Stayed in Patong Beach, Phuket last week at a new gay friendly hotel called B-Lay Tong, a fabulous hotel across the road from northern end of beach, 15 minutes walk from Paradise complex. Visited bars: My Way - poor floorshow and un-attractive boys, but drinks outside on a subsequent visit yielded one average looking but dynamic sex performer later in hotel room; Mamasan - empty bar with some pretty boys all self absorbed; Tangmo - superb crowd of boys and good floor show. Didn't have time to explore the many other bars. Drinks about 100 - 150 baht at the bars I visited. Average tip for overnight with boys seems to be 1500 baht, but I paid double for mine because of the great workouts provided. Gay bar scene here seems more lively and boys more attractive than previous visits. Will return in February for Gay Pride event.

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I have spent the last week in Patong Beach. The 2011 Gay Pride event started on Wednesday and ended last night with a colorful parade along the beach road and up to the Paradise complex. The whole event had a heavy emphasis on drag queens probably because that is what the hoi polloi, which seems to be the target audience rather than gays, best understands about gay events. It ended up being a huge distraction from what is usually on offer here, but I guess the event is about making money from straights rather than gays. The go-go bars were full of straights. My Way even had a family in the audience. By the way, I think My Way must be the worst run establishment with the manager there often interrupting activities by barking orders through a megaphone to the go-go boys to re-deploy them outside to lure more unsuspecting customers. Mind you I don't know why anyone would want to be inside the go-go bars anyway when all the activity seemed to be outside on "Exit Road" which is where most of the gay venues are located. Each venue took turns in staging free shows along "Exit Road" during the three days of the event. This created huge crowd congestion as the hoi polloi competed with gays in moving up and down the street, made worse by the frequent intervention of vehicular traffic along the street. Chaos ensued. However, sitting outside the bars proved to be hugely entertaining, not because of the free shows, but because the passing crowds of straights turned out to be the freak show rather than what they thought they had come to see. Anyway, the local gays seemed to enjoy the opportunity to dress up and show off/shock. I found the event to be very disruptive. At least I had spent the prior three days enjoying a quieter gay scene.

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Yes bar in Paradise is doing a sexy show - a lot of nudity and hard dicks - no sex. First show is 11pm - it is a small bar so it gets full quickly just before show time. Seems a number of boys have left Phuket early for Songkran as many other bars a bit short of boys.

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-- My att'n. has been drawn to the flg. web-site -

> Phuket, Thailand: Crime Capital of Asia | Live Trading News <

-- Source: >The Baht Stop <
-- Usual disclaimer etc. etc.. --

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I was last in Phuket in January this year and noticed an obvious lack of a police presence. This was confirmed by the manager of my hotel, La Flora, who said the local police were useless when I asked why they had not stopped the nightly random setting off of fire crackers at around 4am on the beach in front of the hotel. Patong also was a pedestrian's nightmare as there was no way of crossing the streets due to the steady car and motor cycle traffic with drivers who routinely ignored the few traffic light controlled crossings. After several visits to Phuket over a couple of years, this last visit convinced me that 'law and order' was in decline and further visits will be postponed indefinitely. I was saddened but not surprised at this recent news of a tourist death.

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any update on phuket? how easy is it to move around phuket mainland. how much typically is an island hopping trip to phi phi and surrrounding islands?

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Tangmo now gone further than Yes bar with f...g, s...g shows and the other types of shows from Bangkok in between the usual cabaret acts. Even the guy doing the fire eating show did it in his underpants with erect condom covered cock sticking out - I was a bit nervous of the latex catching fire. Packed both nights I was there.

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how easy is the transportation at night there? there's so much publicity about taxi mafia charging 400 baht for even a short ride.

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