Hua Hin Jazz Festival 2008

Hua Hin Jazz Festival 2008: 13-15.06.08

Here comes again Hua Hin Jazz Festival, the annual jazz event in Hua Hin. It is said to be one of the best jazz events in Thailand.
This year is my first time to join this jazz event and it was fab! I went with my "old" friends- Wijit and Jek whom I met in the World Scout Jamboree back around 6 years ago.
Hua Hin is an old famous resort town in Thailand (It's pretty much like Santa Cruz in California - in my opinion). There are a lot of nice, cool, chic new built resorts and also the mixture of the old town with contemporary architecture. This old beach city contains old wayof life style and it is very significant because a summer palace of the present king is here and the king was there when we were there.
This is sandy Hua Hin Beach where the jazz festival took place. It was such an awesome place to held jazz music event because it is just awesome! Imagine if you come with your sweetheart, listen to jazz, watch at stars in ebony sky with the sound of the waves and the touch of soft breeze... :) I wish I had someone there with me :p
There were not so many people on the first day.
People came early to occupy some space.
Heineken, the big sponsor of this event.
We stopped our jazz alert for a while and walked along the old street and found this old famous restaurant. It has a big terrace edging in the sea. Gastronomical dinner and three hungers!
We came back to the beach for cool jazz. Tonight we had some musicians from oversea too.
Heineken night! Can't remember how much beer we had. My two gentlemen were big supporters of this beer...only because of... pretty ladies at the booth... hahahah... sorry to reveal the truth, my friends :p
The stage

Next day, we just took it easy. We spent the afternoon having big big lunch at a Chinese seafood restaurant and later we just sat back and relaxed in an Italian coffee shop, watching people. Later decided to walk from our hotel which was around 2 km. away from the stage. We did this because it was so hard to find a parking space. So since our hotel had exit to the beach, we just couldnt resist a sandy walk way... Well it wasn't so easy to get to the event because we somehow decided to walk on the dune...well the first ten minutes was fine becus the dune was still high... but after a while, we got deeper in the water and waves came... welll yeah...we arrived wet wet wet.
Second night of the jazz festival, we didnt bother Heineken. We were well preapared and brought our own drinks :) which was...
Gin Tonic played our major role for the second night.
Finally it came the third day and we gotta head back to Bangkok today. We hiked up (by car :p) to this mountain and the goal is this famous place for seafood.
Behind me is Hua Hin Beach.

Fresh oysters..yumm..
Seafood grill.
I'm luvin it :)
After gastronomic lunch...
Last picture at the restaurant. We really had fun and ate a lot of great seafood in this trip. See you next year in Hua Hin!

Pure Bandara, Pure Asian Hospitality

Welcome to Bandara Resort and Spa, Samui!
24-27.05.08
(First four photos were taken by Khun Jon from Luxury Magzine. Photo courtesy: Luxury Magazine)




Last week, I got a chance to go down south of Thailand to Koh Samui (Samui Island). Koh Samui is located in the Thai Gulf. I went there on business trip cus we invited some media to stay and experience our resort for advertorial writing in the magazines. Well I wont talk about work here. Just want to share some pictures. If you wanna go there, I will get you some discount :) This is my room. It's deluxs type. I got a king size bed, balcony with tropical garden view, bath tub, shower. I luv this bathroom cus I can have a long baht and watch TV in the same time :)
This is a beach dog that belongs to a pub next door.
Chom Dao restaurant.
A dessert made by super chef of Bandara.
At Chom Dao restaurant
This seems to be the only pic I could take of myself :) It's in a hotel room in Bangkok, a night before I flew to Samui.
View of some beach in Samui from a plane.Lovely sunny day
One of 4 pools. This is beach pool.
Private beach

Cool drink Mango Tango at Sunset

Thailand Summer Tour: Chiangrai 2008

After Pattaya, we spent a few days in Bangkok and then went up north to Chiangrai.

We went to Saxophone Jazz pub in Bangkok and I couldn't help laughing when seeing this, especiall when my German friend, Manuel was sitting next to me :p
This is the old fort in Bangkok. We dropped by here before walking to Khaosan Rd.
Then on Thursday we took a bus to Chiangrai. We arrived early in the morning. In the afternoon we visited a hill tribal village. We did some city tour too unfortunatly my camera's battery ran dead so that's why I dont have many pics from today :(On Saturday, we had a day trip to visity Chiangsaeng, the old city of in Chiangrai. Chiangsaeng is older than Ayuthaya.
Some ruins
Temple

We also visited some temples on the mountain too. We walked up there and from this temple you can see the Mae Khong river and Laos on another side.The famous golden triangle.
Here is Mae Sai, the most northern point in Thailand which shares the border to Myanmay. There is a small river which is a natural border between Thailand and Myanmar.
This is that river.

Songkran time! We sat in the back of a truck with a big jar that was full of water. Ready for water battle! After a long wet day, we went out to a small pub in Chiangrai. We came home very late and get some sleep before catching a flight to Chiangmai at 8.30 am.
This is our plane. It carries 12 passengers with two pilots but our flight had only 3 passengers! So it was like exclusive trip for us.
Our friendly pilots.
From the plane, we could see this dam. This means we are in Chiangmai already. I love this view.