grs90

Tha BA e-tickets are magic. If you have one you don't even need to queue to check in as you can use the self service check-in machines in the departure area. You'll need to take the card you booked with - don't worry about the old one having expired, just take the new card. The card is only used for an identity check. The BA website explains how to use the self service machines. You can also check in online through the site, up to 24hours before departure.

Gus Based on everything I've read here & elsewhere I reckon I would need £1000 (70,000baht) a month to have a minimum acceptable standard of living in Pattaya. So I really don't think you have enough money to just quit the UK at the moment. Having said that, you also don't have a lot to live on if you stay in the UK. At the rates you mention you probably only earn enough to cover expenses and when you stop work you will be on the breadline. I'm assuming here that you have no pension other than the state one that will kick in at 65. Plan 1 If you move to Thailand now, live reasonably using just your lump sum, you will probably be broke before you are 70. You'll probably still have your faculties intact, and will have a miserable ten plus years living in the UK in poverty until you either drop dead, top yourself, or become too senile to care. Plan 2 So the best advice would probably be to stay in the UK until retirement age, work and earn as much as you can, then move to Thailand at age 65 with your £150K still intact or better, and at least some income (about £3600 a year as a single pensioner I think??) coming in. You could probably then have comfortable 15 to 20 years in Thailand, taking you well in to your eighties. You may have died happy by then, otherwise its join that flying club or return to the UK with your memories and live/die on the state. The biggest problem with thid plan is you'll be as miserable as fuck for the next several years and could drop dead before you have a chance to spend your money. Plan 3 So, overall, I think I would do something like this. Not sure where you're located in the UK but if you can buy a property, say a 2 bedroom house or flat for about £120k then you can live in that while you are in the UK and rent it out while you are in Thailand. Spend, say, 8 months in Thailand @ about £1000 a month and live/work in the UK for the other 4 months. The 4 months working should be more bearable if you know you have another 8 month break coming up. You should clear, after costs, about £350 a month in rent while you are not using the place yourself. If you rent it out for 6 of the 8 months this will get you an income of £2100 to offset against the cost of living in Thailand. Providing you can balance your cost and income while you are back in the UK your lump sum will reduce by around £6000 or so each year but hopefully this will be partly or fully offset by growth in the property price. At age 65 you can reassess your situation. Your 8 months per year, for the next several years, in Thailand will not have diminished your pot of cash too dramatically and, like the second choice above, will probably last you well in to your 80s. The above is just my view. Its full of assumptions. It takes no account of any health issues you may have; it assumes you have no problems renting out a property and that you can get work whenever you come back to the UK. There's probably loads of issues and costs that I have overlooked. In my opinion the important thing is to keep your options open and not just blow your cash too early so it would be plan 2 or 3 for me. Cheers Gray PS. Just re-read my reply above and hope it doesn't sound too condescending - its not intended to be. Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

Try the BJ Holiday Lodge near the bottom of Soi 3. Its new, meets your requirements, also has in room safe. Cost for me recently was 1000baht per night. In my view its better than the Sabii Inn and Sunshine Vista which I've stayed at before at that end of town. email is bjpty@loxinfo.co.th

Don'y know how to do a link but the email is mamaison@loxinfo.com

What dates has your mate booked the flights for? If the outbound & return flights are more than 30 days apart then he could have a big problem. The airline should not let him board unless he has an onward/return flight within 30 days OR a visa valid for over 30 days. I've seen this happen before. One way around it is to buy a fully refundable ticket from BKK to somewhere else, say Singapore, before he leaves for Thailand and then cancel the booking and cash it in.

