Thailand!

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Our first impression of Thailand was an olfactory one. This country smells incredible! Or at least the places we visited did.

Our first port of call was 2+ hours drive from Bangkok. But not to worry…it’s an overnight stop. So we arranged to spend 1 night in Bangkok.

We dropped our bags at our hotel then bought a hop-on-hop-off boat pass that took us up and down the Chao Phraya River to see the city’s most popular sites.

This river is busy with tourist boats like ours, long boats, barges and ferries (about 20 cents a ride for ferries). It’s really like a water freeway.

Bangkok is a super busy city for tourists. All of Bangkok's landmarks are very crowded. If you can’t handle crowds this city is not for you. In the daytime we braved the crowds and managed to hit Wat Arun (Temple of Dawn- this Buddhist temple is Bangkok' s most famous landmark). The temple is epic! It glistens in the sun as it’s decorated by shiny broken China tea cups, saucers and plates. The Thais traded with China hundreds of years ago and all the China dishware that was broken in transportation was used to decorate this amazing temple.

We next hit Wat Pho which is famous for its giant reclining Buddha. The place is filled with giant towering structures called Stupas. A Stupa often contains Buddhist relics or the remains of famous monks or prominent Buddhists. The reclining Buddha was a sight to see, but crowds dampered the spiritual-ness of this place.

After wandering Wat Pho and elbowing our way through the other tourists we grabbed a bit of lunch a delicious dockside restaurant called Eat, Sight, Share (ESS). The food was awesome and afterwards we hopped back on a boat and headed to Chinatown. This was one of the best Chinatown’s we experienced. The markets were still extremely cluttered and the stalls still bled into each other, but the products were interesting and diverse. While we didn’t buy anything, with a little more time we might have.

Next we had to jump in a Taxi to head to one of our key highlight's; the nighttime city bicycle tour with Just Nok Tours. We arrived a little early and Andra was excited to discover our second Asian Cat Café, so we popped in for some quick hot beverages and we made a wealth of new feline friends. After tearing Andra away we headed to the bike tour. This tour was the best decision we made for this stop. We hopped on some mountain bikes and visited some of the same daytime stops we had been to (but now much quieter and lit up spectacularly). The tour was a little over 4 hours and included Wat Arun (at night), Wat Pho (at night), the flower market, the University, and many others including our first intro to Thai street meat!! The food was delicious and seeing the city from back alleys and locations we may have otherwise not seen was pretty cool; we learned some things we may have not have otherwise learned. For instance, we learned that the Thai people all receive free healthcare and the city offers free aerobic dancing classes in many city parks between 6 and 7 pm in a promotion of healthy lifestyle to it’s citizens. And that the Royal Family decides which family member will be the next king…it’s not necessarily the offspring of the current king. We were beat after our bike tour so we headed back to our hotel where we enjoyed a nightcap on its beautiful rooftop bar.

The next day we woke up and headed to one of the last key stops The Grand Palace which was also home to the Emerald Bhudda. The Grand Palace is definitely GRAND and it is the home and working residence of the Thai royal family. It is littered with gold and colourful glistening Stupas.

It’s also littered with hundreds of people trying to take the perfect “modelling” selfie. It became a game for Chris to try and capture people in the process of capturing themselves “perfectly”. Bangkok is definitely a must see city and one we’d highly recommend. Just be aware that the scam artists in this town need you to always have your wits about you.

Our second port in Thailand was Ko Samui.

This laid back island was the polar opposite of the city of Bangkok. Our stop here was short but we managed to see a tourist restaurant and shopping area (Fishermen’s Village), The Big Buddha, a waterfall and have a beer from a beach bar on Chaweng Beach. The island is popular with visitors from Australia and the UK.

We loved the laidback vibe here and it rivals the beach towns we often visit in the Caribbean.. We’d happily take a beach break here in the future.

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