PeterRS

One additional point that I just realised. Looking at a short term insurance policy I had taken out for one trip, it specified in the proposal the countries I would visit. I assume if the couple had visited India without stating it in their proposal, that could be grounds for denying cover. This problem seems not to arise with annual policies, which I would certainly recommend for regular travellers.

No need to wait. I returned from Taipei 7 days ago. Fingerprints and photo still required.

Isn't the problem with hotel points that, like airline miles, they just keep going up? I recently posted esewhere about a 5 day stay at the Marriott on Phu Quoc back in 2019. Using points for 4 days a that time gave you a 5th day free. Now that fifth day has disappeared. Were I to try and book that exact same hotel, it would cost me in excess of 100^% more in terms of hotel points. I tried that on Cathay Pacific in the 1990s. They started a scheme with lifetime Marco Polo Club membership with access to first class lounges etc. for 2 million lifetime miles flown. By 1999 I was up to around 1.7 million. Then CX joined One World and cancelled the 2 million miles plan!

They were the three cities I mentioned - the subject of the post. Re Phu Cuoc I was not there to hook up. I had been in Ho Chi Minh City just beforehand and did meet a couple of guys there. Both were from the apps. Sadly neither were more than average. But I do read that there is quite a lot of sex going on in HCMC. Years earlier i had visited Hanoi and had a great time.

As mentioned, in order Hoi An, Danang and Hue. They are all easily accessible on one shortish trip.

Although I now get through the Fast Track Lane, I am certain it will be the same with all entering passsengers getting a chop in the passport.

You will love Danang and the area. I started a 10 day trip 5 years ago just as the airlines were stopping flights due to covid. Hoi An just 30 minutes away is a glorious little town, with lanterns lit up everywhere in the evenings. There is also at the west end a 15th century Japanese bridge In the centre of this area is the large city of Danang with its fabulously long beaches A little further north there is the old Imperial capital of Hue. The French destroyed much of it, espeically the imperial palace, but it is slowly being restored. This was the scene of a lot of fighting during the Vietnam War. Sorry we have moved somewhat away from Patpong! Not much gay life in the cities but my app started buzzing even before I was out of arrival at Danang airport.

How many times have we hear this tale? Travelling wihthout appropriate medical insurance is madness considering how relatively cheap it is. Reading the small print on policies is also vital. I have never heard of an exclusion due to first travelling to India but, assuming the insurance company does not want a law suit on its hands, I assume this has to be stated somewhere in the policy. The Thai Bt. 300 travel tax is also typical Thai madness if its intention is primarily to "repair and renovate public monuments"! How much will be left to cover genuine accidents from people who failed to take out insurance? Not much, I expect. So what? A new 300 baht tax is not going to put off 99.999% of potential Russian or Chinese tourists IMHO. But it should exclusively be for medical and repatriation costs.

Ah! When you call yourself a King in a republic, some of even your most faithful supporters will surely start having second thoughts! I'm sure it's been said before, but I totally fail to understand how Americans have fallen - twice - for the lies of a trumped (sic) up almost failed businessman whose mentoring was all at the hands of the vile and digusting Roy Cohn, that scourge of gay men who turned out to be a closet gay and died of AIDS. Interesting that in a 2008 edition of the New Yorker magazine, Cohn's assciate and Trump's buddy Roger Stone whom he pardoned, claimed, "Roy was not gay. He was a man who liked having sex with men. Gays were weak, effeminate. He always seemed to have these young blond boys around . . . He was interested in power and poitics." Now there you have a Trumpism or two!

The only advice I'd offer is get rid of them fast! Although it's not quite the same situation, I had a Sydney-based friend who had to fly virtually weekly between Sydney and Melbourne. He preferred Ansett and had accumulated around 330,000 miles. Then in 2002 the airline went bust and with it the frequent flyer programme. He lost all his miles.

I hope you enjoyed it. I was there just before covid and used my last Marriott points to spend 5 nights at that beautiful hotel. Loved the trip. .

Anyone who has lived in Japan knows what earthquakes feel like as you experience them virtually every six weeks. All but a few are mild and only involve a gentle swaying. I was in a bad one in Kobe, though, which did a lot of destruction. Thankfully I was in a relatively new hotel which was structurally very sound. I have also felt several in Taipei, one resulting in a major jolt but litttle damage. The worst I experienced was in in 1989 in the little California town of Pacific Grove not too far from San Jose. I had arrived from Hong Kong that morning for an urgent meeting, hired a car and drove to Pacific Grove. Just as we completed our business around 5:00 pm, the whole wooden building shook, pictures fell off the walls - and instead of diving under desks the four of us just stood there, as if wondering 'what is happening'? By the time we realised it was an earthquake 30 seconds later, the shaking was over. But all the power in the town was out and the roads cracked. It was the worst earthquake in that area since the San Franisco quake in 1906. Part of the Bay bridge collapsed and fires broke out in one part of the city. I finally made it back to my hotel in Pacific Grove which was all in candlellight. Despite aftershocks, I was by then so tired I fell fast asleep. But getting back to SFO the following day for the midnight flight back to Hong Kong was a real problem.

