#2182 we stay at nice places

I'm almost done with telling you about the vacation. It's too bad I missed Wednesday because I did have a topic but I was out of town for work and didn't have all the photos for what I wanted to write about. It's okay though, because I'm back tonight with a quick look at some pics from and of the hotels.

We stayed at three different hotels during the SE Asia trip. They were all very nice, luxurious places with excellent service. The two hotels in Thailand were on a beach, so they had that going for them right off the bat. The hotel in Cambodia was on a nice quiet street and actually might have been the nicest of all. I'm not much of one to take photos of a hotel room, (except for the two pics I texted to Mom and Lizzie of the place I stayed on Wednesday. The room was huge, but not overly fancy) so I don't have anything like that. Instead, these pics show the views or something I thought was unusual and cool.

In Siem Reap, Cambodia we stayed at the Shinta Mani Angkor. I actually don't think the photos on the website do it justice. It was so beautiful and so calm and peaceful. There was such a lovely scent in the air, sort of minty and lightly floral. I wish I knew what it was or if there was a candle of that smell because I would have bought many candles. There were water features all around. There were interesting statues. There were lotus blossoms everywhere.

The room itself was very large. The bathroom was nice - the shower was awesome with a big rain showerhead. If you click on the link for the hotel, we had the Deluxe Garden Room. In fact, that photo might be of our room. That art was exactly what we had. I really like this photo of MT standing out on the balcony of our room. We could see the pool and there was also a lot of greenery. Mosquitoes were an issue in the evening, so we couldn't hang out there very much. Plus it was hot.

We had lunch and breakfast on the terrace. The seating was sort of a hanging/swinging bed type thing and it was like have breakfast or lunch in bed. There were trays for the table. It was kind of strange and totally cool and different. The breeze out there was magnificent. The downside was that there were some mosquitoes. MT got the worst of those critters.

If you ever find yourself going to Siem Reap, I highly recommend the Shinta Mani Angkor. I'd go back there again in a heartbeat.

The next place we stayed was the Centara Grand Beach Resort in Krabi, Thailand. We fell in love with this place when we saw it's website (click on the link to fall in love yourself). The location is exquisite, set against the towering limestone cliffs and fronted by the emerald green Andaman Sea. It is only accessible by boat, which the hotel runs from the Nopparatthara pier every half hour or so. When we arrived, we had just missed the boat so we would have had to wait but we made arrangements to take a longtail boat with another family that had just missed the speedboat also. This photo is our first look at the resort from the boat.

Because the resort is only accessible by boat (or by the Monkey Trail, post #2175) the beach is very private and not overcrowded at all. The water is calm because it is in a bay. The water is warm and not very deep. There are two swimming pools. One is right behind all those white umbrellas you can see. It was large and great for families because there was a small waterslide and it's not too deep. The other pool was adults only and the time we went over there, we were by ourselves for a long time, so long, in fact, that I wondered if we were allowed to be there. Very calm and nice, but no bar service.

Here are a couple of photos of the beach itself. The top photo is the first morning we were there, just strolling along the beach.

This next photo I took just around sunset. As you can imagine, the sunsets were spectacular.

The resort where we stayed in Phuket was the Pullman Phuket Arcadia Naithon Beach. If the Shinta Mani was the nicest on the inside, and the Centara was the nicest from the outside, the Pullman had the nicest views. It didn't seem like much as we drove in. It is up on a hill and the driveway winds through tall bamboo stands and past water features. When you arrive at the lobby, you walk up some stairs and at the top, the whole room is open to an outstanding view of the Andaman Sea, very blue at this location. You look past the infinity pools to the very pretty Naithon Beach below which is hemmed in by tall pine trees and the sea.

The infinity pool in this photo is not the swimming pool. This is just a lounge area. But WOW. When we got our first look at this, we had to laugh at our good fortune and our travel agent's good taste.

As I mentioned, the resort is on a hill and the resort is big. You can call for a little car to take you from your room to the lobby and restaurants and back but we walked all the time because that's how we are. You gotta take a look at the little car though.

It doesn't have any doors! Kind of hilarious. I don't think this photo really shows how steep some of the walkways are. Check this out:

 My calves were rock-hard after this vacation from so many stairs and so many hills.

This is the view from the pool near my room down to Naithon Beach. Isn't it so pretty?! The thing I loved the most about Naithon Beach is that it wasn't crowded at all which I guess is rare in Phuket. The town is small and super mellow. I totally loved it and so did MT.

Of course I have to finish with a sunset photo. I took this shot from our room. It was an imperative that we would go out on our balcony every night to watch the sunset. Can you blame us? Five nights of views like this...amazing.