My husband and I decided to go to the Fanatasea show while we were staying in Patong. We organised it through a guy who had taken us on a tour of the island. He collect us from our hotel in his mini bus and drove us to the venue, he collected our tickets when we arrived and brought them to us. We paid the extra for the buffett 'banquet' and also for the gold seats - more on that in a bit.

Anyways the enterance to this place is very grand with lots of photo opportunities, but just watch out if you want you picture taken with a staff member in costume they do expect to be paid for this, not sure how much because I wasnt paying anyone for a photo! there is a huge lake area full of koi fish and you can buy some fish food for about 50p to feed them and my goodness its a sight to see the whole area in front of you just fills up with fish its immense!
Once you go through into the main area there are lots of little shops and stalls and games for the kids. They recommend coming an hour before dinner is served to gain the benefits of the fun atmosphere and things to do but honestly I wouldnt recommend this as theres not really that much to do. The games are all carnival style and you buy tickets to be able to play - not that expensive which is good but the only thing you win is cuddly toys - the games are quite easy as well (but thenI suppose they are mostly for kids lol) I think we ended up with 6 cuddly toys of various sizes haha....You can play darts to pop balloons, try and get a high score playing darts...only the dart board is constantly spinning, there grab a duck, knock down the cans, bowl balls into holes, etc so all good family fun.

There are many many shops but they seem to have a lot of the same stuff, lots of elephant ornaments and whatnot but that is to be expected as you are in Thailand afterall! The prices in some of the shops were laughable when you know you can get the stuff on the street for a fraction of the price. There were some prertty cool stalls like the guy who made the sand candles, it was mesmerizing watching him make his creations...you could get charm bracelets, pictures, handmade jewellery and beautiful masks (like what you would wear to a masquerade ball) though again some of the price were extortionate. There are also a few eating places/restaurants in this area so even if you havent gone for the buffett option on your ticket you could still grab a bite to eat (not sure of prices).
There is also a little stage in the middle of all this where a mini show took place at 7.45pm this is defo aimed at the kids as it was some tenny boppers singing and dancing, we watched the first song got bored and dandered off but there was a huge crowd of kids gathered round enjoying the show (even if the singing was in Thai lol)

once you are past the majority of shops, etc there is a HUGE castle type building which is obsiouvly where the main show takes place. In front of this theres a beautful fountain with elephants walking round it in circles and yes you can pay to ride the elephants here, I think it was roughly a tenner to ride the elephant but t his was not person, this was per elephant as you culd fit 2 or 3 people on one depending on the size of the person, we didn't do this but all the kids seemed to enjoy it.
Facing the main building it another huge and elaborate building which turned out to be the dinner hall. It was very OTT with the decorations and everything but it was massive. We had no idea where we were going but thankfully when you arrived at the main games they stick a sticker on your with deat number/table for dinner and also for the show, this was helpful and someone pointed us in the right direction. I have to say this wasnt even organised chaos this was just chaos...no one seems to know how to queue or be patient whatsoever! We managed to find the starters eventually and by the time we got to our table it was cold chicken tepenyaki yuk!! oh another thing only water is free even though we paid extra we still had to buy pepsi!! anyways we left the starters and went to the looooong queue for food, there was a good seletion of Thai and european/western food and we took a little bit of everything. What can I say I was greatly dissappointed....the food was either cold, too fishy or just not nice....the nicest thing I had were the deep friend chicken drumsticks and im not a big fan of chicken drumsticks, I am not a fussy eater - I mean I dont like fish but I still tried the fish dishes and one of them wasnt too bad nice and meaty but the majority of this food was just school canteen style rubbish and didnt do it for us at all, we were still hungry after and dessert left a lot to be desired as well, 'fresh' fruit pieces and lots of little 'cakes' The only thing I found nice here were the mini raspberry swiss rolls but they went in a shot so Inever got any more as they were very slow in replenishing the foodstuff. So basically I would not recommend having your dinner here, have a big cheap feed in Phuket somewhere before coming you won't regret that decision!

After dinner we went over the the main building and had to queue for quite a while until it opened. We went inside and there were various queues again with the usual people trying to bunk their way up to the front but thats the same no matter where you go in the world. Bags are meant to be checked on your way through but there was no security working the booths so everyone went on in....once through you have to despoit you phones/cameras/recording devices as you are not allowed them into the main show (im guessing in case the flash maybe distracts the animals?) This isnt as bad as it sounds and is very organised, you go to a booth hand over your goods and they seal them in a velvet bag and give you a tag corresponsing to the pigeon hole in the wall that they put it in.
We then entered the show room and headed to our seats....wow its massive in this place and as we had paid for gold seats we were right in the middle front section. Finally everyone got settled and the show started and of course there was the most annoying family ever in front of us, don't get me wrong im not against people with kids or anything but who on earth takes a couple of months old baby to a show with loud music, pyrotechnics and whatnot and expects it to sleep? Anyways the woman was constantly rocking in her chair trying to get the baby to sleep and it eventually was sick on her, lovely then the next thing their other child (maybe 5 years old) starting screaming and cryign and covering his ears as he was afraid my goodness they kept takig his hands of his ears and shouting at him and needless to say my husband and myself and the rest of the auidence around them were getting very peeved off and starting complaining etc until the father finally left with the son.....the woman however remained where she was with the constant rocking trying to get her baby to sleep...could she be any more stupid....the rocking got so much I had to push the back of her chair to make her realise its not fun for thepeople behind her and she eventually stopped. Would defo not pay extra for these again ever!

So the show had started and another reason I wouldnt pay extra for the gold seat is because all the elephants and people started comingout from the sides and over at the 'regular seats' we had to crane our necks to see anything boo and when they starting taking people from the auidence for some fun they were of course also taken from seats along the edge, etc so we paid extra for no reason it seems.
The show was a brilliant display of dancing/acting/magic etc and was very well done it was in Thai and in English so everyone could understand though you didnt even need any talking as it was obvious what was happening. There was girly dances, martial art style dances, tribal dances, acrobats, magic acts and everything with pyrotechnics, super loud music, shadow shows, everything you could think of and then there were the fab animals (no only elephants might I add but I wont spoil it). I was worried about coming to this show as I hate the circus because I feel sorry for the poor animals but I have to say these animals were all clean and tidy and well looked after and fed, you could see the love for them from their handlers, especially the elephants everytime they did something the people 'riding' them gave them a hug or petted them them it was lovely :)

My husband and I thoroughly enjoyed the show, which is suprising as my husband isnt usually one to like to sit through musicals and whatnot but there is so much going on around you that there really is something for the whole family, plus the animals are perfect at what they have been trained to do, anyone who doesnt like it must be looking in the wrong direction lol.
After the show they drop ballons and stuff which is nice and there really is enough for everyone think I eneded up with 3 though I have no idea why I took them just to bring to the hotel with me haha. Anyways we managed to get out before the crowds as our seats were easy enough to leave (back row of front section so we climbed over them hehe) I went and waited at the exit and my husband got our cameras, etc. This took only a few mintes and then we were off and out of there, we walked back past the shops to the enterance where our driver was patiently waiting for us in the exact spot he said he would be and he took us back to our hotel.

This is a great night out for couples or families it doesnt matter what age you are (so long as your not a baby of a few months haha) you will have fun, even the most grumpiest/boring people would enjoy themselves as the Thai people just have a way of making you smile and feel at ease!
I can't provide pictures of the show as your not allowed to take any!

(also on ciao)