Unlike @macaroni21 I have accumulated frequent flier miles ever since registering first with United in the late 1980s, and later due to company regulations on Northwest for trans Pacific. In Asia I joined Cathay Pacific's first programme named Passages introduced around 1990 which was a joint venture with Singapore Airlines and Malaysian. Then later its Asia Miles programme when it became one of the original seven One World carriers in 1999. Since then I have used miles for dozens of long haul freebie biz class trips from Asia to Europe, Australia and South America. Naturally it helped greatly when like me you have to fly regularly on company business in biz class as most of my several million miles resulting from business travel. As for the CNN report in the OP, British Airways has already changed its loyalty programme to howls of protests from existing top tier members in the media - and as evidenced by the number of websites on the subject. The number of points/miles/spending for free redemption miles and access to perks like lounges has been increased massively - and that is Massively with a capital M. Cathay Pacific is also in One World and I expect it will soon make yet another change to its loyalty programme. Some years ago pre-covid it changed its scheme. Before then I had flown BKK/Tokyo/Taipei/Bangkok for the same number of miles as BKK/Tokyo return. After the change, each sector is priced separately. When I checked the mileage required after the change, for the same route the required mileage was double. Unlike previous years, this year for the very first time I have finally found obtaining mileage tickets difficult. Some months ago I tried to book on Qatar for a long haul trip involving one change in Doha. I have used this carrier regularly for the same route, sometimes with cash on their regular special offers and several times using Asa Miles. When I gave the operator the entire month of March for a two week absence, no biz seats were available. He suggested calling a week later. I did, and this time extended the period to four months - any two week period between March 1 and June 30. All he could get me was one outward ticket. No return was available. I told him this is nonsense! Qatar have 5 daily flights out of BKK, one of which is an A380. They also have 2 daily flights to my onward destination. That all the mileage seats had already been 'sold' made no sense . . . . . . unless Qatar has started to do what Qantas did in the 2000s - open your mileage tickets a year in advance only to existing loyalty card members and wait till 5 or 6 months before the flights to make any remaining seats available to other One World carriers. But that's just a guess. Thankfully my long distance travel is now limited to one flight a year. Looking at a variety of videos on youtube, it seems the best way to obtain free miles in future will be (1) become an American citizen; (2) sign up for a credit card that immediately gives you 50,000+ miles on a certain carrier; (3) do all your spending on that card. But with the credit card and currency conversion charges if used abroad, I wonder: will that amount be worth the free ticket you get? I feel so incredibly lucky that I was able to maximise the benefits from initial mileage programmes whilst they lasted.

Not so welcome were the hoards of Chinese tourists. Ten years or so ago, one of the year's most popular movies in China was mostly filmed in Chiang Mai. In terms of box office, it came second only to Avatar in Chinese cinemas. Before then, the number of Chinese tourists in Chiang Mai was numbered in their thousands. Thereafter it was one milion+. Following that success, the popularity of Thai TV soap operas in China continued the trend. Just before covid, Chiang Mai airport recorded 1.79 million Chinese visitors. Although killed by covid and Chinese travel retrictions, the numbers are slowly on the way up, now joined by almost similar numbers of South Koreans. Not sure which I'd prefer - the small number of sexpats who used to make the city home or the huge regular influx of new tourists, some of whose numbers are reported to have sparked resentment among the local population.

When there was the earhquake of Aceh Province that ked to the tsunami in December 2004, the building swung violently and had to be quickly evacuated!

Thanks to @tm_nyc for alerting me to Shamlessmacktwo's blog. I used to be an avid reader but for whatever reason it has had a place on my bookmark list unread. Re Chiang Mai, love his comment that "once upon a time there was a colony of expat retirees!" On my last visit just over 5 years ago, there were clearly some who seemed fixtures at the newer bar location in the smallish Chareon Prathet Soi 6 virtually opposite Le Meridien and to the left across the main road. But not nearly as many as would be seen years before - both bars and customers. I happen to know two retired couples (one of two expats and one of an expat and his Thai partner) in CNX, but they just have no interest any more in the local gay scene. Whereas before they would take me to this bar or that bar, now they tell me the scene is all but dead. Also love the photos of the curtains at Circle Pub. They remind me of two similar sets of drapes. One in cinemas in the west of the 1970s or thereabouts which would slowly rise and fall before and after the main feature. The other of more interest here was the bar at the end of the little soi in Bangkok to the left and down from Mango Tree restauraht. It is the soi where I believe Super A still exerts some sort of charm (although what I fail to understand given its seediness when I visited pre-covid). I believe its name was Super Lex. Quite a large bar with lots of tables and a square stage. What I remember most, though, were those draped curtains around the stage - exactly as in Shamelssmacktwo's photos! Photo taken (without permission - apologies) from Shamelessmacktwo's blog - https://shamelessmacktwo.travel.blog/2025/02/03/watching-curtains/ Unlike some, though, I have always enjoyed CNX and just wandering around still find new things to do and see - with the occasional eye candy giving me more than a once-over glance. Ouside of the city there is much to see, including the lovely Doi Inthanon National park. Within the city on the oppposite side of the river, there used to be a lovely shop selling Thai handicrafts made by one of the local hilltribes. Over the years I have purchased eight exquisitely beautiful fabric table/bed runners and a quite lovely three-part fabric folding screen which nicely separates the kitchenette area from the living room. I hope Sop Moei Arts is stil going.

