Mar 31, 2019 - Bangkok - we go 5 star

After a lazy breakfast at one of the local places, we catch a taxi to our new hotel. By the way, Bangkok has changed a lot in the last few years, taxis are modern and clean, very few tuk tuks around, and the traffic is organised (sort of). Our new place is rather swish, a one bedroom apartment style, 2 bathrooms with the one in the ensuite having a japenese style one that needs an instruction book. Comes with a butler available 24 hours a day. We have breakkfast in an exclusive dining area (available 24 hrs), afternoon tea every afternoon,...

Mar 30, 2019 - Kathmandu to Bangkok

Flight to Bangkok today. Everyone said we had to be at the airport 3 hours before departure. I had heard the same thing when we were in India and this had proven to be true so we arrived 3 hours before departure. Breezed through check in and quickly through immigration so plenty of time to have something to eat, have a coffee and do some reading. With about an hour to go the notice came up to move into the actual departure area. This is when it became interesting. There were separate lines for men and women to go through security. The men's...

Feb 26, 2019 - Ko Samui, Thailand

Reader Alert: Since the uploading of pictures from the ship is excruciatingly slow, there will be disconnect between journal postings and photo uploads. So please check back as photos are added to previous entries. Today is our first excursion ashore on the island of Ko Sumui in Thailand. We took in a lengthy tour that brought us to the Big Buddha, which was BIG. A respectful presentation at a temple includes covering ankles and shoulders and adopting a quiet presence. Almost creating an international incident where I intervened when a...

Feb 25, 2019 - Embarkation and good-bye to Bangkok

Today we transfer to the our ship. The day is all rather relaxed, with a 10AM departure from Bangkok and a 3 hour drive to the port. Our past experiences for embarkation usually consisted of cramming 1000 people into a Spartan "waiting area" with insufficient seating, ventilation and washrooms for a long wait as they people are slowly called to embark, but not allowed to enter their suites for another couple of hours as housekeeping madly turns over 600 cabins in record time. Only to await another hour or so while they sort and deliver your...

Feb 24, 2019 - Walkabout, leisure time - The Food Edition

Hi All: Today was a bit of R&R. I know, a little silly to say when you are on vacation, but we needed a bit of unstructured time after travel and two days of touring. Finally adjusting to the time difference, we woke late and had tea in our room, which has become our habit. As the heading suggests, I thought I'd do a bit of an in-depth review of our culinary adventures thus far. Breakfasts are included and is a fantastic buffet. The advantage of being in a city that is the crossroads to the world, even the hotel buffet is a cross cultural...

Feb 23, 2019 - Canal tour & Royal Barge Museum

Back to the hotel for a bit of a rest and then we were off for a canal tour with a stop at the Royal Barge Museum. We were too late to witness the floating market at its height but did encounter a the tail end. Again, the dichotomy of poor in dilapidated houses next to massive modern homes continues to strike us. Our stop at the Royal Barge Museum was fascinating watching men and women painstakingly restore dozens of ancient barges to their former glory. these barges are 40 plus meters long and take 1000s of hours to manually remove old...

Feb 23, 2019 - Bangkok China town & temples

Another day of touring where we rose early and headed to Chinatown to take in the food stalls, street food and flower market. Since we were there so early, we could easily move about and chat with the folks, and take lots of pictures. We then ventured on tuktuk to the Temple of the Reclining Buddha, which is enormous. Thailand has over 1300 temples, of which Bangkok has over 400, each with its own Buddha but this one is biggest in the country.

Feb 22, 2019 - The Grand Palace Bangkok

Our first tour in Bangkok was to the Grand Palace were royalty sat until the early 1800s. Apparently there is no good time to go, as the site receives over 100,000 visitors a day and closes at 1530h. The architecture is truly stunning as well as the craftsmanship once you realize that everything was done by hand including all the gold leaf. This remains true today for the on-going restoration work in this vast site with its thee massive temples and many halls. There remains only one building where visitors are actually admitted, the Hall of...

Feb 22, 2019 - Bangkok

Bangkok is simply amazing. It reminds us of Buenos Aires, with its eclectic ordering of shops and industries and derelict buildings and amazing high end structures, with a little bit of Havana mixed in with very old dilapidated infrastructure in some areas. Still struggling a little with jet lag, the heat and humidity but looking forward to some exploring.

Feb 17, 2019 - Last day in Bangkok

.....Our last day started like every other on this trip... with a visit to the breakfast buffet, although we were no longer opening up the buffet at 6am! We were now getting together with the rest of our group around 8am and being the last day, we decided to keep it light. As we had previously walked through a small community nearby on our way back from the medical college and water park, we decided to share the experience with the rest of the group and so made arrangements to meet downstairs to take a walk in the neighbourhood that...

Feb 16, 2019 - Terminal 21, Railway & Amphawa floating markets

As we met our travelling buddies at breakfast, the plan was to make our own way to a local floating market based on information gleaned from the internet sited. Talin Chan was one which was recommended as being fairly close and accessible by BTS and taxi. However, from it's position on Google maps, the recommendation for taking a taxi from Wongwain Yai billed as the 'last station' made us wonder about this recommendation as there were several more stations on the line in our maps and apps. While trying to make sense of this we decided to...

Feb 15, 2019 - Golden Buddha, dinner cruise

Recovering from the Saxaphone Pub was more difficult than I thought it would be as I had switched my drink from a scotch on the rocks to a G&T so the ride home was a pleasant blur. Having an easy day planned we looked forward to our night dinner-cruise on the Chap.... river. However, while looking at things to do, we saw that there was a Golden Bhudda temple complex at the end of a subway line that had a station close to our hotel After checking routes online, Lisette and I decided that after our morning walk we would venture out there if...