Oh, the sun is back again and has brought all his friends too. Looking like it's going to be a great weekend. Today is fantastic (maybe even fandabidozi) - blue skies, not much wind, sea looking pretty calm - great for diving, relaxing on the beach, a surf competition.... er, oops, well maybe there will be more surf tomorrow - the Kata Beach Surf competition started today. I went down to the beach at about 8:30am, and the waves were not at all large. I'd like to go have another look tomorrow.





Phuket Surfing Links

• Surfing in Phuket (on my blog)
• Phuket Boardriders Club
• Phuket Surfing Contest 2007

It has been raining all day today without even a minutes respite. Sometimes heavy, sometimes light drizzle, but the sun has given up the ghost today. Dark skies wound my soul. Won't last for long, though the forecast for tomorrow is not promising either. Bad luck if your holiday in Phuket is now! You should have come last week! Good for the garden I keep telling myself, but our roof has sprung leaks and there were drips on the floor in 2 places this morning. Have to get it fixed, but you know what they say - "When it's raining it's too wet to fix it, and when it's dry it don't need fixing" :) Had to drive into Patong this morning to visit the bank - rain poured down making driving difficult. Would not be surprised to hear of some minor flooding in Patong later - the drainage has always been a problem there in heavy rain.



Wet here in Karon beach too...



The rain is falling on my face
I wish I could sink without a trace.
In the morning I awake,
My arms my legs my body aches,
The sky outside is wet and grey,
So begins another weary day.

Grey Day, Madness (one of my fave songs when I was about 12)

The weekend continued sunny with calm seas. Sunday lived up to it's name - the sun shone during the day, though the night was rather dark. We had to go to bed early since Monday morning was my daughters school sports day at Sapan Hin (in the south of Phuket town by the sea) - I must go back there early one morning as it looked very nice. We had to be there at 7:30am (the aim being to beat the heat by starting early). Of course I had to work, so didn't see the dancing and races and stuff, and my wife said it got very hot in the stadium later in the morning. She called me later from the pool at "Land and Houses Park" (see photo on 12th August) - lovely weather for swimming, but I was working :(

Today has been grey and quite wet, and the sea looked more agitated. I avoided the rain in the morning and afternoon while zipping along on my trusty Honda, but there was a fair amount of rain at Karon Beach today.

Camille, who does a Koh Samui Weather Blog is in Phuket right now, so is also recording the weather in Phuket :)

Now this is more like it! Not that I hate the rain - a bit of fresh cool air is nice; rain makes Phuket green and fills the reservoirs, but a rainy day does limit your options. I can't spend every day in a shopping mall! Since I only have 1 day off per week, I can get rather ratty if that day off is shi**y like last weekend. Today was just about perfect, though I can't say we made the most of the day, having been out at a friends house the night before, going to bed tired and not wanting to wake up early...

Such is the life of a working parent. I set the alarm for 6am on school days, allowing time for a walk around the village in the morning (an attempt to slow the affects of middle age spread), time for a coffee before waking the kids and getting ready for school/work. So waking up at 8am like today is a lie in and feels so nice!

Weather in Phuket today was warm and sunny, hardly any wind and would have been a great day for scuba diving or a trip to Phang Nga Bay or, well, just about anything. Of course we didn't do much, just tried to rest. We took a drive later in the day towards Chalong and followed a side road up in the hills, finally reaching some rustic bungalows which are for rent. Nice! Up in the trees, views over Chalong Bay - the place was called something like "Baan Teen Kao". Then we took a quick walk at Chalong Jetty, which is something many locals do in the evening.

Viva el sol! Forget last week - we don't get so much rain in the "rainy season"!


 

The last couple of days we've had lovely weather in Phuket. After all the rain towards the end of last week and on Saturday, we are most definitely back to warm sunny weather now. Just what the doctor ordered. Winds are light today, great diving weather, and Karon beach was looking very nice this afternoon. I took a little walk. The sand really does squeak. I thought that was just guidebook mumbo jumbo, but it's true. Not many people around. Waves much smaller than recent weeks, but still signs up showing rip current warnings. Great low season weather. According to WindGuru (one of my favourite weather sites), the good weather is set to continue.



I never thought it was that rough (we have had people out diving every day), but a boat sank near Krabi on Tuesday, and another boat made an emergency call saying "a passenger on board needed emergency treatment for a heart condition brought on by stress from the large waves". The dive boats didn't report anything out of the ordinary - we had beginner divers out at Racha Yai on Tuesday and they didn't say it was rough.

Meanwhile, in Thai politics, the Referendum went ahead on Sunday with a sizeable YES vote, especially in the south of the country. The vote in Phuket was nearly 90% in favour of the new constitution. I have not read exactly what the constitution says - but at least YES means the country can move on and hold elections.

• Draft constitution - English translation on Thai Government Website
• Artcle about the new constitution on Wikipedia
• BBC News - Thai Voters Approve New Charter

Meanwhile, ousted ex-PM Thaksin must be happy with his new toy - Man City are top of the English Premiership and beat Man Utd on Sunday.

This morning was much better (unless you happen to like the rain). But it may be a brief respite. The Phuket Gazette has a weather report prediting the rainy weather will continue for a while yet (see here). I have to say, it has been generally quite dry this summer, and without a bit of rain we'd all be moaning about water shortages in February.

I stopped at Karon Beach this morning. Many parts of the beach are still very green and natural (if you frame your photo to exclude beach chairs). Locals do still head out and fish from the beach. These photos were on the beach in front of the Moevenpick Resort.

