The rest of the week

As Alex and Konrad's flight didn't land until almost midday I decided to use the train again intead of taking a taxi.

So I did the check out and asked in reception whether they could call a tuk-tuk to take me to Nana station as I didn't fancy walking with the suitcase and for my surprise, they told me that the hotel offers a cortesy tuk-tuk free of charge...

The tuk-tuk was parked outside so I jumped in and enjoyed the ride to the BTS (overground) station... and from there I went to Phaya Thai

where I changed to the train that goes to the airport and the whole trip from the moment I left the hotel until I made it to the airport took me about an hour..

We had a driver that would take us from the airport to the villa that we had rented so when I got there I looked for someone holding a sign with either Konrad's or Alex's names and a few minutes after my arrival someone put up a sign with Alex's name so I decided to wait there for them... to my surprise when they finally managed to come out, another driver popped out holding Konrad's name... I pointed out to Alex that there was a sign with his name but at the time he thought there was another person called like him so we left with our driver and in about 1 and a half hours we finally made it to the villa where someone was there to meet us, give us the keys, read the meters etc...

During the conversation we found out that they had actually sent a taxi to pick us up (hence Alex's name at the airport) which means that Alex's name still remains unique, they didn't know we had made our own arrangements.

The villa was fantastic... just as in the pictures. A truly amazing place to relax.

Three bedrooms, two of them with on suite bathrooms

 Living room + kitchen

 swimming pool with jacuzzi

 And the back garden

The only problem though, was that it was in the middle of the countryside and if we wanted to go somewhere we needed to call a taxi and wait for an hour before it showed up and then it would take us anything between 20 and 40 minutes in the taxi to get to civilisation. Which turned up to be expensive in time and money and pretty much left us stranded in the villa...

Although the villa was so good that we were more than happy to be "stranded" there. :-)

The first time we tried to get a taxi we went to the three houses by the road and asked the locals where we could find a taxi and one of ladies there told us that her husband would take us for 500 Bath (sqeeze the tourist for as much as you can seems to be the moto in the area) so the first night we went with him in his pick up truck...we didn't have much of a choice really... but then we found out other ways to get a taxi so we always managed to go for either 300 or 400 Bath (6-8 GBP/ 8-10 EUR).

Nice sunsets too

We had a pretty good restaurant nearby where the owner spoke a very good english... Alex spotted this little fellow on the way there one day...

So what do you think it was the first thing we did when we arrived to the villa?...

That's right... we checked the swimming pool just to make sure that temperature and chlorine levels were adequate... and I'm please to report that they were. :-)

There were some storms sometimes... they wouldn't last long... maybe an hour or so.

First you would see the sky getting darker and darker...

 And then... suddenly... hell would break loose

It felt so impressive that I even took a very short video while the locals looked at me as if I've never seen the rain before... crazy tourist!

Right in front of the restaurant there was a local temple, fortunately known by all the taxi drivers in the region and although they are still restauring it, it didn't look too bad...

The left part is still un-decorated

 But you can see the right door to have an idea of what it'll look like at the end...

One of the days we visited a restaurant in town with not only good food but also a Thai dancing show

Konrad took this picture of Alex and myself while waiting for the food

 And the Thai dancing...

We spent most of the time at the villa by the swimming pool with the occasional outing for dinner...

And I'm afraid that's pretty much it, as I had to cut my holidays short, so I'll be missing the diving, the snorkling, the islands that we had been planning on visiting...but who knows... maybe another time... so many countries... so little time. :-)

The Bangkok Temples Part 2

The Grand Palace was supposed to be even more impressive than the Wat Pho temple  but I personally enjoyed more the second... even when I was spending most of my time thinking about a nice glass of cool water instead of the nice temple or statue in front of me...

The entrance to the Wat Pho temple was quite cheap but the ticket for the Grand Palace was quite expensive 500 Bath (about 12 euros)... and they have rules... yes... decency rules apply... i.e. women need to cover their sholders and men and women need to cover their legs.

I was lucky because I was carrying the sleeves to zip back to my trousers so they become long trousers instead of shorts...I would be depriving the world of the view to my sexy hairy legs though... but I thought the temple was worth the sacrify...

You may be wondering why would I carry the trouser sleeves and a thin jumper in my rucksuck on a 35C+ day... well... for some reason unknown to me, Thai people love the air-con a full thrust so instead of regulating the temperature to a nice 21C they always put it at 17 or even lower so after a few minutes in a shopping centre you do need a thin jumper or end up catching a cold like I did on my first visit to Bangkok some years back...

In any case, if you didn't happen to have some with you (like most people) you had the option to purchase a fashionable pair of thai decorated trousers by the entrance... and some couples were even buying matching trousers... I'm afraid I didn't had the guts to take a picture of that as someone would probably end up aggravated by the odd guy taking pictures of peoples trousers...

