It’s been 6 days, but we finally had a full 24 hours without a plane, train, taxi, boat, helicopter, or jetpack required for some kind of transfer. But seriously there were jetpacks at the beach.

This picture of Layla getting a massage while drinking a coconut after just securing us chairs and beers in all of 13 seconds pretty much sums up the day. Cheap, available luxury.

The water is clear and shallow for yards. Everyone complains in reviews about the abundance of people and loud boats. Honestly we were unphased by that. Once you see Coney Island it goes only up from there.

Yes, there are a million people constantly asking you to buy things (not to mention child labor in the form of little girls all but forcing you to buy flower necklaces with such tactics as slapping your back, pinching your arm, and/or kissing your cheek…pretty sure I am now married to like 2 or 3 of them now), but on the other hand it requires exactly zero effort to get someone to get you a $1 beer or do your nails for $3. My $7 arm massage turned into a back massage and was at least half an hour long. Ain’t no way to spin that negatively.

Here’s the obligatory photo of my feet at the beach. This picture was mandatory.

Sunset was a little bit of a letdown, but here’s some more of the Kee’s rooftop. Again, it was kind of lame. Does that sound jaded? This is Patong’s nicest rooftop bar. There, I said something nice.

Tonight felt like an increase by an order of magnitude in the number of people trying to sell us random shit on Bangla Road. Sunday night is apparently the best day of the week to get your picture taken with lizards, lorises, and ladyboys because there was a lot of that. It’s the triple-L of weird street selling. Several lizard hawkers tried to approach us over and over again, eliciting our squeals and running away. This is the best picture I got of the loris. Poor little guy.

Then a random Thai woman snuck up on me and grabbed my arm, pretending to be a lizard hawker. I jumped and then laughed. Good one, lady.

This insane looking bar was like a casino without any slot machines, gambling, or clear drink ordering systems. Ordering vodka sodas meant that we would get a bottle of fizzy water and an empty highball glass on the side. Then when we got the vodkas they came in shot glasses. When we paid immediately (odd for these places as they seem to never bill you because they don’t want you to leave) there was a total clusterfuck with getting change and not communicating at all with the waitress on a level I would characterize as understandable. It felt like we went back and forth for 8 minutes trying to figure each other out. Lots of smiling and hand gestures. Smiling doesn’t explain things! Instead of trying to tell us what we did wrong, maybe just give us the change and walk away? If we think there is an issue we will say something, but more likely we won’t notice. It was very weird. I’m sure we came off as total idiots with illogical behavior. Plus, the gogo dancers were arriving LATE for their shifts and totally NOT dancing on their shiny platforms as god intended. #ladyboytime…literally.

In case anyone was wondering, no we haven’t gone to any sketchy shows inside clubs. But that doesn’t mean we didn’t take tons of pictures of them! My favorite name was probably “Slippery.” There is just no good context for a name like that. Nope.

Did have to go into McDonalds just once, though.

And more spring rolls, pad Thai, and wings from the Muslim food stall. Speaking of…one second while I run back there and get 800 more wings. WANGZ!

Lastly, it was the first day when the jet lag officially ended. Bed at 1230am, waking up at 730am. Like a normal person!

Tomorrow we head to the apex hotel of the entire trip — Nchantra. Get ready for some pool villa realness coupled with asking the staff for ever-escalating things. “Hello, I would like a back rub from an elephant please. An African elephant.”