A Bangkok Dream

Bangkok. We’ve all heard the stories, watched the movies, and dreamed of the adventures. I can now say that I’m in the “club”….the “I survived Bangok” club. Now, don’t get me wrong. You are NOT going to hear any Hangover II or The Beach stories from me with my 4 day adventure; I mean, I was with my parents and husband after all!! You will however hear about near death experiences while biking at night through the city streets, of wild floating & train markets, of mouthwatering thai food, big city shopping, and of Thai culture & its people in general.

We have been dying to go to Bangkok ever since we arrived in SE Asia. We had to hit the beach towns first- Phuket, Phi Phi Islands, and Koh Samui have already been checked off the list. Its now Bangkok’s turn….and we hope to follow that up with Chang Mai and other various beach towns in the years to come. We simply adore Thailand!!

Why fix something that ain’t broken right? Truer words have never been spoken, thus the decision to find our hotel on Agoda along with finding activities and reading reviews from TripAdvisor. Our trustworthy sites once again rose to the challenge & we were rewarded handsomely! It all started with a hotel booking at the new Park Plaza Boutique Hotel in  the upscale & trendy Sukhumvit district. We really lucked out with this gem of a hotel. Situated near a major sky train hub, we were able to zip from the airport to the hotel in significantly less time than taking a taxi and sitting through the hellish Bangkok traffic. Perfect really (unless you cannot or do not want to walk up & down stairs with luggage). The hotel was built just a few years ago and has just over 100 guest rooms, a rooftop swimming pool, a restaurant for any meal 24 hrs a day, modern, clean & spacious rooms, and service that will leave you smiling. We could not have asked for a better location within the sprawling limits of Bangkok!

For dinner on Friday night, we wanted to stay around the area since we were meeting up with my parents who had been in Phuket & Phi Phi’s for the week and were a bit tired. Of course we were craving Thai and the concierge delivered with a smashing recommendation to a neighborhood joint called Suda. It was literally right around the corner and from the crowds waiting to be seated at the open air alleyway of a restaurant, we knew it was going to be good! Especially with a great ratio of locals to tourists. The meal was heavenly and the beers ice cold. We left happy campers for sure.

Saturday was our first full day and we decided to wander around the Sukhumvit area. Bangkok is known for its shopping so we thought it would be fun to check out the malls & alley shops while there. In the Siam area, we found a ton of high end shops, a plethora of trendy street side shops, a million electronic stores, and sidewalks lined with “hawker stalls” selling their various goodies to eat. What a fun way to get acclimated to Bangkok. For lunch we dined at Ban Khun Mae Thai Cuisine near Siam Square (a recommendation from my TRX instructor in KL) and had yet another mouthwatering & satisfying thai meal, complete with really good aircon :-)!

For our evening festivities, I had booked the four of us a “Bangkok Night Bike” tour through Grasshopper Adventures (via Tripadvisor). Um wow, what a fun way to see the sights of Bangkok!! We met up at 6pm and biked for 4 hours- through the crazy car filled streets (read: life was flashing before our eyes!!!), the smokey & wild backpacking district, rode across the river on a ferry, stopped at the hospital where the King is being treated for his illness (of course didn’t go in & actually SEE him, but still), stopped at the Temple of the Dawn (all lit up at night with ZERO crowds, so cool) as well as a few other beautifully lit up Buddhist & Chinese Temples & Christian Churches. We leisurely biked along the Chao Phraya River, stopped at a bustling night flower market and inhaled the sweet scents & beautiful petals, and finished off with a stop at the famous Wat Pho &  Reclining Buddha (which was cool, yet a bit disappointing due to the fact that we could not go inside at night time). I would definitely recommend this bike tour company to anyone- all ages and all biking capabilities.

The “beef” I had was minimal but noteworthy- I felt that there should have been 2 guides- 1 in the front and 1 at the end because with 8 riders through busy city streets, its easy to get left behind. I also think that it would have been nice to spend some time explaining the smaller neighborhoods that we passed through in order to get to the sights (since we couldn’t really go inside any of them anyway). But all in all, it was a fantastic experience and a really fun way to see all the sights of Bangkok without all the daytime crowds & heat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After such a long night, we were in for a short sleep as I booked us an amazing all day tour for Sunday, of which pick up was bright & early at 6:45am! I found out about Bangkok Food Tours through Tripadvisor and their tours looked like a very authentic way to see the countryside of Bangkok and experience more “local” life. Wow, it did NOT disappoint! For our 8 hour tour, we packed in 1 train market, 3 floating markets, and 1 Navy camp. It was a small & personalized tour as along with the 4 of us, there was 1 other couple, along with our driver & tour guide, Olive. Olive was fantastic! She spoke great english and explained things- from food to culture, people to plants very well!! She also gave us each a handout of a map detailing our stops, simple food names in thai, as well as a description of all foods we would eat throughout the day, detailing out ingredients.

