Seriously good travel deals in Phuket
Now here’s a deal for anyone in Singapore: Fly with Tiger Airways to Phuket, free. Okay, so you will have to pay something – tax is S$45 (governments always want their pound of flesh) and there are unspecified “charges”. But that’s still a pretty fine deal.
You can also fly to Phuket, return, from Bangkok, for as little as 486 baht, depending on how far ahead you book. That’s on Air Asia. Nok Air is offering the same flights for as little as B257.
These are some of the guys already flying into Phuket. Now Virgin Blue is apparently planning to get in the game with daily flights from Australia.
Budget airlines seem to have spotted something that surprisingly few others have: that holidays in Phuket are really cheap at the moment, with hotels offering all sorts of deals – not surprising when the Phuket Tourism Association is talking about occupancy rates of 25%, compared with the usual figure at this time of year of around 50-60%.
Phuket’s been hit this year by a triple whammy – the Global Economic Blues, the political violence in Bangkok and the Mexican flu.
Let’s look at these problems. The Blues, of course, affect people everywhere. Even if they still have their jobs, many want to hang on to their money. But if you raise your eyes from the piggy bank clutched in your trembling hands, you’ll find that this is a time for great deals.
You’ve already had a taste of the air fares. Hotels in Phuket are just as accommodating. For example, the sooper dooper Serenity Terraces – where Grand Prix hero Kimi Raikonnen has a pied à terre – is currently offering stays for as little as B4,000 a night for couples.
The J W Marriott is offering 50 percent off, Hilton Phuket Arcadia‘s charging around B4,500 a night per room, including taxes, and you can get two nights at the Sheraton Grande Laguna for less than B4,000. That was today. Who knows what tomorrow holds?
So much for the Blues. Now the reds and yellows. In Bangkok, everything is quiet again – no riots by red shirts or yellow shirts for a month. That’s not to say that everything is perfect; there’s probably a way to go before the politics of Thailand gets back to a normal temperature. But Phuket’s 800 km away, and there never was a problem on the island. Bangkok might as well be another country. (Some Phuketians will tell you that it is.)
As for Mexican/swine flu aka H1N1, let’s take a look at the numbers. As of May 21, the World Health Organization lists 85 deaths worldwide. According to the US National Lightning Safety Institute, 24,000 people die each year from lightning strikes. Does that put things in perspective?
