Bangkok

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What a great start to a fantastic trip.... I go to the boarding gate to fly to Bangkok to be told they've upgraded me to Premium Economy! Result!! They were very apologetic haha. Flight was good, had my own tv, free champagne, extensive menu, a large pillow and a reclining seat with about 2ft legroom and about 8inches of extra space in my seat too! I don't think I could ever fly economy again!
Once landing in Bangkok and having picked up my backpack , I was greeted by a nutty woman who was from my transfer! Not exactly what you want after an 11hr flight!! I met a nice Canadian girl, Christina, who lives in Australia on my transfer,. She was staying in the room next door to me at our hotel too (Viengtai Hotel)! We decided to go out for dinner & exploring the wonders of Khao San Road. Wow, what a buzzing place!! We saw our first ladyboy within an hr of stepping out of our hotel!
Christina and I did a bit more exploring on our first full day in Bangkok. We found a water taxi which took us to Wat Pho (I think!!) temple. We had our first experience of Thai scamming here! Before we left the hotel, we were warned that locals will tell us the temple isn't open today for various reasons and will advise us somewhere else to go.... This happened! We were standing right at the entrance tho & could see it was open! The temple was stunning, pics will follow soon! The reclining buddha was at this temple and is a massive attraction. Whilst at the temple, there were loads of schoolkids and one Thai boy came over to me and asked to take a picture haha. All the kids started giggling to eachother!! We tried to then go to the Grand Palace but it was closed due to there being a school there on Tuesday & Thursday mornings. Instead we went for a wander to try and find our way home... We were stopped by a Thai man who told us some good places to go, we weren't going to bother but we then started talking to another Thai man further down the road & he advised we go. He hailed a TukTuk for us! We went to 3 places & then back to our hotel and cost 20baht each (approx 40p!). We were taking to a 45meter standing buddha, then to another temple, where we got told off as we didn't take our shoes off!! Whoops! We went on to a silk factory which was pretty pants to be fair!
A few hrs after we got back to the hotel room, every1 else arrived. Yay! They settled in and we all headed out for dinner and a few cheeky drinks, turned into a messy night!! We were drinking buckets which consist of Thai Whisky, coke & red bull. Dangerous mix! We met a couple of lads from Chelmsford in there too!!
The following day me, Kayleigh & Becca went to the tourist place and found out loads of info of stuff we can do. So we all booked up everything we are doing for the next 3 weeks! Kicking off with a pick-up from the hotel at 7am the next morning 😞 to take us to our next accommodation.... a floating cabin on a river! This is for 2 nights and 3 days, includes all our meals, all our transfers, entrance to the Tiger Temple, Elephant trekking and much more, then a night train to Koh Phangnan for 5 nights with accommodation booked, then to Phuket for a day before heading off for some island hopping, all accommodation booked. We also booked an internal flight to Singapore. All this only cost 15500 baht (about 310 pounds!!!!).
Once all this was booked, we decided to go and do the same as what Christina and I had done the day before. This time we went to the Grand Palace too. Beautiful! Such a boiling hot day and we had to wear long trousers & t-shirts! Worth it though. When at the palace, we were told it was closed because the king was there, we walked to another entrance & were allowed in!! Dodgy scammers!
All the men keep staring at us girls, it's horrible.
We're all having such a laugh and are getting on so well... touchwood!!

Much more to follow... xx

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