didibobi

My friends and I are renting a house on a small island in Thailand and would like to take some wine with us. I understand it's very expensive there.
Has anyone out there taken anything with them and if so how much is one legally aloud to take. We were planning to take two bottles each in our check-in luggage.
How strict are the Thai customs officials?
Any help greatly appreciated.

JamesA

I pay about USD 16 for a bottle of Hardy's Australian wine for something special, otherwise I pay USD 9 for a 2 litre bottle of quite acceptable Italian wine. Whether you can get wine on the island you are staying depends which one it is.

rhkkmk

when people talk about the high cost of wines in thailand they are usually referring to the hotel/restaurant cost where i find it outrageous to buy anything but a glass and usually we just have beer....

i would find the availability of decent wine in remote locations practically non existent....also i would be concerned about how it had been handled in the heat...for this reason i would buy in bkk and transport myself....ask you hotel or house rental agent about availability

laurieco

I would not put bottles of wine in your checked luggage. There is a good chance they will break and you will have wine and glass all over everything! Carry them on. I believe the customs regulations allow for one litre per person of wine or spirits. When you fly into BKK, customs consists of green lines (nothing to declare) and red lines (something to declare) We've always just walked right through the green line and nobody has ever stopped us or looked in anything. In fact, I can't recall anyone ever even being there.

JamesA

I am not a big wine person so I don't know prices elsewhere realy, but I don't find B 365 for 2 litres expensive at all when you pay anything from B 120-180 for a 'glass' of house wine in a restaurant, the restaurants mark up the wine about 50%, I know the prices, so if I'm in a restaurant and they want B900($22.50) for a decent Australian wine I don't think it's too bad as it's about $16 in the shop.
I guess restaurant mark-ups can be high elsewhere. Paul Masson is about $16 a bottle too.

Cicerone

I could not find anything on the website for the Thai embassy in the US on this, but you might want to take a look at http://www.thaiembdc.org/index.htm. A commercial website I found said that one litre could be brought in duty free. (A litre is about a quart, i.e., one bottle.) Take a look at http://www.discoverythailand.com/Cus...egulations.asp. The site also said the regulations were strictly enforced. I will say that in more than 3 dozen trips to Thailand, I have never been stopped at customs nor had my baggage inspected, so I don’t know how strict they really are.

I agree that you should not pack bottles in your checked luggage. However, if you are carrying a bag which obviously contains bottles when going through customs, you may be more likely to be stopped, so if you can put them in a laptop case or other less-obvious carrier bag, this might help.

Hanuman

FYI, one regular bottle of wine = 750ml. 2 bottles = 1.5 litre.

I bring back "special" wines(like Petrus, Le Pin, Opus1 etc) with me when I travel abroad. You can risk going through the "nothing to declare" line or you can fez up and pay the duty(minimal for non vintage wine but quite expensive for the good stuff).

If you like good wines and don't mind paying about 15 - 20% higher, wine shop USA prices Vs. wine shop Bangkok, then you can buy the wines in Thailand as James said. On top of "Villa" supermarket, corner of Sukhumvit Soi 33, has a good selection of well kept wines. Supermarket often don't look after their wines well so I would stick to the good wine shops.

kuranosuke

hanuman; opus 1, i am impressed. can i get that at villa?

Hanuman

Kuranosuke,

I buy them from 20/20 in LA for about $250 a bottle and they are sometime available in Thailand for about $350 - $500. I'll have to check with the wine shop at Villa if they're available right now but I highly recommend that you buy this wine from the USA, preferably through an auction house at either Christies or Sotheby's - much cheaper, even as low as $100 - $150 per bottle.

kuranosuke

hanuman; i knew you had good taste. i think i will try my luck at villa, and perhaps pickup a good bottle of oz chard, and new zealand pinot noir(i understand its very good) thanks for the info.

JamesA

ttt for Kywood