The website works for me. www.bellavillapattaya.com

Bazza Beds - I can only comment on the one in my room, I didn't check out any other rooms. Mine was a king-size and was fairly firm but it was comfortable - much better than the Sabai Inn where I stayed in June which was like sleeping on concrete. A comfy bed is a bit subjective though isn't it so you'll have to trust to luck on that one! Towels - I asked for an extra couple of towels twice during the week because the original ones supplied were well dodgy. These were supplied without any fuss so I don't suppose you'll have a problem if you ask for extra. Suggest you tip the maid the first time you see her, (rooms were cleaned between 2 and 6pm if I remember correctly), and get her to sort it out for you. Does your back give you any problem going up and down stairs? If it does then you may want to think again about staying here. If you want any other info about the place let me know. Cheers

I've just spent a week in this place. At the discounted rate the big rooms are excellent value for the money. The air-con is metered separately @ 5 baht a unit so this needs to be added on to the price. For me, with the unit running most of the time I was actually in the room, this cost 550baht for a week. Plus points were it was a good size room, mostly neat & tidy although a bit worn around the edges. The owner was a great guy and the staff seemed friendly enough. The room had an electronic safe in the closet which I prefer. There is also a back door which avoids you needing to drag your girl in through the restaurant which is the main entrance. (The restaurant closes at midnight so most times you need to come in this way anyway.) Location was fantastic and the noise wasn't a problem - except for some cunt with an angle grinder working on a bar across the street at 8.30 one morning. The airport pick-up also worked perfectly. Minus points were that the stairs were a bit of a killer when you come home pissed. Steep as fuck and lots of them. The balcony is a shared affair with the other room on the same level so you needed to keep the door to that locked if you weren't in the room or didn't want anyone peering in on you. On a couple of occasions the towels were a bit manky although this was immediately rectified when I pointed it out. No I.D checks which, is a good/bad thing depending on your point of view on this matter. All in all a good deal but without the current discount which ends at the end of September the cost goes up to 650 per night plus the aircon. So about 730 all in. You could probably do a bit better for that money but not much. I'd class it as a place I would certainly stay in again but not so good that I'll stop looking for alternatives.

Millwall FC - I've PM'd you

If you don't mind an indirect flight then you can get a return with ETIHAD for Sept/Oct for £373 with Expedia

I've stayed there twice, most recent stay was last June. Totally guest friendly both times. You do walk through the lobby on the way to your room but no need to stop at the desk unless you've left your room key at reception. I never needed to sign the girls in either.

Good offer on at the moment, available from ebookers and others for June travel.

Lek hotel new wing, as mentioned above, meets your requirements. Email the hotel direct and they will do you a room for 1000baht.

I've done a trip from London with a 3 night stay. Out on a Thursday night with BA, and back at around midnight on the Monday. Arrived at Heathrow on the Tuesday morning. Shower, shit and a shave at the airport; off to Paddington where I collected the suit I'd left from the left luggage. Changed in the bogs and in to the city centre for a 9.30am meeting. All in, I was in Thailand from about 3.30pm on Friday afternoon and back at the airport just before 10.pm on Monday night. The flight was £390 last May (I see its £420 for April/May this year) and spent about £550 while I was there. I spent more per day than usual because I wanted to cram in as much as possible. Add in a few other expenses and it worked out to about £320 for each day I was over there. Well worth it, but I couldn.t afford to make a habit of it. The big problem was when I got back I was a total fucking zombie for a couple of days, and I don't normally suffer jet lag. It took until the following weekend before I got it out of the system. I'd say do it. But as has been said before try and take at least one extra day off so you a minimum of 2 nights over there. Good luck!!

Has anybody on the board got any experience of how worthwhile it is collecting miles, as opposed to just going for the cheapest fare each time? I've read that members from the States get some good deals but from what I've looked at the programs avaialble from the UK look a bit stingy. I fly LON-BKK 4 or 5 times each year and normally just go for the cheapest direct flight I can get. The average price I've been getting is around £450, normally on BA or Qantas but a couple of times on EVA. I'm now looking at prices for Feb and March 2005 and the price for BA is up to £520 inc taxes which is a bit steep. The BA miles program is shit. They only give 25% of the mileage for tickets purchased on, say, ebookers or expedia etc. So it will take for ever to get a free flight. Also, they don't give tier miles for these tickets so I'll never be able to move up to a SILVER or GOLD card. Do other airlines operating from the UK have the same policy of giving reduced, or no, miles unless you buy a full fare ticket? I don't mind travelling indirect provided I can get a better overall deal with perks such as chances of upgrades, free flights, use of the lounges and so on. From what I've managed to dig up so far the emirates program looks OK. But if I've got to pay the price on their website of about £580 for the tickets, as opposed to about £500 elsewhere then, even with the perks, I'm probably bettor off sticking with BA. The cost difference is marginal, the BA flights take 4 hours less each way and the combination of online & self service check in is a big plus. Unlike some others who have posted, I've never had a problem with the BA service and they have not let me down once. On the other hand I want some bloody perks having had none whatsever off the tight bastards for the past five years. I also want a cheaper trip if it doesn't mean spending several hours stopping over somewhere. So, any recommendations on the best deals to be had?

