Bangkok days 2-4

Very remiss keeping up with travel blog but generally too rooted at end of day, the 16 hour session yesterday being a case in point. But it should encourage brevity - highlights only!


On day 2 Bangkok we had a full day planned trip with a guide and driver. We headed west after an early rise and drove through canal crisscrossed flatlands, and onto another powered longboat to explore the area and visit a 'floating market'. The canal area was extensive but more rural, lined with homes and trees, without the city squalor. Homes had boats outside them sometimes hoisted out of the water, and there was domestic boat traffic put putting around. Quite charming and colorful, with narrow tree covered canal lanes, and plenty of flowers, orchards and birdlife. As we approached the market area we passed open boats stacked with vegetables and fruits and by the time we were in the market it was congested chaos. Boats ranged in size and type, including simple paddled canoes stacked to the gunnels with produced and often paddled by an elderly character. Photos show the color and the spectacle of a community that lives by, moves on and markets on the canals.

In the afternoon we (grudgingly) visited a renowned attraction, the bridge over the river Kwai, being a landmark on the Thailand to Burma railway built in WW2 by POW's of the Japanese, who were moving down through SW Asia. It's a story of terrible brutality and the museum was upsetting, not to mention the acres of close set graves in front of it where some of the identified Allied casualties were relocated. But it doesn't hurt to see what humans got up to in the recent past and see where thousands of POW's finished their days, and in what a state. You wouldnt want to be Japanese and visit the place it pulled no punches on the depravity of their conduct.

The bridge itself was bombed by the allies but has been reconstructed. We walked over it then trained up a stretch of the rail line, now a commuting track for locals and attraction for visitors, before being collected by our driver for return to BK.

Days 3 and 4 we had nothing planned except to dive into the city and see what happened. So we jumped in a Tuk Tuk (3 wheetr bike) - big mistake. The drivers frequent their local patches and have arrangements with many local retailers for commissions on tourists bought to the shops in question. The drivers were a nightmare, scoundrels as were most of the related shops selling dodgy wares such as cheap tailoring services or cut price gemstones etc. After several Tuk Tuk experiences and virtual standing battles to get to where we wanted to go we gave up on them and found the sky train network. In the meantime we visited the showcased home of a former American who collected Thai art and whose home has become a museum. We also had to check out some of the Sapphire, ruby, gold silver and jade shops for which the city is famous. That night we dined on a highrise rooftop restaurant, the city around us quite breathtaking at night.

We were staying next to a 7 story shopping centre (MBK centre), and experience in itself. Each floor seemingly endless and packed with shops of all sizes and loaded with people. Next day we started out in the mall then walked to a Thai massage house, to get pummeled for 2 hours. Thai massage includes a lot of postural manipulation and takes getting use to but we emerged into the dripping heat feeling fantastic and continued our walk to a park, where the highlight was seeing water monitors again, fearsome looking brutes swimming in the ponds and lounging water side. That night we extended the tradition of trying each of the three excellent hotel restaurants, before and early night in prep for the first 3 day national park tour. - first up Khao Yai.