Wailea residents Duffy and Sharon Deardeuff were to wrap up a 16-day cruise trip to Asia with a two-day stay in Bangkok, Thailand, seeing the country's glittering temples, its floating markets and other sights.

Then, before they were scheduled to leave Wednesday, their tour guide called with some bad news: Protesters had closed the airport. And the Deardeuffs' dream vacation became a nightmare, as they worked for more than three days to figure out how to escape from a country that could be headed for a civil war, The Maui News reported today.

Anti-government protesters of the People's Alliance for Democracy shut down Bangkok's main Suvarnabhumi Airport on Nov. 25 and the older Don Muang airport Wednesday, bent on overthrowing Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat's alleged puppet administration, according to news accounts.

"The worst thing was the days of not knowing anything," said Sharon Deardeuff, 68, a retired real estate agent. "You had no control. You didn't know what was going to happen."

Duffy Deardeuff, a 68-year-old retired sales manager for AT&T in Seattle, said it was difficult to get news about what was happening at the airport since local news reports were not translated into English. But there were local newspapers in English, and the couple also was able to get information via the Internet and by calling a son in Seattle.

Americans were not targeted by protesters. "We were never threatened," he said, but the country obviously was in turmoil.

It took more than three days with the Deardeuffs staying at the Century Park Hotel to work out a plan with their local tour guide, Peter, a 42-year-old father of two teenage daughters, to obtain a rental car for the guide to drive them south to Phuket, a Thai resort area with an airport.

"He was fantastic," Sharon Deardeuff said gratefully. "If it weren't for him, we wouldn't be out of there today."

Although the Deardeuffs are seasoned travelers, "this is the worst experience we've ever had," she said.

Duffy Deardeuff said that while he and his wife were supposed to leave Bangkok on Wednesday, they didn't begin an 11-hour drive to Phuket until noon Sunday. Protesters made it clear they weren't going to leave the Bangkok airport, and the Deardeuffs needed to find another way out. Their eventual escape route cost them $1,000, he said, which under the circumstances, "we think that was a good deal."

"If we didn't escape in the next few days, we had no idea how long it would be," he said. "We determined our best way to escape from this fiasco was to rent a car and go to Phuket."

The couple's tour guide arranged for them to get a 3 a.m. Korean Airlines flight out of Phuket. It would take them to Seoul and then to Honolulu before finally catching an interisland flight back home to Maui.

The tour guide finally was able to rent a car from a friend, and he drove them to Phuket, with much of the journey over poorly maintained country roads in the dark.

"We drove six hours on a freeway," Duffy Deardeuff said. "Then, we went onto a two-lane road for another five hours. We stopped three times for gas and water only."

The couple ate potato chips and drank water during the long car ride.

"We wanted to put Bangkok behind us and get to that airport" in Phuket, he said. "It wasn't scary until we left the freeway. Then, it was dark and raining. You had no idea where you're going."

The ride itself was "very uncomfortable . . . very curvy and winding in the dark and rain," he said.

Sharon Deardeuff said the couple had faith in their tour guide.

"It was putting our lives in the hands of a young man that's 42 years old," she said. "He's younger than our kids.

. . . We did trust him."

It was a relief for the couple to arrive finally at the Phuket airport, where they waited two hours in line with thousands of other stranded travelers to check in for their flight. Then, there was another two-hour wait for the flight to Seoul.

Duffy Deardeuff said he understood there were as many as 200,000 to 300,000 stranded foreigners in Thailand. The closure of Bangkok's airports has crippled the country, he said.

"Nothing's coming into the country. Nothing's leaving the country," he said, describing the Bangkok airport as a transportation hub for the country and the region. Bangkok residents who rely on tourism for their livelihood expect they'll soon be unemployed, he said.

"They'll be financially impacted for a long time," he said.

The Deardeuffs arrived in Honolulu at 9 a.m. Monday and were hugging friends at Kahului Airport about two hours later.

"We feel so fortunate to escape there," Duffy Deardeuff said. "Other people have no idea when they will get out."

Sharon Deardeuff said she and her husband have had enough of foreign trips for a while, but they'll have an adventure to share with their children and grandchildren when they travel to Washington state for Christmas.

"Someday, we'll be laughing about this, I hope," she said.

For more Maui news, visit www.mauinews.com.