg juices and protein smoothies. But the whole reason we were there - indeed, the entire raisin d'etre of this place - was for the athletics. And now those arent available?

As we had prepaid for the room and had 5 of 7 nights left, we needed to get a refund on our remaining nights. The very nice and empathetic "Hotel Manager" Noot listened to our case and after 🗼40 minutes of discussion agreed that we should be refunded our remaining nights. Great, right? Of course nothing would be that simple at Thanyapura! When Expedia called the hotel to confirm the refund they were informed that nobody at the hotel could authorize the refund and the only people that can strictly work 9-4 Thai time (so middle of the night in North America) Monday to Friday. This of course was a Friday which meant it wont be sorted anytime soon.

As I write this we dont have a resolution to the issue. Hopefully soon and hopefully the hastily-booked Indigo Pearl will have a mold-free room for us!

A long and sometimes winding road...

Recognizing that Thailand by bicycle gives a new and different perspective of the country, Beth ignored her newness to and nervousness about bike riding and we booked a countryside tour..

Picked up by Yo and our very helpful driver, Mr. Tin, we drove about an hour drive south of Hua Hin to Dolphin Bay.  After a quick fitting and bike test where Beth and Yo negotiated and compromised about the height of Beth's bike seat (being just high enough to prevent serious back injuries but just low enough to be bad for her posture), we headed off along the coastal drive.

The first hour was a beautiful seafront ride, paired with a surprising number of stops to drink water and eat fresh pineapple from the local fields. Along the way, we stumbled on:

• Several young men playing obscure childish games and rolling around on the beach in what turned out to be a local university hazing ritual 

• Women sitting at the ocean's edge grinding fish paste out of the catch brought in from the huge nets cast by the fishermen 

• A charming fishing village with boats galore and men readying themsevles to go and catch shrimp, squid, grouper and the like. Many of the fishermen sell their catch to the local restaurants and sell more widely to the community if there are left overs.  

• A local wat/temple where we learned all about the evolution of Buddhism from Hinduism, complete with the back-story of how Ganesha became half man/half elephant, the 3-month ritual that men undertake to practice as a monk, and some general rituals of Buddhism in the local community.

• A seaside village famous for its dried squid that had dozens of racks of hanging squid drying in the sunshine.  Although many people from Bangkok make special trips to this town to purchase dried squid by the bagful, the smell was not the most appealing for our vegetarian tastes! 

• Enormous artificial bird houses (the size of small apartment buildings) with entrance holes and chirping bird music to attract birds to come and make nests in the building that can then be collected and sold to the Chinese to make bird's nest soup.

After a few winding kilometres through a local town, we bumped along a dirt road to hit the seafront of Khao Kalok Bay, another beautiful Thailand beach. Upon reaching the village of Khao Kalok, we parked our bikes, ate more fresh pineapple and then started our hike up a rocky nature trail towards a scenic lookout point of Hua Hin area.  It was quickly apparent that Thailand has some fairly different safety standards than North America, letting people trek on very rocky and treacherous terrain without any sort of protections or supports along the way.  At one point, we were literally crawling on hands and knees in and out of rock caves to get to the lookout point.  Thank goodness we didn't have an issue with claustrophobia!


Reaching the lookout point provided as much enjoyment from actually making it up there safely as it did from seeing the wide expanse below, which once again confirmed just how lush and green this beautiful country is.

Our lunch in Pranburi Beach offered one of the best meals we have had yet in Thailand.  A rundown little shack, the food was creative, tasty and fresh and even though we weren't sure exactly what we were eating, we ate platefuls of it!

Having accomplished the 22-km ride, we opted to go a few extra kilometres to see more of the towns and countryside.  This took us onto one of the busier stretches of road as we navigated through traffic and j-walking pedestrians who seemed to take unnecessary risks when crossing the street.  It was during this time that we realized how protective and effective our guide was.  As we headed up onto a narrow bridge, our safety van had to go ahead because it was too narrow for him to trail behind.  Instead, our guide moved to the back and basically rode in the middle of this busy bridge crossing to prevent any cars from passing or coming at all near to us.  As Beth is not the fastest bicycle rider (and definitely not the best at hilly bridges!), this was a slow process and he fought of traffic for what felt like several minutes.  Needless to say, we continue to be overwhelmed by the kind and thoughtful nature of all of the Thais that we have met.

We made it to 30km before deciding to call it a day.  As we hopped in the van and headed back to our hotel, we chose to ignore the fact that a recent group of Nordic bicyclists had completed our full ride and more in just over two hours (versus our almost full day trip!) and instead closed our eyes in tired satisfaction.

A Sanctuary for Elephants

Having ridden elephants in Laos on our honeymoon, Geoff was only interested in doing something elephant-related here that would keep him firmly on the ground.  So, we were lucky to find an elephant sanctuary in Hua Hin that would allow us to do just that.  

The elephant sanctuary fosters 7 elephants who have been rescued from abuse or life threatening situations.

The terrible circumstances by which the elephants came to the sanctuary are distressing.  Some have been worked to the bone by farmers, not given time to rest, recover from injury or even wash.  It is when the elephants get to the point of being less useful for the farmer that the farmer approaches the sanctuary and hopes they will pay to take the elephant off their hands.

One elephant, for example, who had just arrived at the sanctuary had been worked so hard carrying and towing things during his life on the farm that the sanctuary had to keep something strapped to his back because he doesn't understand how to operate without hauling something with him at all times.  They are working to wean him of this routine.

