Smashing through Chomphon, Phuket, Bangkok – Thailand

by Norman Leibovitz

This is Me

This is Wess

This is Bing Xian

This is the accident caused by Bing Xian

So before I carry on, let’s me make it clear on the record that all the accident that we ever had, was caused by Bing Xian.

While the two of us are just thankful that we managed to retain our lives.. LOLOLOL!

You can watch the Vlog i’ve made on my FB! LOL

 

Parts of the car

Looking happy.. trust me.. we’re not

Okay.. now moving on…

This is us

This is us, and we’re all checked in and ready to board the plane!
Make a guess how much we spent here, in this trip! It’ll be fun rather then it’s always me tell you guys how much I spent! ;D

All geared up!

And this is how I roll!
Backpack(Checked)
Camera(Checked)
Done.

Chicken Satay!

When you take with AirAsia, go and pre-book the food! It’s really yummy and cheap(only $5)

It’s really really really yummmmmyy no kidding..

Budget Rental @ Don Mueng

Don’t be too ambitious and try to fit everything into this one little trip.

Be really focus when you go on a trip like this! For us, we really just want to drive and slam that throttle so deep and so hard and drive it straight into the ground as you hear the engine roar to live and just submerge yourself into that moment like never before.

Some people “must” visit every damn inch of the country, drive every damn road, visit every damn spot. I mean you can, that’s if you have plenty of time, willing to spend and people who are willing to do the same. Else, work with just 1 “big” thing.. max 2.. you’ll enjoy yourself more this way.

Toyota Altis 1.6!

This is our car. This is the Toyota Altis 1.6. This is a damn good car.

Car set-up

When driving overseas,
1. Get a holder for your Phone or GPS. This is important because distraction is the last thing you want when you’re driving on the freeway in foreign land and not knowing the roads doesn’t really help. Not able to view the map properly for directions is worst. So.. holder.. yes.. (and go and learn how to read Google Maps -_-)

2. Get a 12V usb car charger with min 1x 2.1A output.. you know.. the one that goes into the cigarette lighter.. I recommend this.. You’ll thank me later..

3. Rent a trust worthy car from a TRUST WORTHY company. The last thing you want from your rental car is for it to break down.. After going through all the precautionary method to minimize crashes. Then you have to call, and repeat yourself 1,000 times just so that the operator(that can speak only basic english) could understand(hoping that hologram is the 3G just so that you could show and tell with your body lauguage) and then worry about the credit left in your phone. And when all that shit is over, you’ve to worry again if they really know where your location are, and if they really do, how long will they take to reach you.. Go read reviews and feedback on the rental company and the car before you decide.. And I recommend budget. This tip should be place in 1 i’m not sure why it’s at 3..

4. Have at least TWO driver. This tip should be placed at like 0.5 I’m also not sure why it’s at 4. But anyway, yes. When driving long distance, say 8 hour. It’s really taxing to be driving all 8 hour . It’s super mentally draining. There’s so much going on while driving and being in foreign land makes it worst. So I recommend changing drivers either every 150km or after 2hr. Also, if the person you’re traveling with can drive, he’ll be a better help as to helping to spot potential mistakes and prevent* accidents.

5. Learn simple removal and installation and general fixing. Oh trust me. You’ll thank your past self. Especially changing of wheels.

6. Bring along min 2 cargo strap. Yup. If your car is not, I repeat NOT an off road vehicle and you’re brining it off road, BRING THIS DAMN STRAP ALONG. You will thank me, again, later 🙂

7. GET THE FULL F***KING INSURANCE. You can save on anything but THIS.. Firstly, it gives everyone a peace of mind. It doesn’t cost much. It gives your family, friends, you and everyone in the car a peace of their mind and you can travel without any worries. And pray really hard that you don’t have to use it. Should you have to USE IT, at least you’re covered. Yup. Been there done that.

* Apparently for my case, we have three driver and yet we can still get into an accident. So.. It ultimately boils down to the one driving 😂

Only hate the road when you’re missing home

Back seat = sleep

So, my favorite activity when I’m not taking the front seat or drivers seat, is to sleep 😐 Trust me. That’s like the best thing to do. The temperature is perfect, the posture is perfect and the amount of time to sleep is perfect 😎

Jacuzzi Wefie

I have no idea why didn’t we took any photos of this resort that we booked, probably because when we reach its quite late and we’re pretty hype up by this jacuzzi inside the resort of ours. LOL! It is so hot, we can cook eggs in it but it’s again, so damn gooooooood!

