Just thought I would share my holiday experience with all to read.
I have just returned from 3 weeks holiday to Phuket and am counting the days to my return. My husband & I went with my 3 year old daughter and my 10 month old boy and another family of 6.

We were booked to go to Bali, but after the last bombing I changed my mind and thought I would give Phuket a go. I'm glad I did because I cannot praise it enough.(it will be a toss up as to whether we go to Bali or Phuket on the next holiday).
We stayed at the Patong Merlin Hotel. The staff were always there to help and the buffet breakfast catered for everyone.(although I must admit by the end of the holiday I never wanted to see another fried egg or piece of bacon)

I highly recommend a little restaurant called Sabai Sabai. I heard about this on a previous post and thought it was a must to try and find it. Anyway after 6 days of searching and asking every Tom, Dick & Harry we finally found it. It is located in the laneway just after McDonalds and the food was unreal and sooooooo cheap.
Another restaurant I liked was called the family restaurant. It was also down a laneway but alot closer to the Patong Merlin Hotel.

The shopping along Patong Beach was unreal. The quality of clothes was much better than I expected.
DVD's cost us 70 baht which is about $3.00 and we hired a DVD from a small shop just at the back of our hotel so we could check to see if they worked ok. Out of the 193 DVD's we bought only 1 has not worked.
We also bought quite a few XBOX games and all seem to work ok.
Mens XXL singlets we managed to get for 125 baht which worked out to be around $4.50. Mens XXL T-Shirts were 225 baht ($8.00), womens wrap around skirts were around 350 baht ($12.50), and womens singlets were around 200 baht. We found that the OTOP Markets at the front of the Hotel were alot cheaper for most of the stuff than on the beach but I guess it just depends on how good you are at bargaining.

We also went to the markets at Karon beach and found that the prices were even cheaper once again.

We had a charcoal portrait done of the kids and we are so happy with it. I would highly recommend this as it is a great souvenir.

Phuket Fantasea was a little disappointing. I don't know why. I guess everyone made such a fuss about it and maybe I had completely different ideas. Don't get me wrong, I thought it was clever the way the show was done it was just the story got a bit long in the tooth and boring. Go check it out and judge for yourself.

Elephant trekking was unreal. Highly recommended. My 3 year old daughter still talks about it to her friends. She can’t believe she actually got to sit on top of “Pooh Bears” friend.

The monkey show was quite clever although a little cruel seeing them chained up all day. It’s amazing how well they are trained and how human like they are.

The snake show was incredible. How on earth "Jimmy" didn't get bitten is beyond me.

Throughout our whole holiday we used one Tuk Tuk driver. His name was Wyrat and he was always at the back of the hotel along the beach. He was the nicest guy. His wife is due to have a baby in a few weeks so we gave him all our left over nappies and baby goods. We even gave him our pram on the last day. He was so grateful. (if you see him say hello for me)

Other than that we spent the rest of our holiday lazing around the pool and enjoying the high life.

If anyone has any questions just fire away.

“I wonder what the poor people are doing?”

Liz

Welcome back lizzy. Enjoyed reading your report. regards Maureen

Hi Lizzy,

Good to here that you had a great time. Love your JBR. I think Phuket is a great choice for families. We have been to Bali as well and for us, Phuket wins hands down.

Next time check out the Holiday Inn Family rooms/suites, they look great. That where we plan to stay on our next trip.

Cheers

Nati

Great trip report and now cannot wait even more so to get back the Patong Merlin in 3 weeks (and counting!!) After a few of the reports I have read lately I think the snake show is a must.

Daniel

How much did u pay for the charcoal portrait, and how much did they ask at the beginning of the encounter ???

Bupis

Hi Lizzy

Just wondering if you could tell me whether or not they have finished the beach road entrance to the hotel as yet and if so what is there, when we there in August it was fenced up. Appreciate your help

Daniel

Hi Lizzy

Can you tell me what facilties if any the Patong Merlin had for your kids? Our kids are 4yrs and 22mths and I would like something for them at the resort. Also what type of room did you get, are there any which have a separate living area to use when the kids fo to bed?
thanks Karen (NZ)

Hi Rogerthat....

Had a look this morning (15 March 2006) and I can see that the green boards to the right side are still in place. Construction of the covered beachfront resturant and bar areas is still ongoing. Still much to do.... !!

