In locations across Thailand, tourists and local residents marked the Chinese Lunar New Year with colourful celebrations. Ceremonies, cultural shows and celebrations to mark the onset of the Year of the Monkey will carry on today in Chinatown areas in the country such as the Yaowarat District of Bangkok.
The northern Laos town of Thakhek is getting ready to hold a key annual festival. The Sikhottabong Stupa Festival is staged on the full moon night of the old lunar calendar and has been held at Sikhottabong Temple every year since the 1560s.
Strong winds and waves have been causing problems for tourists in Thailand’s far south. Waves estimated at three-metres high swamped a long-tail boat with six Chinese nationals on it yesterday in the Andaman Sea coast’s Noparat Thara-Phi Phi National Park.
This week saw the inauguration of a cable-car route to the summit of northern Vietnam’s Fansipan Mountain. The trip to the top of the 3,143-metre-high mountain now takes 15 minutes. Until the launch of the cable-car service, the ascent involved a two-day trek which was extremely popular with intrepid Vietnamese and international tourists.
The annual book fair at Chiang Mai University started on Tuesday and will run through until next Wednesday. Although the focus of the fair is on Thai language books, there are always plenty of new and second-hand books in English as well as selected other languages such as German and Chinese.
A spokesperson for provincial authorities in the Thai town of Nan has released the dates and details of this year’s annual culture and craft fair. The venue is the plaza outside (Wat) Phumin Temple and it will run between 12 and 16 February 2016.
Chiang Mai’s eagerly anticipated flower festival is set to begin with an official launch ceremony tomorrow evening. City officials will attend the ceremony at Buak Haad Park at 17:00.
The streets of Phuket Town’s historic Chinatown precinct were lit up by traditional lanterns yesterday to pave the way for the Lunar New Year this weekend. The red lanterns were lit on the facades of the district’s old colonial houses as far as Wichit Municipal Office.
The Treasury Bureau of Thailand has announced it will issue a trio of commemorative coins in homage to King Bhumibol. The coins will be available in three denominations and available in silver and gold.
Singapore’s Chinese heritage centre reopened late last week after receiving a major revamp. The process of renovating and updating the exhibits and displays at the Chinatown memorabilia museum at 48 Pagoda Street began in late 2014.
Next week sees the start of the very first Thailand International Yacht Festival at one of Phuket Island’s top marinas. The yacht festival is due to begin on the 8 February 2016 at the Ao Po Grand Marina and will run through until 14 February.
One-time Guns N’ Roses guitar maestro Bumblefoot is set to kick off a series of gigs at select venues in the Kingdom of Thailand this Friday. The guitarist, whose real name is Ron Blumenthal, is set to take to the stage at The Papa Rock Bar in the northern city of Chiang Mai on Friday evening.
The northern Thai province of Chiang Rai is the venue for an international balloon jamboree next week. The 2016 Chiang Rai Balloon Fiesta kicks off on Wednesday 10 February and will culminate in a cultural extravaganza on Valentine’s Day.
The Thai government says it will offer investors the chance of participating in a new rail line linking Bangkok and the eastern seaboard. Finance-minister Apisak Tantiworong told reporters that the high speed rail line to Pattaya and Rayong would probably be offered as a Public-Private Partnership (PPP).
A boutique hotel in the Cambodian town of Siem Reap has been named the second best in the world by the TripAdvisor community. The Shinta Mani Resort snapped up second place in the 2016 Travellers’ Choice Awards and was pipped to the post by a maharaja’s palace in India.
Chiang Mai’s annual Strawberry Festival is once again scheduled to take place in the district of Samoeng. The 15th in the series is being staged on the grounds of the local council office between 11 and 14 February.
Authorities on the eastern Thai island of Koh Chang are preparing to launch a Thai culture festival. The venue for the Sea, Sand and Song Festival is the island’s Sai Khao Beach. The fest will run for three days between 5 and 7 February 2016.
Heavy storms caused havoc along the lower half of the Gulf of Thailand coastline yesterday. Deluges of rainfall, gale-force winds and waves averaging three meters in height caused the evacuation of some coastal districts and the cancellation of ferries to and from offshore holiday islands.
The Thai travel agents’ association has responded to a proposal to charge tourists entry fees to enter Thailand by claiming it has not been thought through properly. In an interview aired on national television last week, Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) governor Yuthasak Supasorn said all tourists should be required to pay a nominal fee upon entry.
The director of Ayutthaya’s road and motorway division has confirmed the region will have a brand new designated cycleway by next year. Jiraphong Pinthabute stated the cycle path will run down from the Chao Phraya River dam in the province of Chai Nat to the Rangsit campus of Thammasat University in northern Bangkok.