In Reply to: wow posted by bali_babie on Monday, 29. March 2010 at 16:10 Bali Time:
We originally planned to live on an Island off Phuket after 15 years of travel all over Thailand but ended up choosing Bali.
These are the differences I note:
Food - cheaper in Bali but in my opinion not as good as Thai food. I love eating a quick freshly made (in front of your eyes) Pad Thai off a street cart. I like the fact that a lot of places you can see food being cooked and can pick your ingredients. If you do go into Patong, try the Baazan Market for food and shopping. If you stopover for a night in Bangkok, try Kaoh San Road for a bit of fun, street food and shopping.
Accommodation - when we were last there was more expensive, but now Bali seems to be getting pricey, not sure if this has changed
Beaches - you can find some amazing beaches on short boat rides from Phuket, great snorkeling, diving, caves. A lot more opportunity to get on a boat and go out on the water. Or you can just walk down to the water (always depends what time of year though).
Shopping - seems about the same as Bali.
Clubs - we have similar in Bali
Beer - cheap, but my husband says he won't drink Chang again, he blames it for the worst hangovers, he prefers Bintang, but he will drink Singah
Taxis- Tuk Tuk's are cheap, fun and easy to find - open air and you can barter the price
Lady Boy's - not so many of them in Bali, great fun girls/boys that will talk your ear off if you get the chance. They are very open to tell you about how they were born a boy but feel like they are a girl. They are all over Patong. Some are so beautiful I think a few guys get fooled..oops.
Shows - a bit of tourist attraction to see something different like Ping Pong Balls coming from private places.
Temples - they have some amazing temples, you can do trips to see all cultural things as well.
National Parks - get out and into the jungle if you can
Elephants - I had a baby one walk out in front of me in Phuket town once, probably wont' happen now-days but I will never forget it.
Movie's in Bars - we watched a lot more movies at restaurants and bars then we did when tourists in Bali as they provide more comfy cushions etc, you can settle in for the night.
Thai Kick Boxing- TONIGHT TONIGHT, Thai Boxing Tonight, No.1 champion of Thailand....get used to hearing that a lot. You can go and see a fight is that's your thing.
People - land of smiles just like Bali, however the time before last that we were there we found a new aggressive side to a few bar and security staff (to us it felt like they were a bit fed up with drunken tourists and were giving it back). We had bad luck and saw 3 deaths by beatings, (a girlfriend was stabbed with a bottle opener for not having the correct money at the bar in Patong so she left the next day) and a lot of fights where tourists were fighting and Thai's stepped in to end it (promptly and with not a nice ending). Not something I see in Bali but maybe it happens here, just haven't seen it. It was the final reason why we chose not to live in a touristy part of Thailand. There are groups of a certain country that go out at night almost like gang members (that particular country are not allowed in Indonesia) and we just happened to visit at the same time they were there, didn't have that the trips prior, even a lot of the menus had changed to that countries language to accommodate the huge numbers of visitors.
Hope this helps. It's all I can remember has it's been 3 years since we went for quick trip and we stayed in Koh Samu most of the time (which had changed a lot in 10 years).