Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Pattaya, the Sin City of Thailand

A week after visiting Ayutthaya, I went to the Sin City, Pattaya. This is a famous destination for the tourists who visit Bangkok. Having heard this city for quite some time, I decided to have a short trip to Pattaya, over a weekend.

Going to Pattaya is just about 2 hours of bus ride away, and it is very convenient to reach as well. Take the BTS and drop at Ekkamai station, and follow Exit #2 and head to Eastern Bus Terminal. There are plenty of bus companies taking passengers to Pattaya. Just go to any bus company which offers you the best timing for departure at your convenience, and that's it. As the bus companies cater for plenty of foreign tourists, the operators there can speak little English which could make conversation easier to some extent. After reaching Pattaya, we can either rent motorbike or take songthaew (public truck with 2 rows of seat at the back) to travel within Pattaya city. We opted for the latter as we were not familiar with the rules and regulations of Thai traffic, so in order to save the hassle we chose the songthaew as our transportation.

Tips: Try to go for 1st class bus which is slightly more expensive but it would save your travelling time towards Pattaya.

Pattaya, is famous for the beach, the nightlife, as well as the sex industry. However, the beach was not so fascinating to me. The sands were coarse, and the beach was pretty crowded. A lot of people playing water sports, as well as hanging around on the beach.

Quickly we took the songthaew ride towards the Buddha hill, which was about 10-15 minutes ride from the Pattaya beach. As the name suggests, the Buddha hill has a big Buddha statue painted in gold, and this is the highest peak in Pattaya city, which we were able to view the Pattaya coastline from Buddha hill. 


Ring the bells for good luck

Next to the Buddha hill was a Chinese-style sacred area. We could see strong influence of Chinese culture here, with statues of Chinese mythological figures.
Journey to the West

The Eight Immortals

God of Prosperity

Guan Yin Bodhisattva

Stories of the 24 Gratitude 

After visiting the Buddha hill, we headed straight to the Tiffany's Show Pattaya, which we bought the ticket earlier. Ticket were costly at 800THB per person, as it was peak season the time we were there. The Tiffany's Show Pattaya is famous for the transvestite cabaret, and it was cited one of the best show in the world. How could we missed this when we were at Pattaya? 

The overall cabaret was excellent, we enjoyed the show very much! Full of musicals, costumes, dancing, and the most impressive to me, was the "One Man Woman". It was only a single person playing drama for male and female, telling love story between the 2 characters. The show ended with the photography session, which the dancers lined up at the front door, and the visitors were able to take photograph with them. Each photograph session would require 20THB paid to each dancer as tips.

We took a stroll along the Pattaya Second Road, and we came across the Royal Garden Plaza Mall, which the "Ripley's Believe It or Not" museum was located.

As the sky got dark, we had simple dinner and head straight to the famous Walking Street of Pattaya. This was the place where all the nightlife was about. Pubs, bistros, go-go bars, everything was here. It was not so happening on the day of my visit, as it was a Buddhist festival, no party was allowed and no liquor to be sold publicly.

At the end of the Walking Street, we came to the Bali Hai Pier, which would be our departure point to Ko Larn (Coral Island) on the next day.

Overlooking the Pattaya coastline from the Bali Hai Pier

On the next day, we took the regular ferry from Bali Hai Pier to Ko Larn, which costed us only 15THB back in 2011, compared to 150THB by speed boat. Ko Larn is a small island located near to Pattaya, which is a favorite tourist destination for day-tour. The ferry took us about 1 hour, and it was much slower than the speed boat and we were able to sit back and relax, enjoying the sea breeze and listening to the waves splashing on the ferry.

Again, what welcomed us was the crowd. Huge crowd! The beach was packed with tourists!

There were a lot of choices of water sports here, which one of the most special would be the sea walker. It was a very costly activity, but the visitors got the chance to wear the astronaut-like helmet linked with surface-supplied air flow, and walk on the ocean bottom surrounded by fishes. Instead, we just signed up for the snorkeling package for 300THB per person, but it was not fun at all. There were barely any fish at the area, and we basically wasted our time in the water.

Small little kid playing water in a small pool, with his life jacket on


The Ko Larn trip ended with seafood feasting, the grilled squids

In overall, Pattaya trip was not really a pleasant one for me. Things were overpriced and nothing much of sightseeing apart from the nightlife. However, it was a truly new experience to me, especially the cabaret! 

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