Bangkok Day 2

After spending the day away from Khao San Rd. (I’ve seen it spelled both ways now, so I’m just going to use both ways), I’ve decided that some of last post was a little unfair. If I’d done a better job researching Bangkok I would have found out that public toilets are few and far between and they are rarely ever free. Knowing this ahead of time would have helped advert some of the distress I felt yesterday.

Also, after spending most of the day at the Grand Palace I’ve come to conclusion that there are vendors everywhere. I suppose that is to be expected. It is, after all, a very large tourist city.

I think part of my dismay yesterday had to do with the fact that I was exhausted. I have a tendency to be more negative than usual when I’m tired.

Now, that I’ve cleared that up, I’d like to share our day with you.

We are still having problems adjusting to the time difference. We went to bed at about 9pm last night and we were both up at 4:30am, but we were both awake on and off after 1am. So, we got an early start on the day. We got up, got ready and did some admin type things. Then we headed up to the internet café on the roof, which we only discovered last night, and tried to get touch with some of our family. Since it was early in the morning here, that meant it was early in the evening there. After that we got some breakfast and headed to the Grand Palace.

The Grand Palace was amazing. It was where the King and Queen used to reside. The grounds are quite expansive and there are several different buildings. All the buildings are extremely ornate with gold and gems covering about every inch. It is considered a sacred place so you must be dressed in cloths that cover your body. We were not so we had to borrow proper attire from the Grand Palace. I was wearing shorts and tank top and Neils was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. I had to wear a long skirt and button up short sleeved shirt over my clothes and Neils had to wear pants over his shorts. We were prepared for that so it wasn’t a big deal. Unfortunately though, it was another super hot and humid day and the extra layer didn’t help much. 

The Palace is a wealth of history. We didn’t hire a tour guide, because it’s just so hard to decipher who can and can’t trust around here. Looking back though, I wish we would have spent the money and gotten the story behind all the cool stuff that we saw. Oh well, perhaps another time. We are probably going to be in the area again.

Seeing the Palace and grounds took us most of the morning. After the palace we strolled down to the Chao Phraya River. Along the way, we were again accosted by vendors. I’m constantly surprised at how persistent they are. We stopped once at one of the market areas and tried a mangosteen and lichee. Both were delicious, however the mangosteen was our favorite of the two.

We hadn’t had lunch yet. We also had decided that at some point we wanted to tour the canals. So, as we walked we looked for both opportunities. We made it all the way down to the pier without deciding on a place to eat, not that there weren’t opportunities, because there were several. As usual, we were just really indecisive. Once at the pier, the vendors for the boat rides were relentless. We finally just walked out of the pier area so they would leave us alone. They were selling boat rides for anywhere between 800-1000 baht per person. This seemed like too much so we weren’t too eager. So we walked away and finally found a place for lunch. We put in our order and while we waited for our food we noticed a guy sitting by himself, so we asked him to join us. His name is Aymeric and he is originally from France, but is currently living and working China. He had just come from the Grand Palace as well and was hoping to also see take a boat tour.

As we sat waiting for our food we noticed a sign that said something about not trusting people who try to sell you boat tickets. If you wanted tickets you were to inquire at the information desk. When we finished our lunch, which by the way was fantastic, we went to the information desk. There we bought boat tickets for a one hour canal tour for 300 baht. Good thing we trusted our instincts and didn’t go with the incredibly over priced tickets!

The canal tour was well worth it. We didn’t see many actual sites, but we got to see a lot of canal houses. The temp on the canal was much cooler than on the pier and it was a very relaxing refreshing hour. It was also surprising that canal housing can be tiny wooden shanties that look as though they might topple with the slightest wave right next door to large expensive looking houses.  It didn’t seem as though there was a rich part of the canal and a poor part, they were intertwined.

After the boat ride, we wandered around a bit until the heat and our lack of sleep got the better of us. We headed back to our hotel and took a nap. We tried to keep it to only one hour, so that we could force ourselves to sleep through the night. In the end, the nap was two hours and we were both still tired when we finally forced ourselves up.

After the nap, we checked in with the internet café again and then headed out for dinner. Neils booked our train to Nakhon Si Tammarat, as we have been talking to a few people there about jobs. We were hoping to leave on Friday, but there were no air conditioned cars Thursday or Friday. This is an overnight train ride, so it’s long enough where not having air conditioning would be incredibly uncomfortable. So, we are headed south to meet up with our friend Martin Saturday night. We will arrive at about 9:30am Sunday morning.

After our train tickets were booked, we headed out to find dinner and a new guest house. While ours is nice, we are both certain we are paying too much. We took the advice of a few friends and wandered away from Khao San Rd. Most everything was booked, but we did find something that I think we will like for a better price. We couldn’t see any of the rooms tonight, but we intend to head back over there tomorrow morning and check one out. It has a large area of Wi-Fi, so I’m hoping to be able to actually post some pictures on Facebook. We also found a good spot for dinner and got foot massages on the way back.

All in all, today was a much better day. As I said, I think my exhaustion was playing a part in my negativity and also I think some adjustment to my expectations is in order. After all, I’m not in America anymore and can’t really expect to hold everything to American standards. There’s a reason why we embarked on this journey and it wasn’t so we could see and do a bunch of the same stuff we saw and did back home.

And now, it’s about 10:30pm here. I’m exhausted and hoping to be able to sleep through the night. Neils isn’t even waiting for me to finish typing this. He’s lying in bed with a pillow over his eyes. Good night!