I wonder if the fact that I enjoyed sauna-going for much of my career lies in the fact that I came from a country where individuals could still be thrown in jail for gay sex. No, not England where the law changed in 1967! I felt I was missing quite a lot in my late teens/early 20s. Then suddenly I had a job requiring travel within Europe and this whole new world of naked men seeking sex in saunas opened up. It additionally had an element of excitement - who might be waiting around the next corner, as it were? I agree that with age one's own attractiveness to many is diminished. I have not been in a Bangkok sauna for many years but until quite recently I still occasionally ventured into one when in other parts of Asia (never elsewhere). There is defintely a group of young Asians with a primary interest in being with older westerners, although I have never tried to work out the reason. And as long as I have been prepared just to hang around looking at eye candy, most times good things have happened!

I get through on fast track having reached the age when this can be done without flying at the front and of the aircraft. When exiting, there is no officer and no stamp in the passport. Since the passport has to be scanned before the machine takes the face pic and lets you through, I assume the passport details can - or should - be recorded somewhere. It all reminds me of one of the reasons for the new machines being introduced. It was discovered only 2 or 3 years ago that most of the information on the paper entry immigration forms had never been processed. A gazillion of them were merely sitting rotting in a large warehouse! What really pisses me off, though, is that returning to Bangkok I still have to pass an officer who does check all my details and inputs into a computer. Yet since I own my apartment, under the law I then have to do a manual telephone report on an Immigration website within 36 hours of arrival to inform someone of my address. Given that after all but just one arrival at BKK, I am always at the same address - the exception was a quarantine hotel during covid - this seems another typically pointless piece of Thai bureaucracy!

Sorry to disagree but I find a view that is nothing but flat ground with some sparkling lights dotted everywhere quite boring - and quite expensive! How many can go on to afford dinner at Vertigo, I wonder? Just a personal view LOL

I hope someone from Chiang Mai gives his thoughts. Mine go back to one year in particular - 2009. Two events occurred that year. The first was that in February a Gay Pride Parade in Chiang Mai was interrupted by hooligan local demonstrators when fights broke out. The police put a stop to the Parade and none took place for quite a number of years thereafter. But it illustrated a depth of anti-gay feeling among some of the city's inhabitants that had not previously been visible. Perhaps initially less important was the opening of what was billed as Chiang's Mai's first gay resort hotel, the Lanna Lavender. The owner, Jay Gregson, had bought an existing 110 room hotel at the northwest by the city wall. It opened with great fanfare near the end of 2009. As the gay public was informed, the rooms had all been upgraded, there were outdoor patios with dining areas above the third floor and another up on the roof (11th floor?) plus the swimming pool had a massage spa attached and there were always boys in attendance. In the basement was a huge entertainment venue for a "Power Boys" twice nightly show. I only went once with friends when we had dinner on the third floor patio. The ambience was pleasant, the food was fine but the service lousy. When the bill arrived, we sent it back because it was wrong. The seond time it was brought, we sent it back again - again wrong. Not a great omen. That said, though, we then went down to see the cabaret. It had well over 120 fixed seats of which around only 14 were occupied. Not a gogo show, merely cabaret but polished and very well performed with some cute guys taking part. We felt it was considerably better than most Bangkok bar shows of that time! We chatted to one of the boys afterwards. He told us that many of the performers were from the nearby University making some extra money. In the right location and with a far smaller number of rooms for the transient gay tourist population. plus a lot more attention to getting the detail right, perhaps the Lanna Lavender would have worked. Sadly it was all but a disaster! Massively too big, only a few of the rooms had actually been upgraded by the time it opened and the remainder were poor. There were endless complaints by those in the 'ordinary' rooms, most of whom had quickly to be upgraded. Clearly the initial financial investment in the facilities had not matched the extensive PR - it had been billed as "a gay man's utopia". The end result ought therefore have been obvious relatively quickly. The owner sadly committed suicide the following January, Power Boys closed two months later, and I believe it was not long before the hotel closed its doors for the last time. Its closing was certainly nowhere near the end of the gay scene. But it gave the lie to Chiang Mai being a popular gay destination with the guarantee of a goodly number of regular gay tourists. I don't believe it ever was, even though it had some really excellent gay venues and remains a great destination today for general tourism. Unfortunately I also believe that unlike those visiting Bangkok and Pattaya, too many gay tourists enjoyed their first visits but just failed to return.

