glynbuk

Its ok for a change Now a youtube player might be an idea, feed it to your tv's and through your speakers ?? http://www.muziic.com/ That would be good for me and a bit of Sam Cooke would make it perfect http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAQE-tHjPAc

I think were a bit early on this one or should i prefer for kids banging on my door tonight ???

That is odd, using Kayak, it shows 645 for 1 person with 1 site i assume is Etihad direct, for 2 passengers it shows the cheapest at £699 using Opodo and £737 using Etihad direct. Trying Ebookers although it shows September 7th as the last date bookable at this time it does not find anything so i would try again in a few weeks time as you may be at the maximum 11 months available.

Looks good although a bit far out, is it guest friendly ???

Christmas prices are bloody horrendous, they have you by the balls and don't stop squeezing. Oh well, i am booked for that period so its got to be done Counting the time till wheels up

My pleasure, whilst BigD is not here i will step into his shoes to keep them warm until he returns

I got the email about the BA sale, however i only fly to Thailand at Xmas and i cannot trust BA not to be on strike, bloody shame as i love to fly with BA

Skytops

Yeah, but what's the weather like in Purgatory

Seems "intheloom" got banned, probably a rereg I always come here at high season and love it, but it is probably because i have not seen other times of year in Pattaya

True, i have been sweating on this strike, i fly to Mallorca this friday and return on monday 23rd, that could have been the first day of the strike. I read the other day that the union initially asked for more than 10% wage rise, set their sights high and haggle for a slightly lower increase i guess ( or taking the piss)

looks great, will certainly give it a go at Xmas

She doesn't look as if she is capable of singing like that does she ??

Looks as if someone helped you and limited how many pages you can access here with your new user group of "Purgatory" Working fine for me and has done for a long time, no problems here.

I would guess the travel insurance would be invalid if you were not wearing a helmet, also if you didn't have proper motor insurance within Thailand then the travel insurance wouldn't cover you either.

Ok, so i am still undecided on what to take for my next trip to Thailand which is for Xmas / New year. I am thinking about travellers cheques, so if i go with LloydsTSB and buy the Sterling travellers cheques with no charge through the travel phone hotline and collect in branch i am looking good, buy £2000 in Sterling and i get exactly £2000 pounds worth of travellers cheques, no charges so far that i can see. I get to Thailand and there is a small charge to cash each cheque, good so far, but where are the banks making money on Sterling cheques ??? If i buy Euro or Dollar cheques then Lloyds will use a bid/offer spread on the currency to make their profit but on Sterling as far as i can see there is no spread(charge) So, where are American Express making the money to print the cheques in Sterling ??, where are lloyds making their money on these transactions ??? I can understand that the Thai bank is making money on the spread on the currency and the charge for cashing a travellers cheque but what charges am i missing ???

Good stuff, which Tesco's was this at

I applied for my clarity card online, and it approved me, i have received the pin number but not the card yet, i also have a Halifax visa credit card but haven't used it for 6 months as i have better cards, so i don't know if you might be worth applying online ??

Hi LTGTR, You have to understand that airlines lie and cheat and use weasel words all the time. Lie flat seats mean they are not flat, they should be called "Angled lie flat" which means they have an angled recline of about 170 degrees (180 would be fully flat) Flat bed or fully flat bed is what you need to look for if you want 180 degree flat beds. Thai air out of London run 2 types of 747-400, versions 7442 and 7443, I hope for the version 7443 but the seats are too hard and uncomfortable but passable, and as they are side by side if the other person is fully reclined and you have a window seat, its difficult to get out. Seatguru is good for information but its not the most up to date http://www.seatguru.com/airlines/Thai_Airw...47-400_7443.php

If Etihad are as good as they used to be then they are superb, problem now is they are more expensive than Emirates by about 200 - 300 quid for the Xmas trip and thats too much. I have looked at Qatar/Gulf and they look good but some of the reviews say they have a few problems and some of the planes can be the older ones with not so good seats so i don't know, i guess its whether you hit lucky and get the good planes, Etihad/Emirates have the newer planes and Emirates seem to have more flights and the chances of less time on the ground in Dubai. The A380 is one hell of an experience on Emirates, the plane i had from Dubai to Bangkok, the stewardess mentioned that they had only had it in their fleet for 4 days. Been reading some good reports of Kingfisher business class, may keep an eye on them for the future.

