Well Pattaya we didn't think much of it, there are far nicer places in Thailand for Backpackers (Phi Phi, Koh Tao :)) but Ashs Uncle Keith lives here and we had promised him a visit. We had wanted to visit as we knew it was a seedy place with lots of prostitution, ping pong shows etc which would be interesting to see (possibly).

Well after our long train journey from Laos to Bangkok we booked on a local thai bus to Pattaya for 113 Baht each which was great. The journey took about 2 hours we think but we were asleep most of the way. When we arrived at our hotel we were very impressed, it had a big posh lobby with marble floors, glorious air con and a modern decor! Here we were two smelly dirty backpackers covered in all sorts of grime surrounded by lots of well off Russian holiday makers! They did double take my credit card as if to say - have you stolen this card?! We had decided to book posh hotels for the last parts of our time in Pattaya and Bangkok as a treat, the thought of going home was getting more depressing and we needed cheering up! Although we did dread the credit card bill upon our return home!

Our room was like a proper hotel room we felt as if we were on a proper holiday it had a balcony and the hotel had a posh outdoor pool and jacuzzi and swim up bar (which we couldnt afford any drinks from) and also a sauna (why?! In Thailand?!) and a gym. We were very happy with the Sunbeam Hotel. We decided to make the most of being in a real hotel so decided we would have the room cleaned, towels and bedding changed every day and also order room service at least once!

Pattaya was just like a western holiday place it had lots of huge shopping malls everywere and loads of huge hotels. On the first day we had a swim and a wander around town, we didnt really like Pattaya it is full of dirty old men and prostitutes everywere which we did expect but just not at every single bar we thought there might be at least a couple of bars that wern't full of prossys, but they all were. We also experienced the huge shopping mall in the centre which was bizzarre, not like the rest of Thailand we had seen. There was a cinema inside and they were showing Star Wars in 3D which we thought we would watch that night as we were missing the cinema. A little film of the King of Thailand came on before the film and everyone stood up as they played the national anthem, quite sweet really, they should do that for our Queen!

Over the next few days we didn't really go out much we just would go to 7-11 and get some chang, a toastie or two and some bananna cakes at lunch, swim in the pool, etc. We did spend one day at the beach which was the only good thing in Pattaya as you just sit there and people come up to you and you can buy anything without moving, Becky got a henna tattoo and Ash ate about 10 magnum ice creams. We even had chicken fried rice brought to us for lunch! You also get them idiots with animals so you give them money for a picture with them and there was this one american guy with a parrot and he came over and put the parrot on Bec's knee and Ash said "No its Ok thanks'' and the guy said " Oh i didnt realise everything was Ok" being really funny with us, as if he wanted money for forcing his stupid parrott on Becky. We were pretty fed up of being hounded, you don't really get hounded in backpacker areas as people dont have a lot of spare money for these things. So Ash got really annoyed and retaliated by shouting " I'LL BREAK YOUR f***ING PARROTS NECK THEN WHAT ARE YOU GONA DO FOR A JOB" Ash's inner chav rearing its ugly head. It was pretty funny he picked up that parrott and walked off pretty quick. Trouble with Pattaya is there are so many stupid Russian tourists paying loads of money for things.

We did go one night to walking street where all the strip clubs are but it was far too expensive (especially compared to Vang vieng were we had just been) so we just went into a few strip clubs and went to watch a "Ping Pong" show, where they pulled razor blades and did tricks with there foofs. In one of which they fired a dart at a balloon Ash was holding above his head, a bit disturbing really. In this particular place Ash went to the toilet which was also a kitchen/changing room for the strippers, a ladyboy host in the bar followed him in there and tried to feel him up! We swiftly moved on to another bar after this haha. In all the bars there are women topless dancing on tables and lots of old white men watching them, ew. We saw a Thai woman in the street with her 2 or 3 year old girl dressed up as a prostitute, yes, make up, high heels, short skirt and bra, all the Russians were laughing and taking pictures, giving this terrible mother money, we were disgusted.

We Went to Visit Ash's Uncle Kieth one day, he came and picked us up and we went to his house and met his wife and all of her rescue dogs and cats. He took us to his favourite resturant at a market and he bought us a yellow curry and beers. He also took us on a drive around town, told us all about his life there, and took us to Tesco and he showed us things his wife liked to cook. On the way he told us that the Russian mafia are a real problem in Pattaya and that a couple weeks ago they beheaded someone. We had a pretty chilled out time the rest of the week, just swimming, and relaxing as Becky had a cold, we were ill loads on this tripa! We went to Swansens ice cream parlour in the shopping mall which was amazing! And we also ate a nice buffett lunch in there one day, lots of Western food like pizza which was a treat. There was not really that much to do and we wished we had not booked so much time there. All in all we have said that we would not got back to or even tell anyone to go there. But our last few days of travelling were ahead of us and they would be spent on Khao San road so to get there we booked a taxi which would take us all the way from the hotel to khao san road in Bangkok, it cost about 30 quid which was decent.