Bangkok Airport and first pics!

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Bangkok Airport was surprisingly nice and easy to navigate. I was expecting problems at customs etc. You always see movies of soviet customs and immigration where its all stern looking fellows in military uniform with ink stamps, automatic weapons and a remit to harrass tourists. I was kind of expecting asia to be the same. It isn't!

We got through customs and passport control without problems. They didn't even ask us any questions about where we were going, or how long we were staying (though to be fair we had filled out immigration cards on the plane). When I went to Montreal a few years ago, they made us fill out cards and then gave us the third degree too.

The first thing I noticed about Thailand after getting through the airport was the humidity. It's about 30-35c here, which isn't TOO bad, but there's so much moisture in the air that any sweat just sticks to you permanently. So far this hasn't been a problem as we have been in nice air-conditioned buildings, but tommorrow we venture out on tour.

We are staying at the Amari Atrium, pics of our room attached. The staff are extremely friendly and it's nice to be in a hotel with a concierge and bellboy service for about £50/night!

Can't say the same about the taxi driver we got from the airport though. He helped us with our bags (while tutting), then proceeded to try rip us off with the fare. I was on to his game though as I've read its common. Rule of thumb when getting a taxi from the airport is to ALWAYS go on the meter in a public cab. If you take a limo service, or non metered cab you WILL overpay. Even then, he tried to 'offer us a special deal' of 450 baht (about £9), but I persisted in saying we wanted the meter. He eventually relented in a huff and put the meter on. By the time we got to the hotel it was 250baht+70 for the freeway toll, so 320 baht. Admitedly it's not a huge saving, but still, I don't like people trying to rip me. Particularly when they are grumpy bastards. After the meter, he just shut up for the hour taxi ride, then rebuked me for not paying him fast enough when we got to the hotel 'you pay quickly quickly'.

We were going to go to the Grand Palace and Temple, but we were knackered and decided to sleep a bit instead.

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