Phuket Update
It’s January 2011 and we’re back in Phuket after a fabulous month in Hong Kong. The sun is shining, there is a breeze wafting over the balcony – blissful!
A few updates on accommodation. Our friends Barry & Lin recently returned from the UK hoping to spend three months here booked into the same Phuket Garden Home they have used before and which we used until we moved into our own apartment in Kamala. The booking for PGH was no problem and because of the huge range of accommodation available here now and a quieter tourist season, the price was lower. But so were the standards! They arrived to find that the room they had requested and which the manager had confirmed had been let to someone else. The alternative they were given was in a noisy spot closer to the bar and was frankly filthy. No attempt had been made to clean it, there was extensive mold on the bathroom and kitchen wall, the loo was dirty and the floor everywhere dirty. Even though they made a fuss, no cleaner was forthcoming. They also found the restaurant has closed so there is only a bar service. Not good.
The great thing about PGH was always that it was pretty and relatively quiet. The rooms were never wonderful, but they could be made OK; the service was often sloppy but that could be ignored. It had a good pool with soft, attractive surroundings. It still has and I wouldn’t say don’t go there, just be prepared to roll up your sleeves, either to do your own cleaning or to set about the manager who definitely needs a severe kick up the rear end. A lot of what I wrote about the place in the post under Places to Stay still applies (but the prices are much lower), but I don’t think it would no be my place of choice if I were looking for somewhere long-term. It’s a pity because with the injection of a bit cash and common sense, the place could have been and could still be very successful. I’ve spent a total of eight months of my life there and I feel a soft spot for it. But we all move on.
We helped B&L look around for somewhere else, looking again at some of the places we’d checked out three years ago. Of these, the closest was Best Mansions on the Lower Chao Fa Road right by the Chalong Gym and Fatty’s restaurant. It’s well signposted and behind the restaurant Da Franco. The immediate impression, compared to PGH, was good. It has the same sort of ambience – chalets around a pool, but there were staff available (not just the cleaners like PGH! ), the staff were in uniform and the place was generally clean. The rooms are like many in that they are more hotel style (one of the great things about PGH was that it had a separate living room) – a large bedroom with a fridge, a reasonable bathroom and a kitchen area that had even less equipment than PGH – a sink and a cupboard, not even a microwave. We’d rejected it before because if you want to work, there’s nowhere comfortable to sit – there’s a verandah, but in the evening, the mossies would probably be a problem. At 12k THB per month, it ain’t bad, but there are limitations.
We checked out one other relatively new place on the Rawai Road from Chalong Circle: Le Piman. Very nice place – 19 chalets around a pool each with a spacious living room and separate bedroom. Very pretty resort with a good sized pool. Downside: too expensive – they charged (high season) 2k THB per night including breakfast and 48k THB per month, excluding breakfast!!!! Amazingly, the place was full. There are frankly much cheaper alternatives that give the same.
So we end up at the condos were we live where there are many apartments also for let. It all comes under the Trees Residence in Kamala, but the place comprises two separate condo areas – Trees and Zen Space. The price quoted was good and a deal was struck. I’m not quoting prices since it’s worth contacting the place direct to get a current quote – it seems to be fluid! Check it out.
We found one other brand new place between Trees and the town called G1. It’s a six storey block of mainly studio apartments with two very smart and large one bedroom penthouses on the roof (6F) The penthouses seem good value – 35K per month, but at 25K per month, the studios are expensive and like a large, well-fitted out hotel room. There are no balconies. G1 has a small pool on the roof with an infinity edge that gave me the heebie-jeebies! Below the infinity edge is a ledge, not very wide, and beyond that a fall of 6 floors! It’s an accident waiting to happen and I wouldn’t let kids near it (or tipsy adults!).
Of course there are hundreds of places around; it all depends on what you want. For longer lets, there are loads of village houses in Kamala and other places. They won’t have pools, but the beach isn’t far away. The lets tend to be longer, but it’s always negotiable and the prices can be good – 10-13k per month for a two bedroom place is about right. You pays your money …