Above - B3 & B4 lapping up the waves at Kata beach.
Above - B2 returns from a surf as B3 & B4 build castles, Kata beach.
Above - Kata Beach sunset, washed down with a few umbrella drinks, perfect!
Above - Gidget getting ready to go for a surf....reality is that FS was the surfboard sherpa for the little boys.
Above - The four boys working on there next major excavation project.
Above - B1 pushing B3 into the waves, a great big brother with the little guys.
Above - B3 up and riding, Kata beach.
Above - FS, Maddie (B1 friend from Abu Dhabi), B4 and B1 in the back of a Tutu, shopping spree in Padong.
Above - Foot cleaning massage with the sucker fish. FS making this look really relaxing.
Above - George Porge, munching his way through some corn stick cobs.
Above - B2 dancing with the waves whilst B1 looks on.
Above - FS and B3 aboard the vessel to take them to Phi Phi island....befpre FS got horribly sea-sick.
Above - Not a bad way to relax in a gorgeous jungle resort.
Above - Tlaking of relaxing....B2 and B3 enjoy the day-beds.
Above - B1 pulls a Blue steel whilst the boys order lunch. A relaxing way to wind out the month long trip in Thailand and a prepare for a what is about to be a hectic and on-the-go trip through Vietnam!
July school holidays 2011 have rolled around and faced with a 12 week period of intense heat and boredom, Fran has packed up the kids and the surfboards and headed off on an 8 week holiday to Thailand and Vietnam. I can't join them on this trip as i have work commitments that won't allow any time off.
What's not to love about Thailand? The people are awesome, the lifestyle is amazing, the natural landscapes are breath-taking, the weather is warm and the food is simply amazing...and everything is pretty cheap too. It was a bit of a no-brainer then when it came to deciding on where the tribe could go for an extended period of time and get the most bang for its buck. Thailand was the first stop, with the team booking a furnished apartment right on Kata Beach just south of Patong. This is probably the best surf beach as far as Thailand is concerned and away from the riff-raff of touring football teams on their end of season tours These are usually in Patong, Phuket. The kids basically lived ion the beach every day and came in the late afternoons for a meal of satay sticks and rice from Mamas (a tiny local Thai restaurant between the beach and the apartment. They become such regulars there that Mama eventually just had their meals ready for when they finished surfing.
Thailand is such a hit with expats from the UAE, that it was inevitable that even being half way around the world, they were bound to bump into someone we knew; the Korff family were staying in Patong and Kata and Fran and the boys hooked up for some beach fun and meals out and of course a few days shopping for great deals.
B1 was accepted by the local surf tribe after seeing him out there every day, i guess they figured he was a local himself after 4 weeks. B2, 3, and 4 were regulars in the surf breaks and must have excavated over a million tones of sand after all the beach sandcastles every day.
If you remember the movie, The Beach with Leo Decaprio, with the amazing land formations and islands; well FS and the boys took a charter boat out there one day for some snorkeling and site seeing. Of course a trip involving the Saunders family (particularly Fran) would not be a trip without drama and FS suffered severe boat sickness which eventually left to the her being transported from the boat to the island hospital where she spent the day. The boys decided that B1 was a good enough parental supervisor and continued the day at their own devices and sponging off other families....gotta love self sufficiency. Funny moment was just before reaching the island the boat operator stopped at a famous snorkeling location and suggested if Fran dived in the water with the fish, that this would cure her sickness. Well, lets just say that the sickness was not cured, but the extra burley sure did get the fish into a frenzy.
So after 4 weeks of living quite possibly the ultimate lifestyle of relaxation, carefree fun and sunning, the family was well tanned up, surfed out and ready to move on to the next part of the journey....Vietnam! in the meantime, NS was slaving away in 50c temperatures in the UAE desert sands but was enjoying a little too much shisha in the evenings with his Syrian mate Ghassan and rugby coach Bob Hope...but plans were in the making and realizing that one of the primary reasons for making the move to the UAE was to take advantage of travel opportunities and Vietnam featured high on the bucket list, so what was NS to do?
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