Bangkok

---

We are finally in Bangkok after a mad day of travelling. We had a bus booked to pick us up between 12:30 and 1 in the afternoon but it never came! Terry walked down to the travel agent while I waited with the bags and the agent said she’d booked us on the wrong day! She sent a taxi driver to take us to the ferry pier and told us to find the rep from the “holiday” travel company. She did eventually turn up after about an hour and we were told to wait for a coach. It arrived about 10 seconds before the ferry was leaving so we chucked our bags on it and went up onto the ferry. We had no idea if the bus took us to Bangkok but it was a bit scary when the ferry dock said “Pha Ngan”, which is the name of another Thai island, NOT the mainland. Luckily, we were infact on the mainland and were driven into Surat Thani. 45 minute later, we’re dropped on the roadside and a random man took us to his tour shop. After a while there, we got into the back of his truck and he took us to ANOTHER tour shop and asked us for 80baht each! We made it clear he wasn’t getting a penny.

After another wait, the coach to Bangkok finally arrived and was quite nice. By the time we left, it was almost 8pm, a whole 7 hours after we were supposed to leave Ko Samui. Last time we ever get a bus to Thailand!!

Both of us slept quite well on the bus, although a film was on for a couple of hours. Suddenly a guy shouted “Bangkok, last stop” and we were in Bangkok, an hour early. Loads of taxi drivers were waiting to rip us off but we were so tired that we just jumped in a taxi to our hostel which he managed to find. The hostel is called NapPack and has big mattress things on the floor of reception so we slept for another 3 hours. We’ve checked in now and have been upgraded to a slightly better room and managed to get laundry done too. Earlier, we walked around Bangkok for ages, getting very lost (Terry is insisting we were never lost but he definitely uttered “I have no idea where we are” at least once...now he’s insisting it was a joke hmmmm). “I knew exactly where I was at all times, I just didn’t know where we were going. Actually, I knew where we were going; I just didn’t know how to get there” (Terry, 2011). We found a Thai Boxing stadium though, and there’s a fight tonight so were going! Tomorrow we are going to an Elephant park so we can ride the elephants.

Bangkok is a bit mad because touts come up to you constantly and try and engage you in conversation, usually by asking “where you from” or “where you going”. They all want to you to get into their tuk-tuk (like a motorbike with big seating on) or taxi and take you to their friends shops to get some commission. We both wish we were Asian for a while so we wouldn’t get harassed as much. It’s boiling hot still so walking around is really exhausting and we will probably cave in and get a tuk-tuk later!

---