Great green guavas

Fri 04 Mar

Our hotel has an amazing breakfast, another big plus of this place. Cold and hot buffet, fresh fruit and juices, and a chef on hand for customised eggy stuff. Delish!

We took the SkyTrain (picture the DLR, but bigger, faster and cleaner) to Saphin Taksin station near the river, then took a river ferry (mad mad mad but fun; you just get on this long, quite narrow bus-boat, then this shouty woman comes down the centre aisle screeching out in Thai, then people furiously digging for the right amount of change - don't dare try to break a big note, that would result in being thrown overboard, no doubt) to the Tha Thien station to visit the Grand Palace. Disembarking the express ferry we fought our way through a market selling tat and dried fishy stuff (pongy) and other street food. Then walked past more street market stalls selling tourist stuff, bottles of coke, 'antique' coins, buddhas, machetes (seriously!) and loads of other stuff.

The Grand Palace complex includes the palace where the King is coronated, does official stuff, and also the marvelous temple of the Emerald Buddha. To enter this temple, modest clothing is required. Fortunately La was in long combats and I had brought jeans along with me, else we both would have had to queue (with all the tourists in string vests and tank tops) to rent sarongs and/or long thin trousers (harem pants). The fun never ends. Strangely 'innappropriate clothing' seems to mainly mean mini-skirts and shorts as we still saw loads of tank tops and other beach/nightclub type top halves.

The temple itself and grounds were magnificent! The Emerald Buddha is also beautiful, but tiny (about 50cm high) and placed on top of a high chair on a parapet inside the temple. And dressed in one of 4 seasonal gold chainmail, or similar, outfits. No photographs allowed so you'll have to take my word for it. Our entrance tickets also got us into a museum of Royal coins and swords and photos of Royal births and weddings.

After a light lunch (nothing worth writing about) we went into another temple, this one of the "Reclining Buddha". Not only was this statue reclining, but it was huge - about 45m long. You sort of enter the temple near the Buddha's head, then wander down to his feet, then round again to the back of his reclining self. Pretty impressive. This temple complex was also beautiful, with other smaller temples, loads of Buddhas everywhere we looked and also loads of stray kitties wandering around looking miserable. On the way out we bought sort of freshly squeezed orange juice then took the crazy river taxi thing and Sky Train back to the hotel.

After a quick shower and relax, we headed for our first massage of the trip. Awesome little spa near our hotel, quite a quality establishment compared to some of the places we had avoided in the streets. And even this place was ridiculously cheap, around £7 each for an hour Thai massage. Much pain, but the sort of 'cleansing' pain, then more relaxing. And they even washed our feet before hand. That sort of made up for the way they laughed at me when I cried out in pain during the massage.

For supper we got lost. Or should I say, I got us lost. We headed off in what I decided was the right direction, then after not finding the restaurant, stopped in a posh hotel for directions, and eventually got there. My poor wife's clean feet and massaged back were almost undone.

Eventually we got there and had a great meal but oh so spicy. Yum. Pre-starter was a collection of titbits like chopped lime skin, ginger, fresh chilli and peanuts all self-parceled and swallowed in some sort of leaf with satay sauce. La then had some very agreeable spring rolls while I had a spicy green papaya and carrot salad. Very spicy. La had a green curry and I had chilli and Thai Basil chicken. Delish. And to always ensure fresh rice, they walked round with a big bowl pretty much constantly and dished out to plates of all tables as required. Genius. Surprisingly, I was able to still manage my new favourite dessert of fresh mango slices with sticky rice and coconut ice cream. Hmm.

After supper we did not get lost and wandered back to the hotel (took about 10 minutes!), and did a brief detour of an alley that was crammed full of bars and places offering all sorts of combined exotic dancing and sporting activities like ping pong. Curious, that :)

Day 49

Sat 05 Mar

After two nights in Bangkok, the world was our mollusc! Another great breakfast; I had an omellete with the works, and pancakes. Then we packed our bags and checked out and left our bags in the hotel storage. We had a midnight flight so would spend the whole day touring the city again. We planned to sneak into the hotel gym when we picked up our bags and use the showers there. Cunning, we were. But as we left the hotel, the ever-efficient staff offered the gym showers to us. Well, same result but no stress, so excellent!

Took the SkyTrain to the National Stadium stop, then a short walk to Jim Thomson House, the former home of American Jim Thomson who almost single-handledly rejuvenated the Thai silk import/export business in the 1950s-1960s. He settled in Bangkok and constructed a wonderful home by buying traditional Thai wooden houses from the country and transplanting them into a single, linked complex. And filled them with Eastern ceramic work and art. A few years after his mysterious disappearance in Malaysia , his home was turned into a museum.

From there we took a taxi (no seatbelts, but blessed cool air conditioning) to the Khao San Road for a bit of a wander and gawked along with all the other tourists and backpackers at the alleyways and market stalls of tourist tat, fake driver's licences etc. Had a very reasonable lunch (best veggie Pad Thai in the world apparently) then bought a few souvenir gifts.

Another taxi to the MBK shopping centre - 7 floors of wall to wall madness. Clothes, shoes, restaurants, general electronics and a whole floor entirely devoted to mobile phone shops, sardined next to each other, selling virtually identical stock from what we could tell, real and fake iPhones, un-locking services, you name it. On another floor La bought a leather belt which was cut and re-buckled to size while we waited. And apparently the MBK is only one of many such complexes in Bangkok and *not* the largest. A shopper's paradise.

SkyTrain back to the hotel and decided to have another massage, but our spa was fully booked so we picked another place nearby, where we both had foot massages (which for some reason included upper back and shoulder work) for about £5 per hour each. May be worth going to Bangkok for massages alone! Back at the hotel we chilled in the lounge and had juice and coffees, then popped round the corner to a very local restaurant (meaning plastic chairs, strip lighting, cheap food) for a quick supper. Interesting surroundings and service but forgettable food.

Then back to the hotel, collected bags and used the Gym showers, then took a taxi to the airport. Another ride with no seatbelts and a friendly driver who laughed maniacally at anything we said. Bangkok's new main airport is amazing, efficient, clean and beautiful. And an absolute high-end shopping gem designed to part awaiting passengers from their cash in the most efficient manner. One of their tricks is not to have anywhere to sit down, except right next to the gates which were (what seemed to be) about a kilometre from the shopping area. In other words a horrible, nightmarish place for the two of us. We spent our last few Thai Baht on some fresh fruit (mine was mango with a side serving of sticky rice, of course!), trekked to our departure gate and then, after 7 weeks travelling, we were on a plane home.

Day 50