Click the pics for the bigger picture - Some pics from my Emirates first class trip, 23 inch tv in the suites, superb on demand movies/music etc, i spent most of my time listening to music as they had the top 10 or so records from every years since about 1952, food was good, had the option of Caviar etc, didn't try it, prawn curry is best for me

In the few years i have been coming long distance to Thailand(from the UK), always at Xmas / new year. First year 2005, i flew Thai air business class on the 747-400. bloody terrible lie flat seats and a very small seat pitch, i promised myself i would never fly with them again.(paid approx £1500) Next year 2006, i flew Etihad pearl (business) brilliant, best i had seen, flat bed and lots of room and easy access in and out of the seats, great food and drink, nice size tv screens(15 inch), excellent all round.(paid approx £1300) 2007 i had booked Etihad out of Gatwick, booked early and paid approx £1500, then i hear rumours that Etihad were moving from Gatwick to Heathrow, everyone denied it and then it turned out to be true, travel agent wanted me to change airport to Heathrow, fly a day earlier going out, spend 9 hours in Abu Dhabi airport on the way home, no way, i told them to stick it up their ass and flew Thai air(oh shit), Paid Thai £1960 and they were running two versions of the 747, one with the old seats at approx 50 inch pitch and the newer one at approx 60inch pitch, got the newer one going out and the old one coming back, SWORE blind i would never fly thai again Newer business seat on Thai 2008, Had some extra money, booked Thai air first class, come the weeks before my flight the yellow shirts took over Suvarnabhumi airport, couldn't risk not flying so i changed flight destination to Manila on Cathay Pacific business, had paid £3100 for Thai first, with the late change the Cathay flight cost me £2800 + £175 change fee, Cathay had the same type seats as Etihad but slightly less width and a different configuration but they were very good flat beds, food was ok and Cathay had chilled cabinets between business and Economy where you could go and pick tubs of ice cream/chocolate etc when you wanted, not bad 2009, i was using better search engines for flights (Kayak/Travelsupermarket etc) had Kayak send me a weekly email of the best prices for my journey/dates, was watching Emirates and the prices were dropping, business class got down to £1600 in May 2009 and First class was on offer at £2580, went for the first class as two of the journey legs were on the A380 with the showers in first and suites, first leg was on the 777-300ER with a suite, next was the A380 and return to Dubai, last leg was on a 777-200 with older lie flat seats, all in all the suites were wonderful, showers were great and the food and drink was good, (except i asked for ice cream on the A380 and they said they don't have any- IN FIRST CLASS how can that be ??), plus the planes on Emirates were much too hot, i know its an arab airline and they all like it warm but that was ridiculous, coming back i showered on the plane before landing at Dubai, with 20 mins i was sweating badly, showered and changed into fresh clothes in Dubai first class lounge and was dripping with sweat within 20 minutes of being back on the plane. first class suite i had on 3 legs of this journey 2010, i have been watching the prices since February, bloody hell, they are trying to save Dubai by charging me an arm and a leg, Emirates wanted £3100 for business class on the same flights as last year and £3900 for first, Cathay and Singapore wanted £5000 for business class and the best i could come up with for my dates/times was Thai in business class, oh shit seems i got the last seat on business for the flight i wanted going out and paid £2200, bloody crazy Oh well, at least its a direct flight(hopefully)

There is a wealth of information and lots of information in this forum, however you need to join the full board by following this info http://www.pattayatalk.com/joinmembers.html In the full forum, lots of members will help and give advice on all matters and much is posted including trip reports.

It really depends what you want and what price you wish to pay. Pattaya with the baht bus system, your in reach of everything within minutes for a very fair price. So, you either pick Soi 2 area(beach road) with the Sabai lodge or Summer spring etc http://www.sabailodge.co.th/index1.html http://www.scandibar.com/hotel/summer-spring/ Soi 7 / 8 not bad but can be noisy http://www.flippergroup.com/ or my choice last Xmas and already booked for this Xmas is the Sandy Spring soi 13 http://www.scandibar.com/hotel/sandy/ I stayed at the Sabai lodge for my first trip to Pattaya in 2006 and loved it, 2007 i stayed at the LK Metropole in the Soi Bukhoaw area http://www.lkpattaya.com/index1.php?hotel=LKMetropole others like the pattaya bay resort in that area behind second road http://pattayabayresort.com/default.aspx I now book through the scandibar http://www.scandibar.com/hotel/ as they will take a booking by email without credit card details (on trust) and you get a free beer voucher for every day you stay and use it in their bar(only for booking in hotels they list above) There are so many great hotels in and around that your choice is massive.

Hi love thailand, You will love Pattaya but agree the beaches are not great. First thing to do is join the full board, read here and apply http://www.pattayatalk.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=5880