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More than just hotel booking from Viking Bar website

Last month we added a new link for booking of hotels in our website under our Link page. The hotels listed under Hotel Club are all over the world and not just for Thailand.

Today, we launched a new page called the Hotel/Flights page. This page caters specifically for hotel bookings, flights, car rentals and even cruises. It is everything to do with your vacation needs.

We have three major organizations that are working with us right now:-

a. Travelocity which gives you the widest range of packages and deals covering flights, cruises, car rentals and of course hotels around the world especially in US and Europe.

b. Hotel Club which gives you a wide selection of medium to high class hotels around the world.

c. Thailand Booking which caters mainly for hotels in all popular destinations in Thailand like Koh Samui, Koh Phangan, Koh Tao, Phi Phi, Krabi, Phuket, Bangkok, Chiang Mai and many others. This site range from backpackers hotels to 5/6 star hotels.

We hope you will find all you vacation needs here. If there is more that you wish to see from us, please drop us a note.

Hotel Booking from our website

We have just added a link where you can now book for your hotels worldwide from our website. It does not matter whether it is a last minute booking or you are looking for special rates.

Just go to our link section and click on HotelClub banner. That will lead you to the booking area.

Staff Holiday in Hatyai

We had to close our pub for 2 days due to a religious holiday. Since one of the day falls on Full Moon Party day, the party was shifted to the day immediately after the holidays.

We took advantage of this 2 days holiday and extended it by one day and took the staff to Hatyai for a short holiday. We have just got ourselves a new pickup truck, hence we thought it would be great to get all together for a drive down south of Thailand.

The journey started early on 29th July. We took the first Seatran ferry at 6am. All of us were quite tired especially the staff as they had been working till 2am in the morning. So, we took a 1.5 hour nap in the ferry. Once we reached the mainland, we started our journey down south.

John was officially appointed the driver as my driving license has expired. The rest of us continued to have our nap in the vehicle as he drove. We stopped for lunch at my favourite restaurant just before Phatthalung. The last time I ate there was almost 2 years ago and the food is still as good and reasonably priced.

We reached Hatyai around 2pm and checked into our hotel. Normally I would stay in Siam Hotel or Hotel Asian. This time around we stayed in Diamond Plaza Hotel because it has a swimming pool. We thought that it would be good for the staff if they got tired of shopping or walking around the town. In the end, no one even saw the swimming pool!!!

The first night, all of us went for a Cabaret show. The setup is extremely different from that in Koh Samui. The stage is professionally setup and most of the songs are in Chinese. The reason for this is because most of the tourists in Hatyai is from Malaysia and Singapore.

The next day, we decided to drive up north a little to a small town called Songkhla. This is a seaside town and it is about half an hour from Hatyai. We drove to the seaside looking for a dragon (which has its head, middle portion and tail) all in totally different sections. It was quite fun hunting for all the three parts. Of course, we also did not miss the famous mermaid statue. We found an ancient pagoda and had to take a elevator up the hill to see it. The view from that hill was fantastic.

On the third day, we had to start our travel back to Samui. Like all holidays, it was very short but we enjoyed it. Our journey back was rather interesting. We were about 2 hours from the ferry point when traffic came to stand still at the single lane road. Many other vehicles started to turn around to go by other roads but since we only know of this road, we decided to stay on it. After almost 45 minutes waiting, we were given the clearance to move. Well, it seems that the delay was caused by the Thailand Prince paying a visit to that area. Luckily we started leaving Hatyai early hoping that we could catch an early ferry back to Samui. In the end, we still ended up with our original booked 6pm ferry.

For more pictures, goto to the photo gallery in our website http://www.vikingbar.net .

Viking Bar Under Renovation

We are going through another phase of upgrades again. This time, we have pushed our ladies toilet right to the end of the bar and have created another toilet (which consists of both a urinal and a toilet bowl). We are still considering whether to add another urinal in the new 'ladies' toilet. What do you think?

We are also creating a new alcove where our Viking Bar sign used to be - hence, there would be more space now especially for big groups.

The renovation is quite an exhausting exercise for us. John has to work during the day to 'manage' the workers. Otherwise, we probably end up with something totally different from what we wanted!!

And poor me, have to work during the nights!! Well, the job is taking longer than it is supposed to. Again, what job does not in Thailand! Tomorrow never comes over here!

But no worries, we are still open daily - from 5pm to 2am for business.

In the next post, I hope to be able to show some pictures of the newly renovated Viking Bar - for those of you who are unable to visit us for a period of time.

Songkran in Koh Samui

Songkran is always celebrated with plenty of water. This is the time when you see the young and old enjoying themselves. For the old, it is like a second childhood for them. All kinds of different sizes of water guns are being carried around and no one is safe during the eve or day of Songkran.

In Koh Samui, Songkran starts on the eve of the day. People starts getting ready to splash on others at around 5pm onwards. By the evening, anyone approaching the night areas (like Soi Green Mango) gets thoroughly drenched. However, everyone takes this in good spirits.

