Ok I will give you MY opinion, forget Pattaya its a sleazy dump.
I made the mistake of spending 7 days here last Christmas. I would suggest hitting Bangkok and do a 2 or 3 day side trip and see if its your sort of place as lots of people on here like it there so its a personal thing.
A taxi cost around 1500 Baht each way (I sure you can get it cheaper) or there are Mini vans that go from Victory monument for around 150 baht (I am not certain on this cost) but do bear in mind that the protesters are set up around here so might not be an option unless they have moved, a quick check on google will tell you what you need to know about this
All hotels in Pattaya are girl friendly but book for 2 people as some will charge extra if you bring a girl back. Search the web as I found a site somewhere that listed what hotel allowed guests with out additional costs
I suggest you ignore mrfasts comment regarding it being a bad time to visit Thailand I was there for 8 days (the whole first week of the protests) and it was great, never saw more than 3 protesters walking at one time. The streets were quiet but the bars & Nana plaza was business as usual. I got 4 star hotel 500m from my permanent home in Bangkok (Nana Plaza) for HK$360 including breakfast, Bar girls long time for HK$670 MSOG, Heineken HK$20 during the day and HK$30 at night.
I was also there during protest the year before and it was the same, I am heading to Hong Kong & Shenzhen again in May and I am going via Bangkok this time and will spend a couple of weeks there.
regarding changing currency I can only help in Bangkok, go to Vazu (think that's its name) under the Nana station, best exchange rates ever, every time I change money you always get .2 to .3 more does not sound like much but if you are changing a couple of 000 it does add up | |
