My arrival in Phuket coincided with the start of the King's Cup Regatta - a week of yacht racing and après race socialising. My timing wasn't entirely coincidental. However I faced a small conflict of interest when
Eric "the Viking", won two tickets for the evening social events and gave me one. Now my best intentions to ensure the boat was in tip-top condition for the arrival of my festive guests faced an unanticipated hurdle - the social events featured free food and drink, resulting in rather unproductive mornings.
The social events were held in up-market hotels around the SW coast of Phuket. Initially the world of plush hotels seemed somewhat alien after my mimimalist lifestyle onboard. However it's amazing how quickly one can adapt to the luxury and a few days in, the main race hotel began to feel like a second home.
Still somehow I managed to balance the demands of the nocturnal partying with an engine service, sail repair, hunting-down some marine stainless-steel and nearly managing to put the galley back together after a frantic few days of sanding, varnishing and painting before Ian arrived.
OK I hadn't cleaned the boat as much as I'd planned, or filled up with water, but I think lugging 10 x 20 litre bottles of water via dinghy back to boat, gave a jet-lagged Ian a good introduction to the cruising life-style....
Kuta beach: N7deg 49.10' E98deg17.5'
Ko Phiphi: N7deg44.8' E098deg45.92'
Koh Dam Khwan: N7deg57.6' E098deg48.5'
Rai Le (Laem Nang) N8deg 00.67' E098deg 49.9'
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