Most of the bars in Soi Green Mango have big buckets filled with water and also hoses joined to the taps for constant flow of water. Customers and staffs join together to put up a water fight with anyone who passes by. The scene in Viking Bar is no different.

To protect our computers and music equipment, we had no choice but to close half our shutters. Even then our floors were throughly wet through as some tried to use their water guns in our premise (even though that is typically not allowed).

Well, sufficient to say that we are lucky that none of our equipments were damaged by the water. And everyone had good fun and we all look forward to the next year's Songkran.

New Addition To Our Menu

We have added 4 new drinks to our current list:

a. Our house white wine

b. Glenmorangie Malt Scotch Whisky

c. Martell Cognac

d. Smirnoff Premium Ice

And, we now have peanuts as well for those who wish to have a little tit bit while drinking.

Change of business hours

Our day time staff has decided to 'migrate' to Sweden with her boyfriend. So, she has left us. Unfortunately this leaves us with a blank as to the day time hours.

Hence, effective 6th March this year, we have readjusted our opening times to 6.30pm for now. Two of our night shift staffs excluding the managers takes turns in handling the additional 1.5 hours each day.

How long will this be ? Well, it is very hard to say for now. Guess we have to give it some time to see how well received these opening hours are with customers.

Changing name of the blog

I have decided to change the name of the blog to Viking Bar because the previous title does not reflect what I write in this blog.

Most of the entries are mainly attributed to what happens in Viking Bar, hence, it would be more appropriate to call this blog Viking Bar.

Viking Bar 2nd Anniversary

Happy Birthday to Viking Bar!!!!

We celebrated our 2nd anniversary yesterday. No, we did not have a big party or event to celebrate this day. But what we did do was to have our happy hour extended till 2am for the benefit of all our customers who was with us yesterday.

Cheers to Viking Bar and let's look forward to another exciting year with our customers.

Chinese New Year

February seems to be a month of celebrations. First we had Valentine's Day and then we had Chinese New Year on the 18th of February.

Chinese New Year is celebrated for 15 days. Traditionally, businessman would choose a good day to reopen the office for business. However, since Viking Bar is a pub and caters for all customers all year round, it is impossible for us to close even a single day (unless required by the government of Thailand).

One of the traditions of Chinese New Year is for the owner to given 'ang pow' (known as red packet) to staffs. In a business like Viking Bar, it is also good for the owner to celebrate the joy of Chinese New Year with its customers. Normally, this is done by giving out oranges and 'ang pows'.

So, being Chinese myself, I decided to carry out this tradition this year. On the second day of Chinese New Year, customers were given 2 oranges and an 'ang pow'. In each 'ang pow' was a free drink that the customer can claim from us during that night. I hope the customers enjoyed it as much as I did in sharing my new year with them. Well, at least I knew that all the drinks were claimed...ha ha ha

On the last day of the new year we will be having fireworks. So, if you are around in Samui on March 4th, please do come and celebrate with us. Incidentally, 4th March is also the Full Moon Party day in Koh Phangan.

Gong Xi Fa Chai, Sin Nien Quai Lek, Wan See Ru Yee to all my Chinese readers.

Valentine Day

We celebrated Valentine Day with a difference this year.

On 14th of February, Viking Bar was decorated with roses and balloons. Each lady customer was given a rose on this romantic day. It must have been a great sight and I could see from the pictures that the ladies were very happy. I was also told that our kitchen was full of roses (as per picture above).

I, unfortunately, was stuck in Malaysia and was unable to celebrate Valentine Day with the customers in Viking Bar. So, guess I missed all the fun.

Happy belated Valentine's Day.

David has done it again!!!!

David of Denmark has topped the Men's Shot Competition. Last year, David did an impressive 9.x seconds. But he was overthrown by Federick of Sweden a few months later. Federick's time was 9.10 seconds.

Yesterday, David and three other friends had a go at it again. And this time, David made a record of 7.25 seconds whereas his friend, Kasper, made a record of 8.27 seconds. This makes them both in the first and second position currently and Federick is now moved to the third position.

So, our top two records are held by the Danish and the third place goes to Swedish.

For the girls, our two Thai ladies have been holding the record for almost a year now. No Swedish ladies have beaten the record so far. Mariann of Norway holds the third position currently.

Our shot competition is very popular with both the guys and gals. All the guys need to do is drink 11 different shots in 11 seconds and under. If they beat this record, the drinks are free. If not, they pay 1,100 baht for the drinks. As for the gals, they only need to drink 7 different shots in 7 seconds and the cost is only 700 baht if they do not make it. All participants gets a free Viking T-Shirt worth 350baht. By the way, all shots are 6cl.

The Current Peak in Koh Samui

This year's peak period starts extremely slow. With the New Year parties and Full Moon Party (on 3rd January) held in Koh Phangan, Koh Samui was relatively quiet for at least a week. Then there was a sudden boost of activities for a couple of days before everything died down again.

