14 Nov

14 Nov - Here's something for anyone planning on staying at the Ramayana Resort. This photo shows the 4 star (?) resort's private beach, (apparently) and was taken from an online hotel booking site. Unfortunately, since last week, the private beach has been relocated to a corner of KP Huts, where it can be found sandwiched between 300 baht/night bungalows and a large drainage canal. If you're not one of Ramayana's guests then it's pretty funny to walk along the beach and see the package tourists putting a brave face on things as the KP Huts German Shepherds run round pissing on the sunloungers. If you are a guest, 'mai pen rai' as the locals say.

Apology: A few hours after updating this page I was emailed by the owner of Ramayana who would like me to point out that the move of the private beach to KP Huts is only for the next 4 months and not permanent. Another inaccuracy included describing the resort as 4 star, this isn't the case, they have never claimed to be a 4 star property. I also admit, there was some artistic license used. For example instead of 'drainage canal' I should have said 'landscaped water feature' and when it came to describing the possibility of German Shepherds relieving themselves on the sunloungers, I shouldn't have mentioned this as it may put people off using the private beach and the odds are it won't happen whilst guests are tanning themselves anyway. ( But I'd still give your chair a sniff before lying down just to be on the safe side.)

Who needs a room or two for Christmas? Due to a family tragedy - I've seen the newspaper reports and it's the kind of thing that only ever happens to Spinal Tap's drummers - our guests for Xmas have had to cancel their booking. So we have rooms free from 19 - 27 December. If you're still looking for a place to stay, contact me.

The Sunday Times ran an excellent article about Koh Chang this week. It's required reading for anyone thinking of staying at Tropicana where the writer stayed: "The Tropicana is still at that stage in its development when dinner has to be accompanied by “sophisticated” music, which means either traditional Thai percussion — a bit like being trapped in a lift with a drunk xylophone player — or a Filipino with his Yamaha set to “hotel schmaltz”. And is it fair to say that Bangbao has all the charm of Grimsby? Probably, not but there again who in Grimsby really cares?

I've always fancied having some long stay bungalows, that can be rented monthly. There are some on Koh Chang but many are just located in resorts or are basically pretty slummy and squashed into an area just off the main road with no view of any kind. When I worked in Bangkok I always liked to stay somewhere with a good view, up in a high floor condo, with views over the city but within easy reach of the work, pubs etc. So on KC I wanted a similar thing. Finding a small plot of land in a west coast location and with excellent sea views on KC isn't easy, finding some that's affordable is even harder. It's taken us over a year. But hopefully, within the next week or so, the search will be over . . . .

Not only has the Monkey School on Whitesands gone, (the monkeys have all graduated) the postbox shaped like a spaceship has now been removed from the view point above Sea View hotel and replaced with a 'normal' postbox. Pity, it could have become a landmark. In case you missed it, here it is photographed in all it's Flash Gordon-esque glory a month ago. I'd like to take this chance appeal to business people and local officials with really bad ideas for tourist attractions or landmarks to build some as I'm running out of things to make fun of.