How we managed to find this resort is that i just hop on to Agoda,
1. Set the location i’m going to
2. Set arriving and leaving date
3. Set your filter to set only those amenities that you want or don’t want
4. Make payment
5. Done

Jacuzzi!

See we even had snacks and drinks that were left over from the road, and brought it in. Omg we’re so cool! HOHOHO

Nope. 3 of us in this miniature jacuzzi is totally not weird. IT’S NOT. OMG IT’S NOT!!

Weeeeeee

This is the outside, facing the pool and the other resort and the restaurant on the left.

Random resturant

So apparently we woke up quite late and the restaurant no longer serves breakfast 😂 but I swear it’s because they closes early. It was like only 10:30am then! Even McDonals serves until 11am 😐 but nvm because it brought us to this little stall behind us which serves really good chicken rice 😱 so similar to the one in Singapore yet it’s so different!!

Oh, always stock up! Best part of the trip! HEHE

And also stock up on,

1. On water! You’ll really need to keep spamming half-full water bottle drink up. Else you’ll really fall sick, dry lips and ever thing will start to dry up. Then your whole trip will be spoilt.. Neyy

2. On your favourite snacks! You’ll also need it because when you’re so bored while driving, the only best thing you could do is to munch on food and that will kind of keep you awake.. Get those spicy seaweed that is like really spicy. I recommend THIS! This is very good to keep you awake because whoever that eats it, will definitely be chocked by the spice powder! HAHAHAHA Sure to keep you awake RAWRRRRR

3.  Anything that you want!  Just make sure your first stop is to TESCO(the huge one) and ask yourself two simple question.

Do you want it? If it’s a yes, buy.. If it’s a no, buy
Do you need it? If it’s a yes, buy.. If it’s a no, buy

That’s how we roll in thailand

Me feeling proud after being trapped in the ditch. HAHA

So, as you can see above, we’re stuck in the ditch. All in all, we’re stuck in the ditch for 3 times.
This is the 1st, and it’s the easiest. Came out without any assistance. *SMUG*

Nice, but not really beautiful sunset

So apparently, I think because of the way I pin the location of the resort, Google is unable to give me a proper road to the place that we wanted to go. So it kind of lead us like into the sands and forest and all that shit.

Over there, we got stuck again. Didn’t managed to take any photo. But that’s the 2nd, and we managed to  get it out again but with the help of a lot of thais. Like a lot of people came to help us dig the sand beneath the wheel and push our car out of the ditch. We were super touched. But we lost like almost all of out water supply to that ;(

“Without a steady supply of food and water, an army will starve or dehydrate, killing or demoralizing the troops.”

 

*and also, we “thought” our vehicle was a all terrain vehicle >.>

Jump Shot

Okay, at this juncture, we’re like happily taking some jumpshot of ourselves and doing some “beach activities” HAHHAHAHA They are as seen in the above and below picture.

First time see sunset >.>

Yup! Taking photo of sunset.. LOL! That’s like the more entertaining thing to do there.. there’s nothing else -_- Why is my phyket experience so different form others!? But it’s definitely fun!

Me feeling proud again, after getting into another ditch.. AGAIN..LOL

And here you go, the moment we’ve all been waiting for! They say third time’s a charm. We got it! The third time!
It got stuck so badly this time round that even a pick up truck can’t tow us out! We have to leave the car there overnight and then pay a guy to pull us out of the ditch the next day using a SUPER HUGE tractor(watch the video for it).

This is our tent! How cozy

So this is the resort that i’m talking about! LOL! It’s a tent! YAY! Okay.. this resort is called Mickey Monkey Resort.. And below is the picture they showed.. when when I booked, I made a mistake and booked the tent instead >.< HAHAHAHAHA
BUT IT’S OKAY! LOOKS IT’S SO COZY AND WARM AND NICE! NO REGRETS!!!! ONE OF THE BEST STAY EVER!

Picture of Mickey Monkey 1

This is the bar outside!

This is like the bar outside.. Look at how strong the wind was! Madness! Very super nice place to relax and great for like company retreat! LOL! Like the one you see in pitch perfect

This is the hole we made! LOL!

