TP Trails

Suggested Itinerary:

Day 1 – Explore Lumphini Park and MBK Mall

Day 2 – Visit the Grand Palace, Wat Arun, and Wat Pho

Day 3 – Check out one of the floating markets (Khlong Lat Mayom and Chatuchak for us, check opening days/times)

Day 4 – Explore Khao San Road, Flower Market, and Chinatown

Day 5 – Drinks at a roof top bar (Zoom) and celebrating Loy Krathong (full moon of the 12^th month, typically November)

It had been a glorious two-, almost three-, weeks relaxing and spending time with family in Denver, Colorado and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Days 101-122), but the time had come for us to start our journey to Southeast Asia. First stop – Bangkok, Thailand. Since we are operating on a budget, we booked our flights using points; the journey included three flights totaling about 27 hours of travel time. We arrived late into Bangkok, so we stayed at a hotel about a 5-minute drive from the airport (The Cottage Suvarnabhumi Hotel). Note that we booked this hotel one day before we left for Bangkok, continuing with our strategy of not planning ahead. It’s a decent hotel, clean and comfortable enough beds after over a day of traveling, especially for the price! We quickly learned that the US dollar goes a long way in Southeast Asia, which is apparent with the quality of hotels you can get for under $30. The next morning, we headed into Bangkok via taxi (about an hour) to get to our next hotel, which was the T2 Sathorn Residences. Fortunately, by the time we arrived at the next hotel, our room was ready, and we could check-in. We loved our time at T2 Sathorn (we even extended our stay in Bangkok there two days, mostly because we were having fun in Bangkok, but also because we had such great accommodations).

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We got settled and decided to tackle a low-key activity for the afternoon – walking to Lumphini Park and then checking out one of the well-known malls in Bangkok. There is always traffic on the roads and drivers are crazy, so our goal was to avoid taxis, tuk-tuks, and the like while in Bangkok, so walking became our primary mode of transportation in Bangkok (although this is also quite terrifying every time you have to cross the road – it appears that pedestrians never have the right-of-way). We also utilized the subway and sky train, but more on that later. Our hotel was in Sathorn, an area which we grew to really enjoy. There are many offices during the day, but it was quieter at night. The walk to Lumphini Park took about 25 minutes. The park provides a nice oasis from the busy city; we saw plenty of people going for walks/runs in the afternoon. The park is also home to Monitor Lizards, which to us, looked more like alligators/crocodiles. After walking around for a bit, we headed to the MBK mall. Along the way, we came across Sam Yan Mitrtown mall. Here we walked around the food court area (we had heard that the malls usually offer great food options) and picked up some delicious shrimp and pork dumplings before sitting down at one of the ramen restaurants for some noodles. With stomachs full, we continued to MBK. The Sam Yan Mitrtown mall reminded us of American malls with typical retail stores, while MBK consisted of thousands of stands crammed in together. The stands occupy 7 floors throughout the city block-sized building and are organized by product type (e.g., all electronic stands on one floor, each selling practically the same items). We were there just to observe and browse. When we finished exploring the mall, we walked the approximate 1.25 hours back to our hotel. We picked up some beer at the 7-Eleven (on literally every corner) to cap off our day back at the hotel room.

