A long-overdue trip

After 7 months in Thailand, it was starting to be embarrassing to say that we had never been to the beach. So, with an unexpected three-day weekend, we finally got in a white mini-van and headed three hours South of Bangkok to a town called Hua Hin. It's a retirement community for ex-pats, mostly, and also boasts so very high end hotels. It's not one of the really pristine beaches (you have to head further South for those), but it was close and we found a good rate for a room in a small guesthouse.

The weather has turned hot. The cool season is over, and we are quickly transitioning to the HOT season, but the wind at the beach made it very comfortable.

The town of Hua Hin is small enough to walk around, for the most part, so we did all of our exploring on foot. Although we saw more fat, old men and women in speedos and bikinis than we ever wanted to see, there was a lot going for the place, especially the large variety of delicious restaurants. We splurged a little and shared a three-course meal at a real French restaurant.

During the day, we took frequent trips to the beach (about 10 minutes from our guesthouse), and spent most of that time in the water. It was pretty, but very crowded, and we're not really the type of people who like to pay for a beach chair.

Still, it was a wonderful way to relax!

My favorite time of the beach was after sunset. We made an amazing discovery the first night that if you go after 9:30 pm, the beach is deserted, and you can go for a romantic swim, under a full moon, with no one to bother you. Ah...

One of my favorite parts of the weekend was meeting this dog.

She came down to the beach to meet us while we were putting on sunscreen and decided that we would be her people for the day. She followed us all over a bunch of rocks, around a point, to another beach, and even came out in the water with us when we started going in. We went in over her head, and she started whimpering, but she kept swimming when she saw John further up ahead. She was so sweet! In the end, we had to walk back up to the beach to get her to stay. We both miss having pets around...

All in all, it was a great weekend. We were glad to get out after two months at home. The beach was beautiful, the water was lovely, but if you want my honest opinion, it ain't got nothin' on the Pacific Northwest!! :)