Unwrapped travel

So you’ve heard of the spicy sauce, now visit its spicy home! Sri Racha, located midway between Bangkok and Pattaya barely rates a second thought in most travellers’ itineraries, but if you’ve got the time up your sleeve — why not? There’s a few half decent places to stay, an offshore island and a bucket-load of good eating!

You’ll probably need no more than a night to take in most of the town’s delights and luckily for you, we’ve summed them all up for you over on the main Travelfish site. So please do check out our Sri Racha travel guide.

We’ve just added a new Travelfish Guide to the store — the third edition of our top-selling Travelfish Guide to Ko Phi Phi in southern Thailand.

The guide is easily the most comprehensive guide to Ko Phi Phi available and as it was researched on the ground in October 2009, the information doesn’t get any fresher than this!

We’ve increased the font size a bit to make the guide a bit easier on the old eyeballs, so it’s a good deal longer than the previous editions. There are also four maps, detailed reviews on 50 (yes fifty) places to stay across the island. In our accommodation reviews we looked at all budgets — from 150 baht dorms to 15,000 baht private pool villas — and everything in between. There’s also information on where to eat and drink, a diving guide and tips on how to do the island on the cheap.

We’re also, for the first time ever, offering a couple of pages as a free download so that you can check for yourself and decide if it really is worth the US$4.95 we’re asking. You can download the sample pages here (in PDF format).

Of course there is the Travelfish 7-day money-back guarantee — no questions asked.

Sounds interesting? You can buy the guide online here — it is available for download immediately after purchase.

We’ve been busy deepening our coverage along the famous Mae Hong Son loop in northern Thailand and have just added seven new spots working south from Chiang Mai.

First stop is Hang Dong, followed in quick succession by Sanpatong, Chom Thong, Hot, Mae Chaem, the very little visited Mae Na Chon and last but not least, Thailand’s tallest peak, Doi Inthanon.

So if you’re doing some slow travel along this route, you might want to give some of these spots a looksee.

For most people doing the Mae Hong Son loop, the blip of a town of Khun Yuam is little more than a halfway point between the far larger town of Mae Sariang to the south and the provincial capital of Mae Hong Son to the north. But, if you’ve the time, it’s a comfortable spot to break up the journey.

As such, we’ve just added some coverage onto the main Travelfish site. Afterall Khun Yuam is an ideal spot from which to visit the breathtaking Mae Surin Waterfall and, in November and December the fields coime alight with flowering wild sunflowers, painting the hills yellow. There’s a good place to stay, a handful of cheap eateries and even a local wat to poke around in, so if you’ve the time, slow down and give Khun Yuam a night — our complete Khun Yuam travel guide is here.

What makes the perfect beach? Are you looking for stretches where no other speedo has swum or are sunset bars and thumping music more your thing? While Ko Tao is best known for its diving industry, it’s also home to more than its fair share of glorious stretches of sand. So here is a round up on some of Ko Tao’s best beaches — note though, this isn’t an exhaustive list — we don’t want to take away all the fun!

We’ve just added a new feature story, titled “How to become a dive instructor on Ko Tao” written by someone who knows what she is talking about — an experienced dive instructor on Ko Tao!

The story is a useful read for anyone considering following this path and includes details on the cost of the various courses, the amount of time required to learn and, importantly, what you can expect to earn working as a dive instructor on Ko Tao.

You can read the full story here. How to become a dive instructor on Ko Tao.

We’ve just added a new feature to the site titled “Corruption in Thailand”. As you’ve probably heard or read, Thailand has had a lot of bad press of late and this story briefly discusses the issues. How big are the risks really?

We reflected on out personal experiences of over 12 years in Asia and in the end, conclude that as long as you don’t forget to pack your brain, the risks are minimal.

You can read the full story here: http://www.travelfish.org/feature/144

I look forward to hearing some tales of woe … or not perhaps!

And don’t forget if the police robbed you, use the story to enter our competition to win a Pacsafe bag!

In a massive city like Bangkok, where there are quite literally hundreds of places to stay, finding the right place to stay can be both a challenge and, well, a bit of a headache.

We thought we’d save you the pain and on a recent trip through Bangkok we door-knocked and room-inspected our way across the city before coming up with our list of what we consider to be the ten best guesthouses and hostels in the entire city.

Our final list spans different budgets from backpacker, through flashpacker to midrange and also covers different districts of the city.

You can read our opinions on each place and even see where each is located see the story on Travelfish here: http://www.travelfish.org/feature/137

That said, Bangkok’s a big place and everyone has their favourite — if you’ve an opinion to share, please feel free to drop in leave your thoughts in the comments section of the story.

Cheers

Stuart and Sam @ Travelfish

Jamie Monk at Jamie’s Phuket has just posted a terrific review of our Travelfish Guide to Phuket. He has lived there for ages and reckons it’s well worth a read, saying:

“So, I am happy to say that for under 5 US dollars you can buy a well researched, up to date, easy to use, recommended-by-Jamie guidebook for Phuket. Well, “book” is the wrong word. Actually you can buy a 37 page pdf file by making payment online and the “guidebook” can then be downloaded. And it’s good. It knows things I don’t know, it has reviews of guesthouses and hotels, it says this about Patong: “a seething mass of tourism, squalor and unrestricted development, a mess of hotels, bars, restaurants, travel agents, massage parlours, tailor shops and touts. Patong is everything that tourism in Thailand should not have become.” Amen.”

You can read the full review here: http://jamie-monk.blogspot.com/2009/03/travelfish-guide-to-phuket.html

So if you’re thinking of going to Phuket do two things — first go check out Jamie’s blog which is a veritable fountain of knowledge when it comes to Phuket, and then, once you’re done there, please consider picking up a copy of our guide!

2008 has already bestowed upon us the splendid “Visit Indonesia 2008. Celebrating 100 Years of Nation’s Awakening” courtesy of Indonesia’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism. Who would have thought we could expect an even bigger clanger in the same year?

The Tourist Authority of Thailand (TAT) isn’t one to be outdone, and according to media reports they’re on the brink of launching “Apologies Thailand“.

Catchy? We don’t think so either.

Aside from the fact that it is grammatically incorrect and really doesn’t make any sense at all, if they wanted to apologise for the slight inconvenience of having two of the country’s international airports overrun by a mob for seven days in peak tourist season, then perhaps something like “Thailand: Take the bus” may have been more appropriate.

Anyhoo, we know what a smart lot you Travelfishers are, so we’re running a competition: can you come up with a better slogan than “Apologies Thailand”?

The winner gets a complimentary copy of every single one of our Travelfish Guides — worth around US$80 in total — and a Travelfish T-shirt printed with the winning slogan. Entries close December 31, 2008.

Have fun, and remember: Grammar doesn’t matter!

You can enter the competition over on the Travelfish forum.