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Published: February 10th 2010
So we decided to head north to Bangkok after Andy had finished his diving. It was an alright journey in the end (more so for me as I had gone to bed earlier than Andy and also not drunk my own weight in Chang beer - its like Tskie beer but worse). The first bit was probably the worst as we had to walk up a massive hill at midday with our backpacks. After that it was a bit of a scary van ride to the port and then on to the catamaran. Rather than the horror of the cargo ship and a 9 hour journey, we were heading to the different part of the coast a bit further up (and a route a bit more well traveled) so had the luxury of an airconditioned catamaran and only a 2 hour journey. Andy managed to add another form of public transport to his list of things he is able to fall asleep on, although he did so with his eyes open a freaked quite a few people out...he is gross.
The boat stopped off at a little town on the coast called Chumpon where there were busses to Bangkok. If we had not already booked the bus to Bangkok I would of liked to stay in Chumpon for a while, judging from what i saw of it. It has a gorgeous long deserted beach (which was a change coming from Kho Tao) which looked on to loads of islands which were national parks. The pier where the boat docked was also amazing as because the water was so shallow the only way to get to shore was on this really long wooden pier. It was a bit scary when you were going over and it didnt help that Andy kept on musing whether the really thin wooden planks could hold his weight and the backpack...
The bus to Bangkok was okay, despite watiching the start of one film about 5 times because the dvd player was a bit broken. I managed to get some sleep, but not that much, so by the time we got dropped off we were a bit shattered. It being about 2 in the morning we just headed for Kho San Rd figuring that if anywhere would be open it would be kho san...and it was very open. There were a million bars and
clubs and just loads of people and noise everywhere. Including the now infamous call for "do you want a tuk-tuk??' at every corner which was also joined by women selling one of the oddest things we have seen so far. A wooden frog that had ridges on its back that when hit with a wooden stick made the sound of a frog. This would soon become a sound that would send us diving for cover rather than have to insist that no we did not want anything they were selling thank you!
We found a guest house that was not too noisy (but it did have a sign on the desk saying that the noise usually finishes at about 3 in the morning). By this point it was almost 3 so we figured that we would just crash for the rest of the night. Surprisingly it was not too bad despite the fact that there was a cockroach in the bathroom and a bed bug on Andys pillow.
The next day we set off on an unintentionally massive walk across the city. We were aiming for the big shopping bit on siam square called the Paragon. We knew
that it was going to be a bit of a long walk but didnt figure it would take us as ong as it did, it really didnt look that far on the map. However we forgot to take in to account of just how massive Bangok is. When we (finally) got there, it was well worth it. The whole shopping complex was huge! Since I had not packed any flipflops I went to the shoe bit to have a look for some. After getting really lost for a while we decided to go to the cinema to see Avatar on the advice frm some people in Kho Tao. This cinema was a bit different to the one in L1. It was massive and really really plush. Avatar in 3D was amazing but mainly just for the 3D-ness of it all as it was my first time seeing it. We were gutted because it was showing on the IMAX one a few hours later, its definately something that we will be doing next time in Bangkok as I still cant get my head around how big it would be.
After that we decided to have a nice meal in the
Paragon rather than street food so we wondered into this nice looking what-we-thought was a sushi place. It was not as we discovered when the moving belt thingy (Yo! sushi-style) did not have sushi on it but rather raw bits of meat and veg. There was also this bit sort of bubbling pot in the middle of the table. We did the normal thing of order beer and look confused till someone helpes you. Aparently we were in a all you can eat in 1 hour build your own soup restaurant, a bizzar concept but they seem to be quite common (ANdy was a bit gutted!). After a poor woman had tried to explain the concept of an all you can eat in 1 hour build your own soup restaurant through mime we were well on board. She helped us by putting together outr first soup which consisted of grabbing about 20 plates and throwing them into the pot. Even we managed to do it by ourselfs....eventually. That night we went back to Kho san for a few more beers.
The next day was pretty uneventful. We got a taxi into town but got stuck in the Bangkok gridlock
for ages. Andy managed to add anoter form of transport that he has fallen asleep on to his list. We just sort of wandered around, rang home and then got a taxi back.
As we only had a 15 day visa for Thailand we neaded to get out of the country quite soonish. We were not stresssing ourselves out too much trying to see all of Thailand as we would be passing through it quite alot. On our way back down from Laos and then we would get a 30 day visa when we came back from Burma. We knew that boarder crossing are always going to be a pain and we also knew that all the visa runs and organised buses to Cambodia left Bangkok at 8-9 in the morning so to beat the rush we got the 7 bus. It sort of worked although we still got stuck at the border for hours. Boo.
It was a bit of a farce trying to get accross the border, we got dropped off at a bus statin where we had some food (soup again for me). We got a tuk-tuk to the Cambodian embassy, well sort of. First
we got dropped off at the building next to it with a guy in there saying that this was the official visa and it was 1200 baht. We though it was a bit dodge so I went and checked out next door which turned out to be the official one and a visa was only 1000 baht. Ba@#$%d. The penny sort of dropped when he got offended by our scepticism and said he would charge us more if we went and came back...hum...
So we got our visa and then a guy turned up and said he worked for the government and would take us to the borrder. We decided to follow him and after a bit of a trek through a market he ended up making good and got us to the first of many many check points. We filled in a million different forms and got ushered into a million different queues in each building. It was just really chaotic but there were people running around sort of pointing you in the right direction. After that we got put on a bus and taken to a bus station a few miles out from the crossing. After that
it was on to another bus and off to Siem Reap.
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kate
non-member comment
great to hear from you!!!!!!!!
Fab photos guys and great to hear from u! i know it hasnt been that long but it feels like it. We went to da greek place sat just gone with skim,ged,nat,andos gill and kb it was a great nite and a good laugh!!!!!!!! Will have to try and up load some photos 4 u! Its half term nxt wk and me and mum r meeting up at the munro with paula 4 a few drinks and tea on monday. Anyway glad ur ok! Stay safe and hope 2 hear from soon! Love ya! k xx P.S. Can i have a tuk tuk and or a wooden frog?! x