The British has got a long railway history. It is dated back to the age of Industrial Revolution in the 19th century. Inevitably, it's quite easy to find some antique buildings and structures along the whole British railway network.

Our journey to Bath started at the Bristol Temple Meads Station. The main building is apparently over 100 years old. Despite the old furniture and finishes, you need not worry about the room temperature as it has been regulated by air-con, which has been there some couples of years ago.

When you look up into the concourse ceiling, it is crossed with steel arches and trusses. Playing back the Harry Potter series in your mind, you may wish to find out where platform no. 9 3/4 is.

I think College Green is named because it's close to the University of Bristol. But it's not that close to the main campus of the University. Instead, it is just next to the Bristol Cathedral. It is a large open space covered with grass. At the western end of the College Green is believed to be the Bristol municipal building.  On a sunny afternoon, there are a few people sitting on this green carpet. They are either reading or just walking their dogs. Some may form a circle and have their private camp-fire like gatherings. With the warm sunlight and soft grass, it is very hard to resist lying on the grass and feel the mild breeze. Better than this, of course, is to read something. It would be much easier to get yourself connected with the literary giants.

There is also an old but lovely building next to the Cathedral - the Marriott Hotel. The outlook of the Marriott is similar to the Peninsula in HK. The Queen's statue stands outside the hotel. This statue is made of granitic rock. When you take a closer look, the statue's head has become greenish. And that indicates the difference between the Chinese and the British. The Chinese cannot tolerate a taint on Mao's picture. The British don't give a shit about the dirt on the statue. The birds, however, do.

The Park Street demarcates the northern boundary of the College Green and it is one of the busiest street in Bristol. When you walk up the street, you will find the main building of the University of Bristol. When you look at the second last picture, you may see that the tower on the left is polished while the rest of the building remains dull. Thanks be to the subscriptions from the overseas students!

It took more than 2 hours from Heathrow to Bristol. After a brief settlement at my friend's home, my wife and I started to browse around this peaceful city.

Unlike HK where it is described as a forest of concrete, there are plenty of vegetation in Bristol. There's a small pond near Stapleton (a suburb area in Bristol). You can see a lot of birds there, including mandarin duck, teal, swan and others that you may not be able to name it. I think the lake is an artificial one, however, it's evident that the landscape architect tried to minimize the human footprints on this natural habitat.

Without the fear of avian flu, bird feeding is a common activity there. The people here are more friendly to wild lives. If your motions are gentle enough, the birds will become less cautious and come close to you. The bird feeds (i.e. bread) can easily be obtained from Tesco (a local chain supermarket just like Park'N Shop in HK) just a few blocks away from the pond. With discount, a loaf of bread may be as low as only GBP 1.00.

Fishponds is a small town in the north-eastern suburb of Bristol. For those who are fond of sight-seeing, it may not be a good idea to spend time in Fishponds. However, Fishponds is a typical English small town. You can smell and touch the British life there.

If you want to have a closer look of the typical English small houses, there are plenty of those in Fishponds. Some of them were even built in our grand grannies' time. As a Anglican country, chapels are commonplace everywhere in Britain. These chapels were originally served for either the private families only or the local communities. The architecture of these chapels is exactly the same as what we watch in the Harry Potter's series. Take a sweep and a pair of oval-shaped glasses and you will become Harry.

Travel Agency
To the best of my knowledge, there is only one travel agent in Hong Kong which provides full package (air ticket + accommodation) for the Racha Yai Island. There are two local agencies for the Resort reservation. So you shouldn't bother with shopping around and getting a good bargain (please leave me a message for details). In low seasons, the package (4D3N) per person is less than HKD 4000 (for the basic "Deluxe Villa" which I am going to discuss later). The package cost may be up by around 30% during high seasons.