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On Day 2 in Bangkok, we visited the Grand Palace and Wat Pho. We considered adding Wat Arun (the third highly recommended temple to visit) to our day as well, but this temple is located across the river and therefore harder to get to from the Grand Palace and Wat Pho. In addition, visiting each of these places requires an entrance fee (Grand Palace is particularly high at 500 baht, or $17, per person), so we just picked two of the three. To get to the Grand Palace from Sathorn, we walked west towards the Chao Phraya River and caught the local water taxi at Tha Chang. There is also a tourist boat that is more expensive (60 baht vs. 20 baht), but typically faster and less crowded than the local boat (there is also an option for a day pass, which allows for unlimited use if you want to see all of the sights along the river in one day, 200 baht). The local water taxi was just fine for us – we walked past the tourist boat ticket area and got our tickets. The taxi showed up about 5 minutes later and we took this to stop #9 for the Grand Palace (about a 20-minute boat ride). From stop #9, it’s a short walk to the Grand Palace itself. The dress code is typical for most temples (e.g., covered shoulders, covered knees, no tight clothes including yoga pants), but note that capris on women are not allowed (need full pants). If you do not comply with these rules, you can (or rather are forced) to purchase the standard tourist elephant pants, shirts, or skirts for a marked-up price. We got to the Grand Palace around lunchtime and it was crowded! I would recommend going earlier in the morning to avoid the large tour groups which tend to start around 9 am. Renting an audio guide (200 baht) requires you to leave either a credit card or your passport (recommend the former) at the rental office to ensure it’s return. We only rented one because it comes with earplugs which makes it easy to share. We spent about an hour and a half at the Grand Palace, which we felt was plenty of time. Also note that the audio guide must be returned within an hour and 45 minutes or they will charge you extra. After the Grand Palace, we walked over to Wat Pho (10-minute walk). The entry to this temple is only 200 baht per person, and we spent about 40 minutes here. This temple was much easier for us to enjoy because it was much less crowded. The dress code also allows for capris on women here. Be sure to check out the Reclining Buddha here!

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Visiting temples and fighting the crowds for a few hours worked up our appetite, so we headed to Chinatown for some food. I will note that there is food EVERYWHERE in Bangkok. We don’t understand how all of the street food vendors survive, but we are so glad they do! The walk from Wat Pho to Chinatown was about 40 minutes. We snacked on various food cart offerings along the way before picking a stand in Chinatown for a substantial meal (rice with pork and noodles with chicken). We also walked through the Flower Market on the way to Chinatown. Extremely cheap flowers – I got a small arrangement for only 25 baht – definitely worth the stop. The shops in Chinatown are arranged by industry/product type (similar to the mall). For example, one block contained only mechanic shops, while another housed all of the textile shops. Again, each store appeared to stock/sell the same items as the next, so I’m not sure how you would choose! From Chinatown, we elected to walk the 1.75 hours back to our hotel – we think walking is the best way to catch glimpses into people’s everyday lives. However, we were exhausted by the end of it!

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The next morning, we relaxed and eventually made our way downstairs to get a taxi to the Khlong Lat Mayom floating market. This market, like many others, is only open on the weekends which made it a perfect Saturday activity. It is also located well outside center city Bangkok and in doing some research, we found taxi to be the most efficient way to get there (no public transportation nearby). The market consists of a few “floating” shops, but for the most part, is located on land. Our first goal was to taste as many different food options as possible. We started with a salt-crusted snake head (or Pla Pao) with some salsas and sides (herbs, cabbage, carrots, cucumber). Very tasty! We would highly recommend trying this (we continued to eat it wherever we saw it in Thailand). Next, we got a few pork dumplings and noodles with shrimp, followed by a coconut and black milk teas. We were too full to try anything else at this market, but we walked around for a while regardless. Another activity at the market is to take an hour boat ride down the Khlong Bang Phrom River. From what we could see, you would be in a group of probably 8 people or so (depending on crowds) and seemed a bit touristy for us. However, if you cross the Khlong Bang Phrom River to the west of the market, there was a woman taking people out in smaller groups (2-4 people) for cheaper. A group was just going out when we arrived and we didn’t want to wait an hour for the return, otherwise we would have done this! We relaxed for the rest of the afternoon back at the hotel and then went to Food Court 572 for dinner (just down the street from our hotel – a group of food vendors with tables in the middle). We ordered a salt-crusted tilapia here, and it was also delicious! On the way back to the hotel, we got a banana and egg roti for dessert. Rotis are similar to crepes and are topped with condensed milk and sugar.