Compared to what gay life in Chiang Mai was like even a dozen years ago, it is now virtually on its last legs for western tourists. True, there is still a cluster of bars in the smallish soi close to Le Meridien Hotel. When we had a look into them immediately pre-covid in November 2019 the patrons seemed mostly old-time regulars and some boys checking their phones. We did not stay for a drink in any. Adam's Apple is still on the go as I believe are the two gay saunas. And somewhere there will still be gay massage venues. But if you take a look at this Chiang Mai site, near the bottom of the page you will see a list of many gay venues that used to give the city its gay attraction. Almost all of them are closed - 2 Brothers . Adam's Apple . Akha . Attitude Magazine Thailand . Barocco . Bird of Paradise . Black Door . Blues Club . Bon Tong Productions . Chang Puek . Christmas . Circle Pub . Classic House . Club one Seven . Coffee . Coffee Boy . Common Massage . Cream Bar . Cruise Bar . CU Bar . Darling Wine Bar . David Crisp . Diamond House . Eve . Flower Festival . Food . Free Guy Club . Friendship Bar . g-star . Garden Bar . Gay Pride . Gay Soi 6 . Glass Onion . Golden Oldies . grand-arena . Halloween . heaven-massage . His Club . House of Male . in Memorium . jacky bar . LGBT . Lotus Hotel . Loy Kratong . Mandagay . Mandalay Bar . Mango Bar . Mansfield Place . Marn Mai Massage . Marspa . Maya . New My Way . New Year . Night Bazaar . Nimmanhaeminda . Note . One 2 Come . Orion Bar . ozeed . Pandee . Paradise Massage . Pedophiles . Pee Mai Tai . Phuket Pride . Pizza . PJs Place . Powerboys . Poy Sang Long . Quick Guide . Quiz Night . Radchada Cafe . Radchada Garden Cafe . Ram Bar . Relax . Sabaidee Santitham . Santitham . Santitham Guest House . Sarcasm . Secrets Bar . See Man Pub . Shan State . Shan State Earthquake . Sleaze Alley . Soho Bar . soho-lounge . Songkran . soulmates-retreat . Spirt House . Thai Puan . The Edge . The Peak . The Pub . The Wall Massage . Valentines . Victory Massage . Visakha Bucha . Warnings . What happened to . Yaa Baa . Yokka Dok https://www.gay-in-chiangmai.com On the other hand it is still a very beautiful city to visit and I am sure the apps will have some attractions.

Forgot to add pics from Petra which I just found with a couple at the end from Mt. Nebo where Moses is supposed to have climbed to die nearer to his God and one of the Roman Amphitheatre in Amman. Again I don't know why the pics are small but easy to increase the size by clicking on them. Also a few other destinations.

I can remember walking through London in the 1970s seeing gorgeous posters in travel agent windows with lots of purple advertising THAI. They looked so enticing! But The THAI we know today started as a joint venture with SAS. I know there was a domestic carrier which was eventually merged with THAI in the late 1980s. I expect this must have been the one run by the Air Force. I wonder if there is any less efficient airline in Asia? Having purchased its ten A340s primarily for the New York, LAX and some European routes, it could only make money with huge business class cabins. And they did not sell. So use of the aircraft ceased ten years after the first one was received and most of the aircraft basically left to rot. I understand 3 are at Don Mueang and 6 at U-Tapao. The 4-engine A340 died as an attractive plane ages ago. Similarly with its fleet of six A380s. Instead fo flying them off to dry desert locations in Australia or the USA when covid hit, THAI's management left them at BKK - slowly rotting. There was a post here a few months back that while many other airlines have reactivied their A380s, the cost of total maintenance and refurbishment of the THAI fleet is vastly too high. I believe they are on the market for just US$30 million each. After endless management changes and debt restructuring, THAI just cannot get it right!

I need here to apologise. My original response was slightly more personal. After posting I felt it was overly delicate and a little unfair. So obviously after you had read it I deleted the part to which you have responded. Just so that your reply does not appear somewhat strange. My fault!

I have no doubt at all you are correct. The only point that I was trying to make and backed up by @macaroni21's comment is that Thais used to make up a large majority of the punters during the period we were discussing - at least 65-70%. That surely cannot be the case now - or are we wrong?