 

• More about Karon Beach

But the wet weather is not what's bugging me - it's the football on TV. It seems I can't get any English Premier League (EPL) on my cable any more. I hope this is temporary. I cancelled the Satellite TV (UBC) last year due to rising costs and the fact that they did not show any World Cup football. The UBC package is about 50 US$ per month (and that's not the most expensive package) and then some major sporting events are on Pay per View on top of that. UBC are alienating people - I know I am not the only cheap charlie in town! The cable is 350 Baht per month (about 11 US$).

Looks like I need to call a pal and see if he's watching Liverpool v Chelsea tonight...

Forget anything I said about yesterday or Thursday being the wettest day for ages. Today wins that award. Almost constant rain from dawn until night time. Cool weather, no need for a fan, let alone aircon. Every low season has these little rainy periods that last a few days, but if you look back at the archives it's easy to see that there's more sun than rain in the "rainy" season. I wrote a little blog article about it a while ago : Low Season in Phuket.



So, what to do on a rainy day... tourists and locals alike can be thankful for the abundance of shopping centers in Phuket. When I came here in 1999, Tesco Lotus was the only one, and it was only a supermarket - the mall section was built later. Then came Big C, Index and the big one - Central Festival. You also have the new Junk Ceylon in Patong.

On a day like this, it gets to 8pm and I am thinking of hibernation. You know, days like this are so rare that it's actually quite nice for a change. The air is fresh and cool, the world is green and we have a night time frog chorus outside our house.

I only have myself to blame for being too big. My new plastic raincoat covered my torso, but alas not my legs, and it was a wet evening yesterday, meaning I got wet on the way home on my bike. Also in the rain the journey takes longer as I drive slowly. Riding a bike in Phuket is not as dangerous as some people like to think, but you can almost guarantee that in the rain you'll get some nutcase racing along at 80 kph, not wearing a helmet and wrapping his brains round the front of a truck. So I always ride slowly and keep left.

This morning was even wetter, so we came in the car, meaning dropping our daughter at school, then coming to Karon beach to drop me off. My wife will have to drive back here later to pick me up too... It's still raining. About time we had some proper rain!

This weekend, Thailand votes for a new constitution (See BBC News), and we hope this will go smoothly and pave the way for elections. More importantly, it's Liverpool v Chelsea on Sunday. Thankfully for beer drinking football lovers like me, according to the Phuket Gazette, there will be no ban on alcohol sales this weekend.

Hopefully we'll get a few rays of sunshine as well as a bright future for Thailand.

Weather in Phuket has been a little more low season like in the last few days. The weekend was very nice, but now it's rather wet and gray again. Well, it happens sometimes. Nothing serious but enough to make you go home without a tan.

We had a sick little boy for a couple of days, so didn't get much sleep. Maybe the change in the weather got to him. Hot and sunny on Saturday in the pool, running around until all hours at a little party on Sunday, then wet and "cold" (very relative term) on Monday.

Today was wet almost all day. A few rays of sun and several hours rain - probably the wettest day for a couple of months. Never mind, I have my trusty plastic poncho - 20 Baht in 7-11. They are meant to be throwaway, for emergencies, but with proper care they can last for ages!

 

It's been a hot and sunny weekend in Phuket. The winds have slackened, and the sky has been bright blue for the last few days. I felt the midday heat on Friday, coming to work late to allow my wife to attend a Mothers Day event at school. A 30 minute bike ride in the sun was enough to get my tan back.

Yesterday was a chance to sleep late and then head out to enjoy a beautiful day. We went swimming at the Land & Houses Park, which is a huge housing development in Phuket with some very nice houses. We've looked at living here, but at the moment it's just a tad out of our reach. The pool is great - 100 Baht for kids, 150 for adults. Hard to drag the kids out of the water!



Today was the same, but reports from the field (a dive boat diving at Racha Yai Island) say the wind was picking up in the afternoon making for a slightly bumpy ride home.

We've had a few windy low season days here in Phuket. Last week the seas were nice and calm, great for diving or a paddle in the sea. This week it's been rather blowy, though mostly sunny at the same time. Tourists have to be careful of swimming at the beach at this time of year. If you see big waves, best not to go swimming. Several people drown every year at the beaches here. Karon beach is a long open beach and the waves can have quite a kick, plus you often get undertows. I suggest some light reading:

• Don't Drown on Your Thai Holiday

Wednesday was rather blowy, even in the shelter of Chalong Bay, where we had a little launch party for the MV Giamani, a new dive boat. This morning the beach was all awash at Karon, lots of white water and foam. I didn't see anyone swimming...





You can find wind and wave predictions for Phuket (and many other places around the world) at Wind Guru.

With apologies for lack of updates for a week. It's just been rather busy at work.. Everyone seems to have decided that NOW is the time to book their dive trip to Thailand. Advance booking is a good idea, for sure - if you are planning any diving in the future, ask Sunrise Divers Phuket. After sitting at a computer almost all day, it's been hard to face one at home! Plus we were tired from last weeks parties, we had another kids birthday party on Saturday, and my internet connection at home is rubbish. Our house just seems to be up the wrong street to get ADSL - we are about 800m from the main road. I CAN get a 3,000 Baht per month internet package using satellite technology from Singapore, but at this time I do not want to pay that much.

Oh, yeh, the weather. Mostly sunny. Mostly dry. Mostly light winds.

There has been some occasional rain over the last week. Yesterday I left home in the sunshine, noticed some clouds over the hills and 5 minutes later got drenched by a sudden downpour which lasted only 5 minutes, then I was back in the sun again!

On Saturday we took our kids to Phuket Zoo for a repeat visit. I am not a zoo fan really, but I do like to see my kids get excited to see a camel, a toucan or a crocodile. It was a hot day and the zoo is a hot and humid place with trees all around. There is a small indoor (aircon) aquarium and a very nice orchid garden too.







Forecast: Nice. Oh and the footy season has kicked off with another dull Man U - Chelsea game.