Suddenly the island resembles more like the low season instead of the peak season. At the same time, it seems the monsoon hit us late this year as it began to rain in mid January. Most of us puzzled at the apparent lack of people around. We know the tourists have not stopped coming to Thailand because we hear that Phuket was fully booked and in fact, over booked.

Yet, looking at Koh Samui, the number of visitors did not resemble the peak of 2006. Now that we we are nearing to the next Full Moon party in another 10 days or so, we suddenly see a surge of visitors that just popped up over the last few days. But the numbers are still way below that of the year 2006.

Well, guess all of us are still waiting for the peak to come.

New addition to our family

We had a new addition to our family in December last year. She is very cute and sweet. Every time we wake up in the morning, she is crying because she is hungry. I have never heard anyone cry like her. She will not stop until she is fed. And she is always hungry. She eats like 4 times a day at least in the beginning. Luckily she is slowing down now - she eats about three times a day.

Oh, did I mention that she is a little cat? Yes, she is an orphan and appeared at our doorsteps in December last year. We were a little apprehensive about keeping her at first because of Ide (our dog). Ide has been with us since June 2005 and she has become quite possesive of us.

Like all single children, it is funny to see how Ide vies for attention each time we pick up Kitty (that's our kitten's name). But they are both now getting used to each other. At times, Ide still growls at Kitty, especially when she tries to be cheeky and puts her claws on Ide's nose. But on the odd occasions, we have caught both of them 'kissing' each other.

Kitty is growing very fast. She is now about 5 months old and is very playful. She tries to play hide and seek with me each time in the garden. She is also teething and likes to bite anything that is within her reach.

When it comes to dinner time, Ide always tries to eat Kitty's food before eating her own. If Ide is not watching, Kitty will eat Ide's food instead of hers. Oh yes, Ide is very good at eating fish. She can clean a fish out so well that it leaves only the bones. Even the head is clean. On the other hand, Kitty needs the meat of the fish to be removed from the bones before she eats it. Now, I am wondering which is the cat and which is the dog!!!!

Happy New Year 2007 and recap on 2006

Dear Readers

We at Viking Bar would like to wish all of you a very happy, prosperous and healthy new year.

Time really flies and it is already my second new year that I am celebrating in Thailand. It seems like yesterday when I just made the decision to shift here with John.

Last year was a very exciting year for us. We kicked off January 1st 2006 very well and was so busy that we did not have much time to even breathe for about 3 months. From January to December, we saw what was the business like during the peak, high and low seasons.

Our customer profiles also change through the different periods. More Scandinavians come during the peak season as this is the winter season back home. But when it came to the high seasons, we saw more of the English and other European nationalities. We even had a few from Luxembourg. In between we had the Australians, Canadians and Americans. We also had customers from the middle east and South Africa. I think almost people from all continents was at the bar one time or another during the full year. Oh yes, we have very few Asians - maybe because very few Asians come to Koh Samui. After all, Samui is an island where you want to relax and do nothing for your holiday. This type of holiday style unfortunately does not suit many Asians who loves shopping, shopping, shopping and cannot just sit and do nothing at the beach....ha ha ha

Like the previous year, we made some improvements to the bar. We added a new 42" plasma LCD TV just before the world cup. We improved our store room, renovated the previous bedroom to be a office upstairs and added a staff toilet. We also separated the men's urinal from the ladies toilet, hence creating 'two' toilets so that queues need not be so long. Unfortunately, this meant that the ladies toilet is now much smaller than before. Well, guess we all need to make some sacrifices sometimes.

Oh yes, in terms of drinks, we introduced a new cocktail called Hurricane after our holiday in New Orleans. This is a great drink and is very strong but tastes deceptively mild. We also introduced a new shot called Bluetooth, named after a famous Viking Warrior. As for snacks, we now have popcorn and bombay mix.

We also extended our bar hours to the early afternoon. Now, we are open from 1pm to 2am and happy hour is now from 1pm to 10.30pm. Our deals for happy hour is the best in this busy street of Soi Green Mango.

We have had some staff change as well. Palla, our youngest staff is still with us but she now works in the afternoon shift. We have new waitresses and bar tenders.

As for our web site, http://www.vikingbar.net/, we launched our online shop to sell some souvenirs for our readers, customers and visitors. We also launched our Viking Blog (what you are reading now) and hope to share our experiences with our readers.

The monsoon that was to appear in end November did not arrive. We were all prepared for the worst after experiencing the monsoon in the year 2005. But to our surprise, all we had was a couple of days (only a few hours each time) raining and sunshine all the way. Of course, there were continuous false alarm of thunderstorms and heavy rains but after the experience of 2005, everything seems very mild.

2006 was also the year of the military coup in Thailand. Again, the only effect visibly seen was the reduction of tourism. It was and still is very peaceful here (despite the recent bombings in Bangkok on New Year's eve).

Well, that's a quick recap of what happened last year.

Once again, happy new year to all of you out there.