Blogs from Khon Kaen, North-East Thailand, Thailand, Asia

Retour à Chiang Mai, je commence à bien la connaître cette ville, capitale du nord de la Thaïlande, et pourtant, je suis surpris en permanence par son dynamisme, son expansion, sa capacité d’accueil touristique en recrudescence. Je jette mon dévolu sur l’hôtel Nanya (520 THB (14 €) sur Agoda, 650 THB en direct), piscine et petit déjeuner compris. L’hôtel est situé dans la partie ouest de la vieille ville, les guesthouses y poussent comme des champignons les soirs d’orage, tout près du Wat Phra Singh que nous ne manquons pas d’aller visiter, incontournable. Chiang Mai se parcoure facilement en vélo, c’est tout plat, location 50 THB pour 24 heures. C’est moi qui fait le guide à ma petite thaï (de petite taille comme il se doit), c’est sa première visite dans le nord. Je me débrouille ... read more

Geo: 16.42, 102.83Another fresh morning with our fellow breakfasters wearing fleeces and puffer jackets. Overhead is a clear blue sky and sunshine but it is not making its presence felt in our courtyard.We have decided to skip the early morning International Bus and spend the morning here in Vientiane. We have to check-out by 12:00 and the afternoon bus is due to leave at 14:45 so the timings work ou quite well.After breakfast we stroll down to the riverside again and walk about 1 mile along to the large King Sissavang Vong statue. Cutting back throug the pleasant park, past the Presidential Palace and That Dum we stop for a final Lao coffee and pastry at the small shop we have been using.Just along the road is a wine shop topped by an enormous wooden barrel ... read more

Geo: 16.42, 102.83As we are not able to go to Laos this week as planned we are taking the day to go to Khon Kaen where there is an immigration office where I can extend my current visa without having to leave the country.Up with the alarm at 05:00 and at 06:00, just as daylight arrives, we are leaving to bike into Phon Thong and drop the bike off. Walk across town to the bus station. I usually drop Jai off at the sttion first with our bags and walk on my own but as we dont have any bags she has to walk as well today.There are no signs of any of the small minibuses this morning so we end up on a normal bus service. This bus goes the long way through Roi Et ... read more

Geo: 16.42, 102.83I am going to be a little pressed for time when we reach Bangkok so am delighted to find that we lad as forecast at 09:15. I am one of the first off the plane and make my way quickly to immigration. This is usually a nightmare here with long queues at the foreign passport desks and empty Thai passport desks. I had intended trying to blag my way through a Thai desk but surprisingly there is almost no-one here and I walk straight through. Having arrived at the baggage carousel so quickly, however, I now have a 30mins wait for my suitcase to appear and stand looking at my watch as the minutes tick by. I then make a dash across the airport to the taxi area and am soon leaving Suvarnabhumi behind ... read more

The day finally arrived again, when I packed up my stuff after a two-month long stay at my Bangkok apartment, and headed for the provinces once more. This time, I decided to head northeast towards the region known as Isaan, and what many might consider the true heartland of the Thai country, populated by the rural working class and rice farmers. And so some 6h later on the comfortable Nakhonchai Air bus, I was in Khon Kaen. If you scroll way back to some later 2012 blog entries during my first stint here in Thailand, you'll see that in fact this wasn't my first time in Isaan per se. Some 1.5 years ago, I'd headed westwards from the capital towards Korat and subsequently Ubon, en route to the border crossing with Southern Laos. This time though, ... read more