Even before we decided to go to Krabi, I knew I wanted to stay at Holiday Inn Resort Krabi if we ever jejak sana!!!!! 

I read about it on Ezdi's entry in 2013 and dah simpan niat since then ok. I showed pictures of their pool access room to Saliheen, who fell so hard in love with it too! The pool access room was no longer available on Agoda when we wanted to book it so we booked directly via Holiday Inn Resort Krabi's official website. Nak pool access room punya pasal haha.

Journey from airport to resort via Krabi Shuttle took about 40 minutes.

Check-in was quick, and we were given the first pool access room in the Couple Wing, nearest to the lobby, which we loved! I think some people might not like it due to lack of privacy because ada orang lalu lalang from the lobby but we didn't mind it at all. As it is, pool access memang tak private la kan haha. Yang penting, we didn't have to walk so much whenever we wanted to go to the lobby or keluar masuk the resort #pemalasharam

No pictures of the room itself since you can see them here (360 degrees views here, just click on the different tabs to see different areas) but I do want to post a few pictures of my new friend and I in the pool from over three days:

Cute right my unicorn float!!!!!!! Tak cute is when my badak body accidentally rolls off and splashes into the pool hahahahahaha. Anyway, I bought it from this Carousell account for S$90.00. You can find many sellers offering this type of cute pool floats la, this seller just happens to live 10 minutes away from me. Also, if you plan to beli floats yang besar gedabak macam the unicorn or the swan, I highly recommend you beli electric pump jugak. Kalau tak, if you try to blow up the float pakai mulut, it will makan 7 hari 7 malam and your mulut will be the one yang kembang macam boya lolol

Nothing else to say except I love everything we did at the resort!!!!! Which was: eat, swim, sleep, repeat. Oh, and two rounds of spa and massages! Hehe. I also love both the early morning dips in the pool and the late night floating sessions while staring into the starry sky with Saliheen... very peaceful and therapeutic ♥

A few other things that I love about the resort: (1) There is a cluster of food stalls and retail shops (including a 24-hour Family Mart) next to the resort (2) You can access the beach, which is directly opposite the resort (not the best views but it will do just fine if you only intend to tan or read a book by the beach) (3) Hotel staff was friendly and always obliging.

Definitely a resort that we will return to if we make another trip to Krabi for a chill-out holiday - especially if we ever had children someday! We saw tons of families with children, since the resort markets itself as a family-friendly accommodation (as it should, since they have tons of stuff meant for children's comfort and entertainment). It's not as lively or happening as Phuket or Bali in terms of shopping, partying and late night activities, but that's the whole damn point of us having a holiday in Krabi - to makan lots of nice Thai food, get massages and chill out all day everyday. Shiok!

Weekend in Krabi - Flight and Transport

Saliheen has been wanting to go to Thailand over a weekend to tailor more shirts for work so after we came back from Tokyo, that's exactly what we did: Made plans for a weekend in Thailand! He actually wanted to fly over to Bangkok but my family told me they were going to Krabi during the same period so I asked Saliheen if we could go to Krabi and spend some time with them instead. It'll be fun, I said, we get to surprise my dad (who didn't know our plans), we get to go to a beach destination, and oh look, there are tailors in Krabi too!

Whiiiiiiiich explains how we ended up spending the leap year weekend in Krabi. Hehe.

The Flight

My sisters already chose the dates and flights before we decided to tag along so we had to choose the same flight via AirAsia. I wasn't happy with the booking process because the website kept crashing on me wtf but after 2387034 tries, it finally went through! If I ever meet Tony Fernandes, I am giving him a piece of mind about my lousy booking experience >:(

But whatever. It didn't take away the excitement that Saliheen and I felt because my dad didn't know we were tagging along to Krabi, and we had to pretend to send the family off at the departure gates haha! Going through security and boarding was a tricky and heart-thumping affair (kita dah macam penyangak siak, trying to hide our faces all) but we managed well enough for my dad to be genuinely surprised on the flight haha his expression was priceless, you guys!!!!!

If you follow me on Snapchat (I am active there now) you'd have seen how it went down snap by snap, hehe. Although I guess I could also upload a video which my sister recorded from her point of view..............

Check out our pathetic bobbing heads, trying to avoid being spotted by my dad HAHAHAHA

Nice little discovery I made on this flight: me having another similarity with my dad in the form of our love for flight take-off and landing! I saw him peering intensely out of the window during take-off and landing and realized he wears the same fascinated expression as me during the same moments. Ke mana tumpah lauk kalau tak ke nasi (atau meja... atau baju).

Anyway, my thoughts about our AirAsia flights: Seats were ok for a short-haul flight, flight had several short bursts of turbulence, but generally more pleasant than the time I took TigerAir to Jakarta (there was turbulence and taik idong on the window). I might or might not take AirAsia again, depending on whether their website decides to be a bitch next time.

Airport Transfer

I don't know whether it was just the timing that we arrived (2.10pm) but the airport counters were crazy packed by the time we got in line for customs clearance!!! I think it's because of the cramped layout for the arrival counters la. The crowd cleared after awhile and we were out of customs clearance after an hour of waiting.

Booked airport transfer with Krabi Shuttle (as suggested by my sister Farahin) because we wanted the convenience of having transport immediately after we arrived in Krabi. Highly recommended! They were fast and responsive via emails, their vans were decent and their drivers were polite and always on time (We used Krabi Shuttle to go to Krabi Town too). You can pay via credit card online or pay cash on the spot (which we opted for because it gave us a peace of mind)

It cost us 1500 baht (S$58.00) for a round-trip airport transfer on a standard minibus that can accommodate 8 pax. You can use their online booking form here (easy to use) to see their quote for various routes and vehicle types! Oh, I think it took about 40 to 45 minutes to arrive at our accommodation in Ao Nang area from the airport? Definitely less than an hour ah.

Ending this entry with a travel video which my sister shot and edited! We appear sporadically in the video because Saliheen and I stayed in different accommodation from my family and we didn't join them for the water and island-hopping activities during the day (We've done them before when we were in Phuket and didn't want to do them again). But we met for dinners and Krabi Town + I still wanted to post this video because 1) my sister did a lovely video of her birthday trip/our family vacation and it deserves to be watched 2) this is to make up for the lack of pictures in this boring ass entry hahahaha.

Birthday Trip 2016 - Krabi from fazmals on Vimeo.

If you're wondering why Saliheen looks like he is done with the world at 04:43, it's because he came down with food poisoning on our second last day in Krabi HAHAHAHAHA ya ya now kelakar la, can laugh about it all, but at that time, he really looked like he was going through a world crisis k (Shall blog about food in Krabi next)