hopkinsonfamilytravels: Travelling to find a beach, Bangkok to Hua Hin

After researching various travel options we decided to book a taxi to take us to Hua Hin. It appeared by my calculations to save a good 3 hours travel time for the additional cost of no more than £10. Still however it does not feel like us - and we feel sell outs travelling by ways that are not the least expensive and staying in non budget hotels.

So we had a leisurely breakfast in our 5 star hotel, then the kids had a swim in the pool while Liz packed one bag to take with us - the rest we put into storage at the Chatrium Riverside Hotel.

The taxi we had ordered arrived at 12 noon exactly and we set off for Hua Hin, which is the place where the Thai royal family have had their summer palace and have traditionally holidayed.

Bangkok goes on and on - its a huge metropolis, and the streets are full of hawkers with road side stalls - food, fruit, anything - you just wonder as you get to the faster flowing roads if they ever make a sale from day to day.

Although the roads are full, the road network is excellent - it was at least dual carriageway all the way to Hua Hin.

On the way we passed salt flats - (vendors selling bags of salt by the side of the road), and even saw working elephants pulling loads.

First stop was Phetchaburri where we toured around a previous Thai kings royal palace. Its several hundred years old, but seemed to become the residence of some European prince around 1910. The literature was a bit confusing - but it was interesting enough nevertheless. The palace is on a hill - I guess to get better air circulation - fortunately there was a cable car going some of the journey - it was 37 degrees Celsius so any strenuous effort is off putting! For the kids the huge number of monkeys was the particular attraction.

From there we asked the taxi driver to take us to some caves which we had heard about (the taxi driver who knew all about the palace had not!). These were pretty special, and clearly little visited. They were originally sponsored by a Thai king some 400 years ago. Its a large cave complex (99 steps down) and very cool inside - although plenty of natural light from holes in the ceiling. Inside there are 5 chambers, with great light patterns, the usual stalactites and stalagmites and some 99 images of Buddha - including a large reclining Buddha. The caves are looked after by Buddhist nuns. We were able to ring a Buddhist bell, and the kids said a prayer and left an offering. The taxi driver was Buddhist and was clearly very happy to go to a place he did not know existed. Apparently he drives people to Hua Hin almost on a weekly basis (its a real Thai weekend getaway destination) and regularly stops at the old palace, looks like this will now be added to the itinerary!

From Phetchaburri we quickly covered the 90k of so to Hua Hin, seeing huge posh beach side hotel resorts as we started to get close to the beach.

This time we have elected to stay in a much more modest guesthouse in the centre of Hua Hin. Its close to their night markets and 10 minutes walk from the beach. Still much more expensive and upmarket than our previous visit to Thailand 20 years ago and a far better standard - but at £40 for 2 very clean air conditioned rooms with huge beds including breakfast we have no complaints (even if it's far removed from the quality of the Bangkok hotel!)

We walked to the beach at Hua Hin and were initially shocked to see it covered in beach cafes - so densely that there was no where to sit on the beach (just like the old images of Spain from the 1970s). Fortunately we soon discovered a bit more beach by walking a few hundred metres - but its not quite the isolated beach that we had originally intended to experience in Koh Chang. To make matters worse we have arrived at a weekend (and this is a destination of choice for Thai weekenders) and, unbeknown to us, they have an annual jazz festival here which attracts people from all over Thailand. That is on this weekend too. We will make the best of it, or the very friendly guy at the hotel says we could take a taxi to a much quieter beach some 6km or so away.

After a walk on the commercialised beach, we have to confess that we allowed the kids to have their first McDonald's of the whole holiday - which they enjoyed. We then had a quick unplanned return visit to the hotel as when we passed some workmen by the pavement Eleanor stood in their mound of unset concrete - well over ankle deep and enlarging her shoe to double its size. Luckily by the hotel their is an outside tap with high pressure that we could hose her and her shoe down with before it set. We then had a walk around the night market, and Liz and Jim had a Thai fried rice (Jim's blew his head off with chillies - not one to be repeated). Joesph by this time was about out on his feet such was the heat, so we were pleased that we had chosen a central hotel, just a couple of minutes back to the hotel where we could switch on air conditioning, have a shower and fall into the oversized beds.

Stayed at Baan Manthana Hotel, Hua Hin, Prachuap Khiri Khan 77110, Thailand