Thailand
Trip Start
May 03, 2008
1
2
44
Trip End
May 02, 2009
Bangkok,
Bangkok,
Thailand
Thursday, May 8, 2008
We got some nice food that night in a small restaurant down a side street (or "Soi") that night and went to sleep off the jet lag.
The next day was sight seeing day!! First on the list was the Grand Palace
Grand Palace, Bangkok
. As we made our way there we were stopped by a "teacher" who informed us that it was closed for the day along with the other places we were going to. He showed us on the map some other places we could go see that were a bit further away - we would need transport of some variety! We weren't surprised when a Tuk-Tuk driver appeared at that moment (for anyone who doesn't know what one of these is, it's a sort of motorised cart!). Once we got away we went to the palcae which was indeed open as we suspected!The Grand Palace itself was beautiful. There was gold on and in almost every building there. It's an impressive sight to see gold lined rooftops side by side. Insie the different temples were also golden treasure troves. Golden Buddah's and golden detail on the walls. Basically there's a lot of gold!
Everyone has to remove their shoes before entering the temples and proper attire must be worn at all times - shoulders and legs covered.
Next port of call was Wat Pho which is a temple that contains a reclining Buddah. Obviously made out of gold in case you were wondering! He's a massive 50 metres long....
At this point the heatand humidity started to get to my cold blooded Irish self so I started to feel weak and dehydrated. I sent Simon off post haste to get a bottle of water for me - I fended off the Tuk Tuk drivers while I waited! After that we walked around in a few circles before we found the port we were looking for to get accross the river to Wat Arun. We eventually found it and decided to have a late lunch in the restaurant there
Grand Palace, Bangkok
. It was nothing spectacular but was cheap so can't complain.We got the boat anyway but to be honest, after the previous sights, Wat Arun was a bit disappointing. There wasn't a bit of gold to be seen! Just steep steps and an average view. We quickly left and walked back up to our accomodation which I was thankful for as I was wrecked! Simon was a bit under the weather so we didn't go out that night.
Day 2 was a lazy day. We were both tired because we weren't sleeping at night and being tired at weird times of the day so we just took it easy and wandered around the stalls in the area and samples the food.
The next day we were off on a day trip to Kanchanaburri which is about 80km North-West of Bangkok. We went to the cemetary dedicated to WW2 soldiers in Kanchanaburri town. It was sad to see so many gravestones from many different nations. After this we went to the Jeath War & WW2 museum. The place was basically full of old weapons! There was even a rusty old bomb thrown in for good measure. This was also the original site for the bridge over the river Kwai, which was blown up towards the end of the war. It has a good view of the re-built bridge which we went to see next.
The bridge was cool. We walked all the wat accross it taking various foto's along the way. We hit a slight snag on the way back as there was an oncoming train heading our way!! Luckily there are various standing stations dotted along the way for such circumstances and the train doesn't move that fast anyway
Grand Palace, Bangkok
! Once we were safely back in our minibus we went to the next station to get on the train (as I said, they don't move that fast!). This was to bring us past some scenic views but I must have missed them....We stopped for lunch in a nice middle of nowhere place and got rice with various sharing dishes that were really nice. Fully fortified, we headed for the elephant camp. It was a bit weird climbing on an elephant's back but he didn't seem to mind. This followed with a very bumpy ride around the camp on a most uncomfortable seat - I guess the Kings and Queens got a few more cushions than we did). It was fairly slow moving as you might imagine but we came to a stop when it came to going down a very steep hill. The elephant didn't seem to fancy it (I've decided not to take it personally....) and he trumpeted away for a few minutes before being coaxed down by his driver.
We then took a bamboo raft down the mountain river to a waterfall. Some weirdo decided it might be nice to go for a swim in the river. Each to his own but I was staying well out of that river - it looked more than a bit dirty. That was it then, we faced the long and bumpy journey back. We had a really nice dinner that night in Ranees. The Massaman curry was divine.
The next day we had to check out at 12 which we just about made! Our bus to the next destination of Vientaine in Laos wasn't until 7pm so just a lazy day around Bangkok for us.
