Day one- and some

---

Well we got on the plane OK in Adelaide . Great seat on the plane. The Airbus only had two seats on the side and then four in the middle. We were on the side so we had a great time and we did not have to worry about any one sitting next to us with all the body odor and personal space invasion that that entails.


The Airbus is amazing. Each seat is rally large with lots of space and each seat has a large LCD display that can stream over 600 separate shows to you individually. That way you can watch all the latest movies such as Avatar, Hurt Locker etc etc plus hundreds of others plus heaps of TV shows. It also has a game channel so if you are bored you can play games, a kids channel with lots of stuff for kids. The flight took about 6.30 hours but Lisa and I hardly noticed. The staff on the Singapore Airlines are exceptionally good. The service was super all along. The food was great and the beer cold. What more need to be said.

Arrived in Singapore on time and I was worried that we would have to make the transfer plane in less then one hour even though it was in a different terminal. I need not have been concerned. The transit to Terminal 2, from terminal 3 was very straight forward and easy. There was a sky train that was express to the other terminal. We go there in plenty of time to spare.

The flight from Singapore to Bangkok was on a Boeing 777 I think? Slightly older plane than before but still great service. Given all the complaints I have heard about Qantas service, I see no reason to just not stick to these guys. At every level my experience of this airline is excellent.

Arrived quite late in Bangkok, about 11.30 pm Adelaide time. The customs/passport thing was an non issue. They took our photos at customs but as Thailand has no Visa requirements this was fair enough.

We got our bags after a while. Lisa and I stared having thoughts of lost baggage as we were one of the last ones there but they turned up eventually.

Quarantine was simply am matter of walking through an unattended station if you had nothing to declare.. If you did have something to declare then you had to be bothered to go to one of the attended stations. The thing is why would you bother, given that you can just walk out of the place without any discussion anyhow.

Got some Baht at the airport so that we could pay the taxi. Lots of touts tried to get us to go in their limousines but we headed to the public transport section of the airport and got a metered taxi.

This airport is huge. When we were taxiing I saw planes from just about everywhere in the world. Not just Asia but most of Europe and the Middle east as well. The terminal is a series of connected glass cylinders. But their shear size is astonishing. These glass cylinders are must have a radius of 30-40 meters. They have multiple levels inside them and are very wide. When you land you really notice this place. I guess the airport is quite new and given the importance of tourism to the Thai economy I guess it makes sense.

The taxi took about 40 minutes to the Montien hotel. Quite cheap and a respectable ride. Locally made Toyotas with gas tanks. This of course meant that there was virtually no room in the boot of luggage and hence some of it had to ride shotgun. I guess if there are any more than two of you, you will need more than one taxi. The taxi system at the airport was very good and quick. The drivers park their cars and wait I a cue that meets up with the cue of travelers at a dispatchers desk. She asks where you want to go and makes a note of this, then hands you a card with your drivers details on it. This way you can complain if he does anything wrong. The trip to dowtown Bangkok was punctuated by the driver yelling out things like ‘40 baht” or ‘25 baht” which was ; as I quickly learned; my cue to hand him that amount of money to pay for the freeway toll.

Driving here is totally crazy. I suppose not crazier than any other Asian city but you really have to wonder what the road toll must be with the sort of stuff that is allowed to occur here.

The Montien hotel was built in the 1970s and you can smell it. The whole place has this mouldy ‘old’ smell,
Still I really like it. The service has been great and the porter that took us to our room was very helpful. I am always confused about how and when to tip so I gave his some cash as he spent some time giving us directions on a map for where to go.

The room is small but the aircon works and all seems to be as designed. We got to bed Adelaide time 12.30-1am. Pretty tired but exhilarated.

Woke up Adelaide time 7.30 but that was only 5am here. We tried to keep sleeping but it just did not work. Lisa did some yoga and I studied all our travel literature working out what to do.

We hit the road fairly early, and given that we did no see a single Caucasian for about an hour we were obviously the first of the tourists on the road. We walked around all the back streets for a while watching Bangkok wake up. We stopped off a street side stall and got some breakfast. We decided to eat the same thing the locals were eating so we got some fried rice with meat and chilies and eggs. It was super good. There were lots of other stalls but to be frank we just could not tell what the hell they were selling. There were huge crowds around some of them but when we looked we could not recognize any of the stuffing the pans. Maybe tonight for dinner I will just point and eat and see what I get dished up.

After this we got a coffee and read the local paper in Starbucks. And read all about how the Red Shirts had taken over parts of the city and how they planned on coming to the Silom district to annoy everyone a bit more. We decided to not let this interfere in our day so we just went on with our plans.

We caught a Skytrain to the water. The Skytrain is literally a train built on stilts. It is great. Cheap and convenient. The traffic here is totally over the top. You cannot get anywhere in a hurry. Cars, tuk-tuks, motorbikes, trucks etc. The thais solved this by building a rail network that goes over the congested traffic. Works great. We got a ticket to the rivers edge and got there in a couple of minutes. Once there we bought a 150 baht ticket for a sightseeing tour of the Grand palace, throne hall and Wat Pho (reclining Buddha) This was the bargain of the century. I am sure it was not meant to work out for the seller of this trip as it did but we got a guide, a ferry ride there and back, an air-conditioned bus just for the two us us for 5hours for $Au6. Crazy.

I will sign off now and continue the story next time. It is 5 pm here and Lisa and I have not eaten since the rice dish this morning. The reason is that this place is hot beyond belief. Hot and humid. So we are finally hungry enough to eat even in the sickly heat. (ps excuse the spelling mistakes)

---