Other elephants have been hit by cars after working the streets of Bangkok selling "feeding bananas" to tourists for 12 hours a day.  Another elephant was too old to work at the elephant village proving rides to tourists anymore, and was simply tied to a tree to starve to death.

When the sanctuary hears about these stories it then does their best to raise the money needed to buy these elephants and help them recover.  Although these animals will never be released back into the wild, the sanctuary hopes they can at least provide a comfortable life for the elephants for the rest of their lives.

One of the ways that they raise money is through educational outreach days with tourists.  Arriving first thing, we learn all about elephants and their lives in Thailand and beyond.  After an extensive briefing session, we are then introduced to the elephants and can help feed them food and medicine, take them for a walk and then bathe them to help them stay cool.

While Nairobi's David Sheldrick Foundation still has our full commitment for the incredible work they do saving orphan elephants and helping them recover and hopefully return to the wild (please adopt an elephant in support!), we nonetheless appreciated the commitment that the staff and volunteers had to these remarkable, friendly, playful and sweet elephants.  A morning at the sanctuary and you cannot help but be charmed by these gentle giants.  It is just tragic to think that the ivory trade, hunting and inhumane treatment is threatening the very existence of these enchanting animals.

A great way to work...

After the bustle of Bangkok, we headed out of the city to Hua Hin, the country's oldest beach resort area, and a favourite vacation spot of Thailand's royal family.  Our hotel, Asara Villa and Suites, was a tranquil spot and had won numerous awards for its eco-friendly and lush grounds.

It is hard to think of a more enjoyable way to work, than sitting at a table overlooking the sea, taking a midday break for yoga in beautiful Thai gardens and relaxing after a "hard" day with drinks and dinner on the beach or at a sunken table surrounding by flowing water.

May working remotely always be so lovely!

Buzzing Bangkok

As our plans to go to Argentina didn't materialize as well as we had hoped, we took the opportunity to go to Thailand, another one of our top travel "must-sees".

With only one full day in the country's capital, we met our guide, Ms. Nikki, early and set off to explore Bangkok for the day.  

Our first stop was the Grand Palace which has been the official residence of the Kings of Siam since 1782.  The Palace is made up of numerous buildings, halls and pavilions centred around lush lawns and greenery.  The Palace has evolved organically over the years, boasting numerous types of architecture and styles.  King Rama V injected the largest architectural variations by erecting many buildings that reflected his close relationship and extensive travels in Europe and the Western world.  In addition, Thailand's close relationship with China can be seen throughout the Grand Palace, with many of the buildings designed in the Chinese style.

As a side note, there were lots of Chinese tourists at the Grand Palace. Chinese tourism apparently skyrocketed this year after the movie, "Lost in Thailand", became a hit in Chinese culture, grossing more than $1 billion yuan since its release.

Although it is a working palace and hosts several royal events, the Palace is now primarily a museum and has become the most visited tourist attraction in Bangkok, with 50,000 visitors a day.  The large number of tourists, paired with the mid-30s "winter" temperatures in Bangkok, made for a very hot visit. It was difficult to appreciate the magnificence of this Palace when fighting so many other tourists who were also making their way around the site and stopping for photos in some very inconvenient locations.

Even still, we had a chance to take a look inside the Temple of the Emerald Buddha (and see the small emerald buddha who had recently had been changed into his "winter wardrobe" by the King himself),  the Coronation Throne Hall, the Royal Reception Hall, a miniature replica of Cambodia's Angkor Wat (which looked remarkably like the real thing!), and of course the Palace's weapon rooms.

Bursting through the hoards of tourists, we made our way over to the canal dock to board a long tail boat for a tour along the bustling Chao Phraya River and the quieter Klongs (canals).  The boats in the harbour all sport bouquets of flowers on their bows to bring good luck.  In addition, the boats have recently added plastic surrounds to protect passengers from the unwanted splashes of some pretty dirty river water.

The Klongs themselves are quiet, with houses lining the sides of the river.  As grandfathered houses in this area are exempt from taxes, little has been done to update these old buildings and, as a result, many are incredibly run down, with sunken roofs, holed walkways and some very suspect looking electrical wires running above them. We still cannot figure out how they would ever know which wire did what!

After a short boat stop to feed the fish in front of the Buddhist temple (to promote health and the sanctity of life) and a short dam transfer to the higher part of the river, we hopped off the long boat for a short lunch break before an ambitious afternoon of activities.

Our afternoon itinerary began with a trip to Wat Pho to see the Reclining Buddha.  The Reclining Buddha is enormous - 46m long - and is covered with gold leaf.  Its feet alone are 3m in size!  The temple is actually fairly narrow, considering the size of the Buddha it houses, making it difficult to see the entire Buddha in one panorama.  Nonetheless, looking at the Buddha from its various angles is striking, and made more intense and spiritual by the constant clanging of donation coins being dropped into the monk collection pots that line the side of the temple.

For our final stop, we squeezed into a local tuk tuk and headed to the local flower and vegetable markets. We were struck by just how fertile and lush Thailand is, being able to grow a very wide variety of vegetables and fruits and make a multitude of different spices and other delicacies.  Although many of the Thai fruits and vegetables are smaller than their Chinese or international counterparts, they are known to have much more flavour and use far fewer pesticides than these other locales.


As we headed back to our luxurious (and very affordable!) hotel, the Oriental Residence, we were exhausted from the stimulation overload of the day and opted for a quiet, but delicious, vegetarian dinner feast at Na Aroon restaurant .