The portrait we had done was of 2 children and it cost 4000 baht.(Approx $140) We didn't negotiate because we had spoken to other people who were picking there ones up and got it for the same price. Our friends had one done of her 4 kids and it cost 8000 baht. I know it may sound like a lot of money to spend on one picture but its more for the memories.

Hi Rogerthat,
Sorry but I thought it was all finished when we were there but according to a later post there is still a lot of work going on.
I'm a little confussed. Maybe I was in too much of a hurry to get shopping each day to notice.

Karen,
We stayed in a pool view room and found them big enough for us. I even took the baby walker for my 10 month old. We had a look at the larger rooms which actually have a seperate sitting room. It looked great. I'm not sure how many of these there are nor how much they would cost. When our kids went to be we tended to sit out on the balcony and enjoyed the peace and tranquility.

Hi Liz, Great to hear you had a wonderful time in Phuket. We read with great interest as we are also frequent Bali travellers and are also off to Patong beach in September for the 1st time. It sounds like paradise so we are all looking forward to going.
Cheers Pete.

Hi Pete
I was a frequent bali travellor also, we were booked to go on the 23rd October last year but after the bomb went off we changed to Phuket. I didnt want to go there as l really had my heart set on going to bali. But after being in Phuket only once l will now only travel there forever. I intend to try to get there every year and l want to retire there. Thats how good it there.

Hi Lizzy, glad you had a great time and agree that the Merlin is a great hotel. The breakfast is well done so no need to stick to bacon & eggs, bit of everything go's down well. Have never been to the snake show so it is also on my list of must do's on my next visit, August or September at this stage.Looking forward to anything that you may add.....
Cheers Ronnie

Hi Lizzy

Wow 193 dvd's thats just amazing. You sure have a lot of cases to buy!

Great report also, since this is our second time coming uo this year we were planning on taking more of a relaxed approach, and maybe going over to Karon for the morning or arvo. What would you recommend? Also with regard to your 3 year old, did you buy many clothes for them whilst there? Ie at Robinsons or Big C....Any recommendations? As I have a 2 1/2 year old to buy for.

Cheers

Ang

Thanks for the info re the charcoal portraits. ALso 193 DVD's I had heard they were starting to crack down on the copied DVD's obviously not if you returned with so many. Did you have any problems going through customs, I assume they were just tucked away in your luggage. ??

Bupis.

Thanks Alex and Lizzy for the update on the front of the Hotel, much appreciated. I was hoping that they may be finished in time for our trip on the 10th of April so I could sit out the front and have a few drinks and watch everything go by, guess I will have to walk up the road a bit

Daniel

You can still sit out front and have some drinks, but it'll have to be at the open patio style area with plenty of tables & chairs on the finished half (more like 2/3rds) side of the Patong Melin beachfront.

No we had no problems going through customs with all the DVD's.
We took a few of the large CD cases which held 100 CD each over with us and we emptied the DVD's into the folder.
The customs people asked if we had multiple copies of each DVD but that was it.

My 3 year old has a completely new wardrobe. The clothes were unreal. So many skirts, tops and dresses. I made sure I bought the next size up so Im ready for next year. We spent a day in town and went to Robinsons and Bic C but truthfully I was a little dissapointed. The clothes were nice but nothing different to what we can buy at home. Its worth a look though.

Lizzy I noticed you did the elephant trekking, last time we were there we had mixed reports about it and did'nt go although we plan to do it this time can you advise who you booked through. Thanks

We went elephant riding with our Tuk Tuk driver His name was Wyrat and his tuk tuk number was 954. It was next to the monkey and snake show. We did all three activities in one day.
Highly recommended.

Hi, just wondering about the cost of the elephant riding and approx how long it went for

I can't remember how much the elephant rides were but it was well worth it whatever the cost. We went on a 30 minute ride because I had my 10 month old baby with me but I think they had a 45 minute ride and also a 1 hour long trek through the forest.
Its up to you. If I didn't have to nurse my baby I probaby would have gone a bit longer.

We are going for the first time in July and reading your post makes me even more excited. We are travelling with teenagers and was wondering if they do jet skiing on patong beach. Is there Billabong or Ripcurl clothing there.

Unfortunately there are many noisy jet skis at Patong beach + paragliding behind the speed boat + banana inflatabiles behind speed boat.

Hi Durnie, Yes you can get copy billabong & ripcurl at Patong they are everywhere. Also please be careful with those jetskis , I don't want to read about another accident in the phuket gazette. regards Maureen

I agree, leave the jet ski's alone. There is no insurance and it is a free for all out on the ocean. Better safe than sorry.....