We began our trip at the famed Train Market about 90 minutes outside of Bangkok, (of which you can see a plethora of videos on YouTube). Starting at 8:30am, this train literally runs through the market 8 times a day!! Its simply astounding. We had never seen anything so amazing in our lives. After first walking through the “wet portion” of the market and getting thoroughly disgusted at the meats on display, we arrived at the back end where the market opened up along a set of train tracks.  Various fruit, vegetable, spice, and seafood vendors line up along the tracks….and I mean RIGHT next to the tracks, to sell their goods. When the warning signal comes, all the vendors pull back their respective awnings and allow the train to pass by (somewhat slowly), all the while never moving their goods, which don’t ever get smashed!! I couldn’t believe my eyes!! The train rolled right over top the cucumbers, and not one of them was smashed. This was truly the most unrealistic and amazing thing I have seen in a very long time!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After this show-stopping first stop, we headed up a ways along the countryside to the Takha Floating Market. This stop truly took my breath away.  Before getting to the water canal, we stopped at a street side vendor selling grilled bananas dipped in pure palm sugar sauce….um yea, heaven on a toothpick! After our little “snack”, we walked over to the canal and were absolutely floored by the sights! About a dozen old thai women in old rickety wooden boats with feet dangling in the waters as they cooked up some homemade grub for the locals and tourists to feast on. I’m sorry, what?! The food was delicious and after our feast, we hopped on to a couple of old wooden boats ourselves guided by a husband and wife team. These boats had no motors and our guides used wooden oars to steer us through the quiet and calm canals. What a serene way to spend an hour! We stopped at a local’s thai home where they let us inside and showed us around. On our way out, the woman of the house gave me an orchid for my beauty- how sweet is that?!?! From here, our guides took us through more lazy & abandoned canals to another private residence where we hopped out and met the most fascinating woman ever. She has a palm sugar farm and here she collects (from the palm trees), cooks, and hardens palm sugar to sell to larger factories, where they package it all up all pretty for sale to the shops and markets throughout the country- WOW. This woman was 61 years young and had bicep muscles TO DIE FOR!! Honestly, she was phenomenal- been making palm sugar since she was 12 years old- she starts at 5am and ends a 8pm, every.single.day. My hero. Oh, and her “KitchenAide Mixer” was the most beat down, pieced-together hunk of metal ever. Loved this humbling experience. Plus the palm sugar literally melted on my tongue- yum!

Our third stop was the Bang Noi Floating Market. This market was a bit different from the first in that there were not as many women in wooden boats grilling up some tasty treats, rather on each side of the canal were rickety old shops, food stalls, and massage houses to enjoy. We did all of the above! While enjoying a light lunch of, you guessed it, more thai food, we each took turns enjoying a neck & should massage- heavenly! We also had time to wander around the shops for handmade goodies and walked along the canal- a very peaceful stop indeed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From here we took a break from market life and went to the Bang Kung Navy Camp. Here Olive explained to us more about the Buddhist Temple that we visited, about traditions & wishing trees, and allowed us inside to rub our own piece of “gold” paper onto the buddha with our wish/prayer. An exciting way to understand their culture more for sure! Outside of the temple, there was a massive array of Muay Thai sculptures, all along 2 lines mirroring each other, and all showing various poses of fighting stances. We had some fun acting along :-)!

Our final stop took us to the hugely popular and insanely crowded Amphawa Floating Market. Along with the women in wooden boats cooking up delicacies, we also found a very large amount of various shops- selling anything and everything you could imagine. We ate more here and also enjoyed some thirst-quenching traditional thai drinks, and capped off our eating fest with some homemade thai ice cream….I choose mango, delicious!

What an exhausting and enlightening fun-filled day!! We all came away incredibly full, very tired, and in awe of the thai countryside way of life. We are so glad we fit this tour in and I highly recommend you do as well!

We were understandably exhausted after a late night biking followed by an all day tour so on Monday we slept in a bit and over a late breakfast, decided we needed to head to Bangkok’s Chinatown for the day, complete with a Tuk Tuk ride! We jetted off on the easy to use sky train system toward the district and from the station, hopped on some tuk tuk’s to the center of the district- so much fun!! We meandered along the streets and took in all the crazy sights, smells, noises, and more. Talk about sensory overload! Chinatown in Bangkok truly is a feast for your senses- all of them!! We were overwhelmed with crowds, stalls, smells (good & bad), & the people. After our fill, we headed back over to the backpackers district (the one we flew by while on bikes) to have lunch and people watch. Khao San Road was made famous by The Beach and The Hangover II movies and thus will always have great people watching- both at day and night! Unfortunately, we picked a random spot for a burger & beer, and it did not sit well. Go figure right- eat thai food all weekend and am fine, then eat a burger and I throw up- ugh. Still didn’t’ ruin the day though- we enjoyed the gipsy watching! That night I was down for the count with some food poisoning so we had to cancel plans for rooftop bars and stayed in- boohoo……but at least we have more to come back and see next time!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What a fabulous & whirlwind adventure in Bangkok- we enjoyed it so much and our feet still ache from all the go-go-go! I’m so grateful to have this fun experience with my parents and am so proud of their adventurous spirit- bike rides, random market food, chinatown, and more! A trip for the memory books for sure……

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Onwards & upwards for more- safe & happy travels!

Kimbra