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It was a weekend of markets for us as we followed up our visit to Khlong Lat Mayom on Saturday with a visit to the Chatuchak weekend market on Sunday. We took the sky train from the Sala Daeng stop to the Mo Chit stop (includes one transfer), which was very easy! The trains are very modern and clean, and there are ticket machines at each station that can be set to English – check that it accepts bills as some of them only take coins (in which case, we used the ticket windows instead). The Chatuchak market is large and located next to Chatuchak Park. We walked around for a couple hours, eating our way through the stands. Today we tried tom yum kung (seafood soup), green tea popsicle, octopus, dumplings, hardened crepes with coconut cream (look like small tacos), and a coconut. After our market visit, we walked over to the JJ Mall to use the bathrooms before heading to Chatuchak Park to read and relax. At the mall we came across a large section devoted to selling everything for fish tanks (e.g., fish, eels, stingrays, turtles, tanks, pumps, coral, rocks). I’ve never seen so many pet fish in one place before. In Chatuchak Park, we picked a nice shaded spot by the pond to read and nap for the afternoon. There are people at the park entrances that rent mats to sit on if you didn’t bring a towel/blanket. From Chatuchak Park, we took the sky train south to the Ratchathewi station. This was the closest we could get to Khao San Road using public transportation, and it still left us with an hour walk. We arrived just as the sun was going down, and we were still a bit early to see the typical crowds. While Khao San Road would typically not be our scene, we felt like we at least had to witness it for one night. We ended up grabbing a few beers and light food fare at one of the bars along the road. We tourist-watched (not a scene for locals) for a couple hours from our street-side table before setting off for the 2-hour walk home (we could have shaved off 30 minutes via subway, but it was a nice night).

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On our last day/night in Bangkok, we started with a few errands. We dropped off some laundry at Jane’s Laundry a few doors down from our hotel that had good reviews. They returned it to us that evening, clean and folded! Then we took the subway from the Lumphini station to Hua Lamphon station (train station) to purchase train tickets. While we could have booked tickets online, we didn’t have a way to print them, so we thought it would just be easier to go to the station. We were headed to Ayutthaya the next day. Since the train is only 1.5 hours to Ayutthaya, we figured we could save money and take the local train (20 baht per person, no A/C, no assigned seats). Tickets for the local train can only be purchased on the day of travel (but don’t sell out), so we would have to wait until tomorrow to buy these. However, we also wanted to buy tickets from Ayutthaya to Phitsanulok in two days’ time as this is a popular, longer route (3.5-4 hours). Fortunately, they still had some 2^nd class seats available for the morning train that we wanted. After securing our train tickets, we took the subway back towards the hotel one station (Sam Yan). There is an AIS store in Chamchuri Square – after researching the provider options, AIS appears to have the most coverage across all of Thailand. We were able to get a SIM card for my iPhone for only 250 baht (includes unlimited data for up to 1 month, calls and outgoing texts are extra). Note that AIS did need my passport to activate the SIM card. With our errands complete, we headed back to the hotel for a quick shower and then set off for Zoom Sky Bar. We wanted to get a drink with a view before celebrating at the Loy Krathong festival. The roof area at Zoom did not offer the happy hour special (half priced drinks), but there was a balcony area one floor below (36^th floor) with just as great of views.

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After drinks, we walked over to the Asiatique riverfront area as we had heard there were some good Loy Krathong celebrations in this area. We happened upon Wat Yannawa, which was hosting one such celebration. There were food vendors and opportunities to purchase krathongs (which we did). Then we waited to get up onto the riverfront walking area to release the krathongs into the Chao Phraya River. The riverfront boardwalk area is elevated from the river, so the Wat had slides set up to place the krathongs onto. The celebration was crowded, but fun! After releasing our krathong, we went back into the Wat and got some food from the vendors. Since we were leaving early the next morning, we didn’t stay out too late celebrating.

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