As busy as a bee in Bangkok...part iii

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HE SAID...
We woke at 6am to prepare for our 7.30am taxi trip to Phuket Airport. We arrived at the airport to find queues of people on the sidewalk - it’s the first time I’ve had to line up outside an airport terminal to get in. We checked in our packs, found our gate and headed straight for the aptly named Airport Pub for breakfast - I had an iced coffee and Ren had an omelette with toast. It was surprisingly good, although spoiled a little by our table’s close proximity to the smoking room. We boarded the plane and the flight was great, but I did have to ask a few over excited travellers to stop pushing into Ren’s headrest while she slept. We arrived in Bangkok at 11.30am expecting a pre-booked airport transfer to our hotel, but there was no-one waiting with our name on a card. It took a bit of negotiating, but we eventually found our driver and sped off towards the Royal River Hotel. On the way the heavens opened, but luckily the rain had stopped by the time we arrived. We checked in and settled into our room that had a fantastic view of the Mae Nam Chao Phraya River. We headed out to scout this new area of Bangkok (we had stayed on the other side of the river when we were here a few weeks earlier), stocked up on snacks at the local 7-11 and retreated back to the hotel - we were exhausted from our travels through northern and southern Thailand.

We headed out for dinner at a small family-run restaurant at 8pm. We shared a gai gaeng keaw wan (chicken in green curry) and gai pat prik med mamuang himaphan (stir fried chicken with chilli and cashew nuts). It was sensational. We saw a few musicians riding pushbikes with guitars down the alley where our table was placed (outside the family restaurant), so we followed them and discovered a trendy riverside bar. We sat down and took in the view of the Th Krung Thonburi Bridge with cocktails - I had a whisky sour and Ren had a godmother (vodka and amoretto). After a while it was time to retire, so we walked back to the hotel and fell into bed. Travel days are great, but they can be so exhausting.

We woke at 6am and headed straight down to breakfast - it was included. Unfortunately, it was also included for a massive group of French tourists who were hell-bent on beating everyone else to the toast (and whatever else they could get their hands on). It was a western-influenced breakfast, so there was nothing to write home about. Surprisingly, they were serving bread and butter pudding with custard. I didn’t try it, but Ren did and she quite liked it.



SHE SAID...
We were back in steamy Bangkok after concluding our Thailand Adventure Intrepid Travel trip. The flight over from Phuket was crowded and loud but quick, and Phuket Airport had been a sight to behold with more humans crammed into its space than I would have thought was possible. It was the first airport that I’ve had to queue to just walk in through the entry doors!

When we arrived at Bangkok airport, our expected hotel transfer was nowhere to be seen. After searching all the ‘name’ signs in vain, we stumbled upon the very efficient Tourist Agency Organisation of Thailand. After a phone call, a frantic young girl - the transfer agent - rushed over to us. It was clear from the onset that this girl wasn’t very bright - first she was fixated on the transfer we had on 26th February (when we first arrived in the country) and tried to tell us that we had arrived on the wrong date. Then for the next hour we engaged in a ground-hog day like confused conversation about the transfer, when it was booked, where we were going etc etc etc. A rapid fire mobile phone conversation would then ensue in Thai with someone who had a very shrill voice. Then I’d get the phone passed to me etc etc etc. Even though this girl had both our details in front of her the whole time, and I told her at least three times that the transfer could be in either of our names...it still took her an hour to find out that the transfer was booked in my name and not Andrew’s name and hence the confusion. But this still didn’t explain why the transfer wasn’t waiting for us! Anyway, with the transfer finally sorted, we had a long drive into town in what was now lunch time peak hour traffic. Traffic conditions weren’t improved by the massive afternoon rain storm, but our driver was so good that we both managed to have a nap for the hour drive.

We checked into the Royal River Hotel for one night before we headed east to Koh Samet for a few days. Yes, this was our ‘One night in Bangkok’, and the world should have been our oyster, but we were at that stage of our travels where we wanted the mountain to come to Mohamed. Having already engaged with Bangkok’s cultural highlights when we were here on our recent stops, we were well and truly templed and tourist- sighted out. All we really wanted to do was stay out of the tourist areas! We had no real plans for our stay- we waited to see where the magic took us. 😊

Our hotel on this stop in Bangkok was in Riverside, near the Th Krung Thonburi Bridge on the western side of the Chao Phraya River. We had a brilliantly large room with gorgeous river views. They also offered a free shuttle boat service to shopping areas down the river, but we arrived too late to catch it this time. Hopefully we will have time to do it when we return from Koh Samet. We were in a more residential area outside the city centre, and even though we were not really that far from our old stomping ground in Banglamphu where we stayed the last two times we were here, we felt a world away. I would recommend a hotel on this side of the river if you want to be away from the madness of the central business and tourist areas, but still within easy access of it when you wish to venture out. This suited us brilliantly for this leg of the trip, because we wanted a quieter atmosphere without being totally away from the action (should we get a sudden urge for a late night shopping expedition).

The Chao Phraya River is a beautiful sight to behold, and more so in the evenings - we had views of the Th Krung Thonburi Bridge almost right under out hotel, as well as the Saphan Phra Rama IX Bridge which is extremely well-lit and beautiful at night. It is claimed that this is the longest single-span cable-suspension bridge in the world...

It felt a little like we were killing time on this short stop in Bangkok - not at all because we had had enough of the city, but rather because we were about to start our final beach indulgence and we were in transit.

We had a completely relaxed day, and it was an effort to drag myself off the bed (where we had been watching Thai soap operas - so hilarious) to get to dinner. We considered eating at the hotel restaurant out of sheer laziness, but when we got downstairs the restaurant was soulless, so we walked out to the small side street and had an atmospheric meal at a little family restaurant. We were both in the mood for chicken, so we had the gai gaeng keaw wan (chicken in green curry) and the gai pat prik med mamuang himaphan (stir fried chicken with chilli and cashew nuts) - both delicious. It has taken us three weeks in Thailand to graduate to ‘medium’ spicy. 😊

While we were having dinner a guy rode by on a bike with a saxophone in a little trailer behind him, and seconds later a guy with a guitar in his hand rode past. We concluded they were heading to the Riverside Bar whose neon sign I had spied through our room window. We followed the bikes to a plush little bar right on the water, with the Th Krung Thonburi Bridge looming large overhead and Bangkok’s skyscrapers lit brightly on the other side of the river. We settled in for cocktails - Andrew had a whiskey sour and I found a drink I am totally in love with - a god mother, which has vodka and amaretto - so delicious! We then stumbled back to the hotel and crashed.

We stumbled out of bed and went downstairs for an early buffet breakfast at 6am, but a few busloads of French tourists had beaten us down there. I was very surprised at how rude and pushy these people were. There was more than enough food in the buffet to feed everyone five times over, but they were acting like it was the end of the world and this was their last supper. After we managed to actually reach the buffet tables, I decided that I would try the Asian breakfast of khao pad kai (egg fried rice) and moo pad khing (stir fried pork with black pepper and ginger). It was sensational and much more flavourful than the western breakfast of dry sweetish bread, oily fried eggs and dried out bacon that Andrew tried. Andrew was intrigued by what looked like bread and butter pudding with a runny custard like sauce that was on the pastry table, so he got a serve to try. It really was bread and butter pudding and it tasted very good. My taste buds must have been very confused with savoury dishes and dessert for breakfast. 😊

See you on the national park island of Koh Samet!

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