Hong Kong, Phuket, Chalong & Racha
There are direct flights to Phuket. But don't expect that it's as frequent as that to Bangkok. Hence, we took some time to plan our itinerary. After getting off at Phuket International Airport, we went to Chalong Bay in the south of Phuket Island where we took the speed boat to Racha. We might enjoy a more comfortable and elegant way to Chalong Bay as the Resort provided Mercedes Benz (E-class) limo service from the airport to the pier. This would have cost us some 1600 bahts. Alternatively, we opted to the limo service desks inside the airport. We just picked one of them and it cost us around 550 bahts only. And there wasn't much compromise to comfort.

At Chalong, the Racha got a reception office where the staff helped us checking-in. We were offered some complimentary cocktails, self-help fruit & sandwiches platters and cold towels with refreshing scents after the limo ride. At the same time, we were asked to choose the preferred scent of shampoo and shower gel, which includes lavender, lemon grass and jasmine.

There were two freights between Chalong Bay and Racha per day. It takes around 35 minutes from Chalong to Racha by speed boat when the sea is calm. As a warm reminder, the speed-boat ride is rather bumpy even though the sea does not look rough at all. But it shouldn't be a real matter at all. As soon as the speed boat was approaching Racha, we could see that the water was very clear and turquoise.

But this was just the beginning of the interesting bit. The speed boat was anchored in the shallow water region of the Ter Bay, which was an overall sandy beach with rubbles at both ends. We landed on, instead of concrete pier, a long pier made of plastic floating cells. We had to make some effort in finding our own centres of gravity while walking on these floating cells.

Accommodation
The villa did not disappoint us. It was just as beautiful as on its website. We were led to villa 322 where we were going to stay at. When the door was opened, the scent of aroma oil, with some soft jazz music, diffused throughout the air. No. 322 was a deluxe villa (the basic standards). It was beside the Garden Pool, one of the two pools in the Resort. It was slightly at grade and thus maintained a suitable privacy without compromising the garden view. The architect gave plenty of space for flowers and scrubs (as well as little animals). When we looked into the shrubs, we could find lizards and tree frogs seeking shades under large leaves. But ladies needed not be deterred by these lovely little animals. They were harmless and quite shy. I tried to take a few good shots at them but in vain. The most common bird on the Island looks like magpie but with a few colorful feathers. They are less shy and eager for feeding by the tourists. For the prevention of avian flu, don't feed them. The environment was so peaceful that we literally woke up every morning by chirping birds and warm sunlight (when sun-shade was not applied).

The highlights of the deluxe villa standards include a king-sized bed, a bath tub, a normal shower and an outdoor rain-shower. There's a big window in front of the toilet. We were able to enjoy the beautiful scenery of coconut palms under the clear blue sky while we were answering our natural calls. On top of these basic standards in Deluxe villas, there are Superior Deluxe (i.e. Deluxe villa having sea view), different types of suites and the one and only one Lighthouse villa.

Room service was subtle without any sign of intrusion into our privacy. Every night, they left a good night note with an orchid. They also left gentle reminders to update us the special events. There's a special but interesting way of leaving "do not disturb" message. Just leave a tree frog doll in the "Do Not Disturb" box beside the villa number sign outside the villa.

Facilities
Swimming was definitely the major activities in our trip. The relaxation never comes close to bathing in the swimming pool during the sunset when the sun rays are much gentler. There are two swimming pools in the Resort. Garden Pool is one of those that I mentioned before. Its charm comes from the surrounding palms and various shrubs. There's one infinity pool situated on the first floor of the main building and is facing the Batok Bay. As its name suggests, it looks like merging with the skyline of Andaman Sea. It's never been a problem of getting free deck chairs during the low seasons. I suspect it won't be the case during high seasons. Other standard sports facilities like tennis, basketball, volleyball, mountain bikes are available. But I believe that everyone would prefer spending time in water sports.

If you are a very busy man, the Resort also maintains a certain level of access to internet. It's amazed to note that, despite the limited number of computers provided (only 2), these are all the new MacBook model.