I took a short (3 night) trip to LAOS two years ago. Its possibly not the cheapest way to go but I flew Thai Airways from BKK to Udon Thani, then took a Thai Airways minibus to the border. Visa on arrival was 20 or 30 USD at the bridge, then hired the local baht bus equivalent to a hotel in Vientiane. Repeat the above travel arrangements in reverse order to get back to Bangkok. Vientiane and the immediate surroundings had just enough to do to keep me busy for the two days I was there but if you stay longer you may need to travel further afield. Nightlife was very tame but fortunately I took two TGs from the Bangkok Biergarden on Soi 7 with me. One of the memories I'll take with me to the grave was walking in to the Novotel in Vientiane and asking for a "room for three please" in front of a SAGA like tour group who had arrived at the same time. If looks could kill then the old biddies would have done for me on the spot, but the old guys were almost patting me on the back. I know its not fair to slag off a country based on one short visit to just one town but from what I experienced Laos is a shit hole and I wouldn't go back. Personally I would recommend a trip to Rangoon on Burma instead. I was not travelling in the busy season so did not book in advance. The flight was only half full and the hotel I stayed it had plenty of room. Cheers

How about the Natural Beach Hotel on Soi 11, accross the road from the beach? 750 baht per night

Sunshine Vista serviced apartments was pretty good when I was there in April. It would meet all your requirements listed. If I want to stay at the north end I will book for there again.

I stayed at the Sandy Spring for a week from 27/6 and, apart from one morning when what sounded like an electric saw was going for about 30 minutes, was not disturbed by the noise at all. However, given the state of the building works for the new condotel and the place just across the road, I may just have been lucky by being there between noisy phases of the works. If you like the place (as I do) then give it a go. You can always check out and move somewhere else if you find that the noise is a problem.

That's wonderful news as I've got a booking there starting 24th June. I'll have to refuse to pay for the full stay in advance so, if its still going on then, it will leave myself free to check out of the place if its a problem. I like the location there though so, assuming everywhere on soi 13 will be affected to at least some extent, what's the nearest place likely to be out of the way of the disruption, at about the same standard as Sandy Spring?

For this sort of thing you ideally need one of the Asian airlines to be offerring deals on an "ASEAN" aipass. This lets you buy a book of coupons, for about $100 per coupon, that you can exchange for flights between the ASEAN countries. I think Cathay Pacific were doing them recently and Garuda were certainly doing it during 2003 when I used it. Sorry I don't know if anyone is doing them at the moment but it might be worth checking the websites of the asian airlines.

It depends on what you want from the hotel. Where you will spend most of your time? What is your attitude to ID checks? How many "guests" do you anticipate having at the same time? I've stayed at both within the last few months and, on balance, the Sandy Spring shades it for me. Its in a bit better location for the places I tend to frequent, the rooms are slightly better and bigger and the pool was great for the down time. On the other hand the shower is better (for a group!!!) at the Sunshine Vista, the guest policy is more relaxed, (no ID check and bring back as many as you want, whenever you want), and it was slightly cheaper. So decide exactly what you want at/from the hotel and compare against what both offer. Post the detailed requirements if you want and I'll be happy to give my views on them.

So how does this work then? I've booked, and paid in full, flights for a very short trip in May and again for week in June, both with BA. Will I get hit with the surcharge or does it only apply to new bookings?

I've just spent ten days at the Sunshine Vista. If you use the R24 internet booking you can get a room for 6600 baht peer week which includes daily breakfast for 2 people. IMHO the place is not quite as good as the Sandy Spring. I would put on a par with the AA Residence which is also in Soi 13. Its OK though and I would stay there again if I wanted to spend most of my time in the north pattaya area - (some great bars in Soi 2).