Hot and hounded in Bangkok
Trip Start
May 03, 2008
1
2
47
Trip End
May 02, 2009
Bangkok,
Bangkok,
Thailand
Thursday, May 8, 2008
On our first full day we saw the tourist sites of the Grand palace and the Wat Pho temple. Don't think I've ever seen so much gold, ornate would be the tip of the iceberg. The palace is filled with buildings full of intricate design and again lots and lots of gold design. Didn't get to see the king though as he moved out some years ago obviously was tired, wanted a change in decor, after all what can you do with gold home decorating-wise.
After we walked a few streets to the temple Wat Pho which contains a reclining GOLD 50m Buddha lying on his side, don't know how they managed to get it the building to be honest.
Grand Palace
There were a few other hundred gold Buddhas around the place but not of the same stature, you know what they say, seen one giant Buddha, seen them all..
Everywhere you walk in Bangkok you constantly get asked for tuk tuks or taxi's. Makes a change from Dublin that's for sure. Becomes a bit of a pain after awhile though as you just get a little tired of them especially when they tell you whichever attraction you're heading to is closed, so far I've found them all suspiciously open each time....
Yesterday we took a tour to Kanchanaburi to see the river Kwai famous from the film "Bridge over the River Kwai". We visited a war cemetery with thousands of an allied solders headstones who died after being forced to build the railway. After we walked along the new bridge, the famous old one having been blown up in 1945 though no one seemed to mind however, lots of tourists walking up and down the three planks that cross with no barriers, safety precautions are bit circumspect sometimes around here... We traveled down the road and jumped on a train which crossed over the bridge but to be honest you couldn't really see much.
After lunch we went to an elephant farm and rode an elephant. Not sure I completely agree with it, the animals didn't look like they were in too bad condition and most of the directions the elephant took was from Thai commands. At one point we were about to go down this steep hill and obviously the elephant didn't really fancy it as it let out huge roar (or trumpet whatever sound they make) took some persuading from his handler in the end. We then took a bamboo raft down the river and one of the guys decided he wanted to swim in it (mad eijit), wouldn't get me near it. Visited a nice little waterfall on the way back as well.
Last day here in Bangkok before we head out tonight on a 13 hour bus ride to Vientiane in Laos, the fun of it...
