Bangkok 6-8th January 2009

Bangkok is our first stage of the trip, arriving from a not so sunny and warm England after a 12 hour flight to 30 Celsius plus and a very pleasant light breeze. How English of me to start off with the weather. Doing our first bit of bargaining at the airport for a private cab, we opted for the bus into town - the AE4 which is highly recommended to get into hostels or hotels around the main rail station. After a 12 hours flight and 2 hour transfer- traffic- we headed out for a nice long walk and explored at random. Eventually we got to the Khao San Road which was full of likeminded (?) travelling folk, but did thankfully also cater for our urgent need of Phad Thai. 25 bhat for a very decent feed from a street vendor, who collectively sell pretty much everything you'd want to eat. Chicken liver grilled isn't going to be hitting my all time favourite food list.Next day was a quick and dirty trip around Bangkok looking at the Grand Palace and neighboring temple complex which had we listened to touts we would not have had time to see...as Robert so eloquently put it, don't trust anyone in Bangkok. The sites are really worth seeing, the temples and Buddha's are lovingly kept and grounds maintained...well worth the 50 bhat for the temples and 350 bhat for the Grand Palace. Heading off to see Bangkok from the river we found the best option was to jump onto a river ferry for 13 bhat and took a trip for miles and miles upriver before jumping off and catching a boat back to near the hostel. Catching up on much needed sleep and perhaps fighting a little jet lag, we then headed to the Pat Pong area for some obligatory ping pong and beer. The hostel- the Cozy Place hostel I can only recommend, clean and tidy - seemingly very secure and in a good central location but away from the humdrum of the tourist city areas. Off to jump on a bus to Koh Chang and do some relaxing :-) Jennifer will write the next entry..MT