Woke up this morning and really didn’t have a plan. We didn’t know how to get around this place. The front desk tried to explain the buses in their broken English, but we still didn’t quite get it. We thought we would try out the bus ‘system’ and go into the Old Phuket Town. Headed down for the breakfast that was included, which turned out be sliced white bread, some local dessert wrapped in banana leaves, little pastries with maybe a meat mixture in them, coffee and tea. Skipped breakfast here. Thought we would just grab something in a restaurant as we walked towards town looking for the bus stop. We had to take the pink bus #1. Ha Ha. That didn’t quite work out either, however we did grab a smoothie at a street stall. I had orange pineapple and a Doug got a banana strawberry. They were huge and thick. We both only drank half. Still no bus stop and we figured we must already be over half way to town. It was a 2.7 km walk. Have I mentioned lately how hot it still is here! We finally came upon a bus stop but figured it wasn’t worth it now and continued walking. In many places the sidewalk could barely be called a sidewalk.

You could see the architecture starting to change as you approached the old town.

We came across a coffee shop/restaurant, The Old Phuket Coffee and thought we would get a coffee and maybe a bite to eat. Expensive coffee ordered only, we were informed that there was no kitchen today. Wonder how often this happens?

After our rest and cooling down, the place had fans, we continued to wander the streets. If I was still sewing and had lots of space in my luggage it would have been a delight to shop. So many fabric choices and notions. The street we walked down was lined with fabric stores.

At the end of this street we stumbled upon an area where there was a fountain and what appeared to be a couple of parade floats. Of course I took a few pictures.

These were made out of flowers and leaves. There were so many of them. Different sizes and designs.

By now it was almost 1:00 and we were getting hungry. We saw a sign saying pizza. That sounded really good right now so we went over to investigate. Couldn’t tell at first if the place was open or not as the windows were tinted, but we looked closer and saw it was doing a great business. Full of tourists! My kind of place. This place turned into one of our best finds so far on our trip. We ordered Chang (surprise surprise!) and a pepperoni pizza. The ice cold Chang, pizza and service were amazing. Bill was about $15 Cdn. Not bad. Highly recommend this restaurant, OSOT Apothoke Cafe & Pizzeria for anyone traveling to Phuket.

As we left the restaurant they were telling us that there was a big festival going on tonight combining the Chinese New Year and the towns annual festival. He said it would start sometime around 5:00, once it cooled down a little.

We continued to walk around and take photos of the buildings. Some beautiful architecture here.

To my surprise we came across a temple in the middle of all these buildings. We always try to give a bit of a donation when we visit the temples unless we’ve paid to get in. We were told at this temple that it is Good Luck when you give. I think he saw that ‘SUCKERS’ sign on us!

Maybe I need this shopping bag so I can shop? Do you think the airlines will allow it as my carry on bag?

After more walking around we were wanting something sweet. At least I was and it didn’t take much to talk Doug into a slice. I had the Apple Mango crumb pie and Doug a slice of Blackforest cake. Both were surprisingly good.

By now it was after 3:00 and we were both tired and hot. There was no way we would last another 2 hours until the festival even started. We decided just to head back to the hotel. The street food vendors were setting up.

Thought we would catch the pink bus back……if we could only find the bus stops. Ended up walking all the way back. It was a deadly walk as there was not a whole lot of shade to stay in. Put almost 15,000 steps on my Fitbit today. A good workout in this heat. Finally back at our hotel.