So the sun has raised, and the first thing in the morning, they arranged for us to get one of the local with those huge tractor to tow us out!
Effortlessly, boom! We’re out! But look at the mess we’ve made! Look at how deep that shit is! HAHAHAHAHA

This is the aftermath

And the wheels! Look at the tyres! LOL! We paid them 1500Bhat to tow us out. Can be avoided, but it’s okay.. not too bad.. quite an experience.

So as soon as th car is our, we had to quickly be back on the road! As we’re travelling straight to bangkok, about 800km, 10hours of driving..

Vroom Vroom Vroom BANGGGGG BOMB BOMB BANGGG PIANG!
So Bing Xian was driving and if you can see in the photo below, there’s a tarmac road and a sand road(apparently still under construction) So we saw some cars travelling on the sand road, so I told BX to take the sand road, and cut all the cars on the left which is on the tarmac road.

STEP STEP STEP, due to the sand road, the tyres lost tractions and started to lose control.. AHAHAHAH the whole car went down the ditch (as you can see on the left side of the picture) went in came out from the opposite side, BX swerve back, went in the ditch again, came back up and it finally came to a stop..

It was so horrifying that I thought the whole car was going to flip when it enters the ditch OMG Just imagine you’re so freaked out, you thought you’re going to die, you just didn’t scream but started to prep and brace yourself, hoping for the best. Amen.

This is the accident caused by Bing Xian

So when the whole drama was over, we went to find the parts of the car that was destroyed.. HAHAHA This is just like part of the car..

Parts of the car

And more…

Looking happy.. trust me.. we’re not

Just so you have a clear idea of how the car looked like when we first rented it, it’s as below.. look at this beauty.. look at it..

Before

Then now may i bring your attention back to ours.. You’re welcome..

After (Looks at the radiator!)

So we’ve decided that everyone need a break and calm ourselves down with some food and drinks, especially BX!

hansel in distress

I have no idea what happened, but he took the wheel shortly after again, and then SUDDENLY THE WHOLE CAR STARTS TO VIBRATE!! SIAO LIAO

So we pull over by the side, and OMG punctured wheel.. so now you know who is the sway one here right? HAHAHA

Thankfully the pit stop that we pull over was a car mechanic! So we paid them 100Bhat, and he changed the wheels for us. Easy Pisy. 30mins.

Looking at our tyres being changed

After all those hooha.. We drove for about another few hours then we finally reach out hostel in BKK! I always stay with this hostel when i’m there! I think it’s kind of cheap and the staff and the other traveller there are friendly! I can almost always talk to at least a few other people there, learn their culture and their country! Always gets me excited!

Finally reached our usualy hostel in Bkk!

Okay.. then the rest is just those normal BKK stuff.. you know, really nothing special to me.. I didn’t even buy anything.. All the stuff I bought from the sales item from H&M and Uniqlo.. LOL Wutttt

BX buying “Havianas”

Street food

@ Chak Ju Chat

This is them feeling grouchy to have to wake up so early

But one place, not new, but it’s my first time is Dalat Rot Fai!
Rot Fai Market is located on Srinakarin Soi 51, just behind Seacon Square Shopping Mall!

Tell the driver Seacon Square if he doesn’t know where the place is or where Srinakarin Soi 51 is! You’ll definitely be there!

So once you reach there, there’s 3 zone, namely ‘Market Zone’, ‘Warehouse Zone’ and ‘Rod’s Antiques’. Each of the zone is really very unique. They sell from everything to everything! Literally!

The food sold there is also very unique! From like like fried century egg to squid to beef noodles and ice-cream! yum yum yum!

Squid with that AWESOME SUPER SPICY CHILI! DAMN GOOD

Then they have their antique section, which features quite a wide range of vintages cars and bikes. I know people who actually enjoys them. I do enjoy, you know.. just not that much.. HEHE

Go visit Dalat Rot Fai when you’re in Bkk! Awesome place!

Vintage cars and bikes

Working car, casually on the streets

With one of the set up

A group photo of us with the vintage stalls!

On the stage

And on the stage!

Going home ;(

So all in all we spent

Don Meung –> Chomphon –> Phuket –> Bangkok –> Home
So have you guessed how much I spent for this wonderful trip? ;D

$200 = Ticket
$48= Accommodations
$60 = Car
$$350 = Expenses

Think it’s really okay for such trip! LOL! Could be cheaper without all the towing and all! HAHAHA

Byeeeee

Well, this is a really special and different trip! LOL!
If you need some details or anything, feel free to PM me! I’ll be more then happy to share them with you!

Till Then,
Norman