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Fast Food Travel / McDonalds / Phuket Travel / Thailand Field Trip / Photo Gallery / Food Travel / Most Shocking McDonalds / Thailand Travel / → All Tags

Munching McDonald's Exotic 'Samurai Pork Burger' in Phuket

As dedicated as we are to trying out the most local and unique foods for our Foreign Grocery Friday series, we also have a definite thing for investigating the fast food preferences of destinations. This usually involves stalking the pastry cases of Starbucks in Switzerland or snacking as the world's fanciest Taco Bell, but more likely we're around the corner squinting up at the menu boards of a McDonald's.

Hoping for some rice patties or other exotic offerings, we wandered into the Golden Arches in the Central Festival Mall in Phuket Town, Thailand. Instead we came face-to-face with the Samurai Pork Burger, a standard item on Thai McD's menus, and something that sounded safe to try.

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Food Travel / Foreign Grocery Friday / Thailand Travel / Thailand Field Trip / Phuket Travel / → All Tags

Foreign Grocery Friday: The Salak Fruit of Southeast Asia

When we travel, one of our favorite things to do is to pop into a local grocery store and check out the food products and candies we'd never find anywhere else. So we're trying out this new feature, Foreign Grocery Friday, where each week we'll feature some of our (and your) favorite overseas treats. Got a recommendation? Let us know!

Heading to a store and identifying the fruits of Southeast Asia can prove a workout for both Wikipedia and Google Image Search for your smartphone. It's like a game! That is, until you encounter one fruit that remains anonymous even with all the googling of "brownish fruit, sharkskin texture, thailand."

Thus, we turned to Twitter a few days ago to identify the above fruit, and several of our awesome followers @Jaunted recognized it immediately as Salak, or palm fruit, a plant native to Indonesia but grown through SE Asia. It also has varying names: Sala in Thailand, Salacca or Salak everywhere else.

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Phuket Hint: Aim For The Sand-less Bit In The Middle

Thailand... Are we nuts?! Nah: The airport trouble is over, and while politicians keep bickering in Bangkok, the rest of the country is ripe for exploration. Claire Duffett just spent two weeks in southwest Thailand sailing the Andaman Sea from Krabi to Phuket.

After Koh Phi Phi, we approached Phuket with trepidation. Surely, tourists literally spill into the ocean there, right? Well, not really, if you know where to go.

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World's Wildest Bungee Jumps / Bungee Jumping / Bungee-Jumps-Map / → All Tags

Bungee Jumping When Safety Seems To Matter

Let's be honest: We're pretty scared about bungee jumping. But there are a few reassuring facts about the Jungle Bungy in Phuket: It's over water, so we figure we've still got half a chance if our bungee cord breaks; it's cheap--first jump of the day is 2000 Baht ($55) and it gets heaps cheaper if you do multiple jumps; and it's safe because the boss jump master is a guy from New Zealand who totally knows his stuff.

So what can go wrong? Nothing apart from us losing our nerve, perhaps. Maybe the tandem bungee is for us, but they also offer a catapult bungee, backwards bungee and a water touch bungee.

For nervy jumpers like us the website is very reassuring about safety, and then they say that if we have any troubles, "We can give you a nudge if you like!" If you make it (if you jump, that is, not if you survive) you get a "Certificate of Courage." We'd display that proudly on our most prominent wall, we think.

Related Stories:
· Jungle Bungy Jump Phuket [Official Site]
· Phuket Travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: ciao-chow]

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Vegetarian Travel: Phuket's Festival Starts September 28

Calling all meat-haters: The Phuket Vegetarian Festival is coming up from September 28 to October 7 and there won't be a beef steak or a deep-fried chicken wing in sight.

The Vegetarian Festival is a special time for some locals, who strictly observe a vegetarian (or for the extremists, vegan) diet to basically cleanse their souls. There are daily processions from various Chinese shrines around Phuket which are colorful and meat-free.

If you want to take part yourself there are a few rules you have to follow: As well as avoiding all meat dishes, you have to wear white, can't drink alcohol, can't have sex and must "behave physically and mentally." While this isn't exactly our idea of Thai holiday fun, there's surely something to be said for a purely vegetarian parade.

Related Stories:
· Phuket Vegetarian Festival 2008 [Official Site]
· Phuket's Vegetarian Festival [Jaunted]
· Thailand Travel Guide [Jaunted]

[Photo: Electrostatico]

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Vegetarians in Pain

The wild card in VegNews' list of the "10 Best Veg Destinations in the World" is near the bottom: "Phuket Vegetarian Festival is not the kind of festival populated by gentle tree huggers in hemp pants playing djembes, doing yoga asanas and drinking spirulina smoothies. And it's not for the faint of heart. But it is a colorful event every vegetarian will want to attend, though perhaps not something every vegetarian will wish to participate in."

So we know what it's not, and we know it's colorful, and we know it's mandatory. Why so cagey? Could it have something to do with the copious amounts of repeatedly pierced body parts you're likely to see?

Related Stories:
·   Phuket Vegetarian Festival [Official site]
·   Phuket's Vegetarian Festival [Jaunted]
·   Vegetarian Festival [Flickr]
·   Spectacular and Mysterious [Thai Ways]