Pattaya at Last

We finally arrived in Pattaya, but first we took a side trip to the Museum of Illusory Interactive Reality, (not the real name) or something along that line. I now hate to admit that I was absolutely hating this place while we where there. It was pretty crowded and the acoustics were exactly like being inside a giant concrete bunker with lots of noisy people talking and shouting. The "art" wasn't what I call art.

It was an expensive hybrid of a museum and an amusement park. Two dimensional art that tried to become three dimensional. You then react with it, photograph it, and return it to two dimensions where it tricks you into thinking it was three-dimensional all along. Confused yet? Don't worry about it. Here's what I mean.

Then it was off to find a hotel. I have to say, this is the best hotel I've ever stayed at anywhere. The rooms were about $70 bucks a night. But on the second evening there was a problem with the air conditioner or something. Anyway, some sort of strange chemical fumes began to persistently waft from the air conditioner (something like burning electrical insulation mixed with cleaning solution) sending Dang down to the hotel desk to complain and soon we were transferred into a $200/night VIP suite for the same price. And they seem to have forgotten to charge me for the nice steak and wine I had for dinner that night too.

Dang and "The Boys" on top of Pattaya

Yes, this really happened: but Dang always seems to come out ahead with this hotel room shuffle. Despite the hidden meth lab smell wafting from the AC in the first room, I still say this is the best designed, best managed hotel I've ever had the pleasure of staying in -- for the record -- the Centara Hotel. It had a salt-water swimming pool down stairs, the best breakfast buffet I've ever experienced, the nicest rooms I've ever stayed in, the nicest showers, HDTV with a channel package to please, Thai, Chinese, Arab, English, Indian, and Russian tastes, speedy WIFI that didn't require a new login/password combo every 3 hours, making the last three posts possible while finally letting me get to my Time Warner email and iPhone text messages for a coupe days. The room is the most modern I've ever experienced with high-tech touches everywhere I looked, and not matter how closely I inspected, I couldn't discover a single detail overlooked by the housekeeping staff.

Yes, I know, all rooms look nice in the photo, but this is better
trust me. It's full of LED lighting, intelligent technology that works
and everything is (not just seems) new, sparkling clean, and 21st century.
I wanna live here forever.

And just a short walk outside the hotel lobby was Pattaya; "Disneyland" for adults, though I must say there are a lot of couples who brought their kids. I suppose having the kids nearby helps keep daddy from wandering into the red lights. Lets just say there's something or someone here to satisfy the most fickle fantasies.  The town is crawling with Europeans and Americans and Russians, and Arabs and I suppose that's why it's so easy to find something to fit any taste. (I'm talking about food)

Something interesting at the beach, the water-jet is attached to and powered by the jet ski, whose driver was quite adept at keeping the high-pressure hoses from getting twisted by driving in circles as the flyer did water-jet powered loops. The flyer had smaller jets attached to each arm for keeping his balance.

Pattaya seems like a good place to (ahem) retire and it may be possible without winning the lottery.