Phuket Day 4 (1)

Woke up to a great American buffet breakfast served at the hotel's restaurant. We had delightful servings of bacon (again *groan*), sausages, eggs, breads and pastries, cereals, cold cuts, salads, some Thai dishes and fruits. I think I am addicted to coffee, I just need to drink it during breakfast everyday. I was happy for a moment that the yoghurt was dabao-able, but then it tasted like shit. Ugh.

I love buffet breakfast

After that, we went for a swim in their pool. I was intending to suntan, but it was cloudy and it even started to drizzle a while later. Heck.

I love their swimming pool!

When it was time, we went back to wash up and wait for the minibus to pick us up for our excursion to Bang Pae Safari. It finally arrived at about 3pm and there were already six tourists on board.

Along the way, I saw a dead cat in the middle of the road. Apparently it had been knocked over by the vehicles but nobody cared to pick it up. What if it gets run over repeatedly and you know, all the good stuff comes out? I was so sad that I broke into tears, startling Sluggie and the driver beside me. I remained that way till we reached Bang Pae.

A guide took us to the Gibbon Rehabilitation Centre, where gibbons are kept and nursed. They are not fit to be released into the wild because of various reasons: some carry the HIV virus (that will pose danger to humans if they attack them), some have had their limbs amputated due to other diseases or abuse from previous owners, some are over-aggressive etc etc. My heart goes out to these poor creatures.

Then the guide took us to trek through the jungle to arrive at a waterfall. There were many Thai teenagers diving and swimming at the bottom of the waterfall. What fun. Sluggie and I were oogling at the topless hunky guys and the curvy girls with wet translucent pyjamas. Keke.

At Bang Pae Safari

The waterfall

Then we were taken to a rubber plantation where we were shown how rubber was tapped from a tree. I was yawning because I ALREADY KNOW. Malaysia has an abundance of them. It was an eye-opener for the angmohs though.

The rubber plantation

Then we were taken for the elephant ride. Sluggie and I were seated on one small elephant and the rest were assigned bigger elephants. Yeah yeah, we are small-sized Asians. A cheeky Thai boy sat on the elephant's head guiding it, while we sat on a bench on the elephant's back. I was indignant when the guide kept hitting the elephant's head with a stick whenever the elephant strayed from the route or stopped to munch on some plants. Such cruelty! Sluggie consoled me saying that if these owners do not put these elephants through this labour and pain (and earn our tourist dollars), they would have nothing to eat. Okay, fine.

On the elephant

Playing with a cute little squirrel owned by our guide

The guide took us for a thirty-minute ride on the elephant through the rubber plantation and in the river. After that, we alighted and we bought bananas (at exhorbitant prices) to feed the elephant that we rode on.

Delighting the elephant with bananas

Sayanging the elephants