The Grand Palace covers a great extension... and I know that because I had to walk all around it when I was looking for the Wat Pho temple... and it took me 30 minutes...

One of the things that Susana told me to check out was the Angkor Wat replica. They do have an exact replica of Angkor Wat at a scale... of course...

Not as impressive as the original but it gives you a good indication about size and scale of the real one.

The statues here were quite impressive as well

and there were some impressive frescos as well... I'm guessing depicting some important events in Thai history

and the final bits of the temple...

By the time I finished it was 15:30 or so and I was quite peckish so I thought I would just get another taxi and go to the nearby shopping centre to have a late lunch and perhaps watch another movie in a nice and air condicioned place... because I wasn't sure how much more heat I could take after spending 4-5 hours walking in the sun at 35C... I suppose it goes without saying that at this point I was dreaming of all sorts of cool drinks with lots and lots of ice...

Got out of the temple walls back to the street and inmediately sppoted a queue of taxis, great! I thought... fresh iced cool lemonade in less than 20 minutes  :-)

Got into the taxi, told him where I wanted to go knowing full well that with the taximetre it would cost about 80 Bath... his response... 400 Bath... I choked first... thought I didn't understand correctly with his thick accent and repeated 400? he affirmed with his head and I just laugh....  then I said 100 and it was his turn to laugh... out loud... he didn't even tried to reduce it a little bit or anything... so in that instant it became clear to me that these taxis waiting outside the temple were just a tourist trap... 400 Bath wouldn't have ruined me but it felt like robbery at gun point so I opened the door and left... I could still hear the taxi driver laughing as I was closing the door... They must be making so much money out of the tourists...

Okay...plan B...walk outside the touristic area and stop a taxi... so got into a 7-11 and bought some cool lemon juice and did another half an hour of walking under the scorching sun until I couldn't see any tourist and stopped a taxi... told him where I wanted to go and he said 200... okay only double I can live with that... Cool drink and a nice meal 20 minutes away. :-)

After the meal I went to watch a movie and then, just because I'm worth it went for a one hour Thai massage that hurt like hell and then just on my way to the hotel I decided to get a one hour foot massage just because I was still worth it. :-)

The following day I was picking up Alex and Konrad at the airport on our way to what we thought was a villa near the beach in Jomtien... but that's another story for another day. :-)

The Bangkok temples

Let me start by saying that this was a veeery long day but knowing what I know now I don't think I would've done it any differently.

Before coming to Bangkok I did some research into things to do and places to visit around Bangkok and discovered that the bridge over the river Kwai is not too far and it can be done in a one day excursion... but decided to have a backup plan just in case...so I got in touch with my Bangkok expert, Susana. She lived in Bangkok for more than half a year so who better to ask? :-)

She gave me a few recommendations, I checked where all of them were in order to get a sense of how far and how long it would take to visit them.

As yesterday I was very tired I didn't fancy spending today running around all day catching trains, taxis, tuk tuks and whatnot so I went into my back up plan and opted to visit one of Susana's recommendations, the Grand Palace and another nearby temple  Wat Pho (The reclining buda).

My original plan was to get up early to avoid the midday sun, take the BTS (overground) towards the centre and then a taxi.

As I walked down the street from my hotel I couldn't help to notice the amazing electrical installation.

You can hear the electricity buzzing as you walk by... it's also wise to look for hunging cables and try not to hit them with you head as you walk through...

Also very handy in case of a heart attack... just pull from one of the cables and you'll be good to go in no time. :-)

You may think this is just a one off thing... but no... the whole town is wired this way!

As I got out of the BTS I stopped a taxi and I got really lucky as my taxi driver not only understood where I wanted to go , remember they can't read latin characters so I asked earlier how the place I was going was called  and  repeated it to the taxi driver, he afirmed with his head and signal me to get in... and for my amazement he put the taxi-meter on!!!

Usually taxi drivers try to rip you off ... not as much as in Egypt though... they prefer not to put the taxi-meter on and just tell you how much they are going to charge you (usually 4-5 times the real price) and it's up to you whether you take it or not.

I must have found the only honest taxi driver in Bangkok!!! a pity he couldn't speak english otherwise I would've asked him for his card and used him every time...

Anyway, I digress...

Between breakfast, the BTS, the taxi etc... I got there at 11:30 not 9:30 as I was hoping... although the extra sleep felt really good.

The taxi fare was 78 Bath (a couple of euros). Remember this figure because I'll come back to it...

As there was a lot of traffic and we were sitting on it I told him I would do the rest walking as we were already on one of the sides of the Wat Pho temple...  what I didn't know is that there was only one entry and it was on the opposite side of where I was so I had to walk for 30 minutes under the scorching midday sun until I found the main gate...

I this point I already had drunk the half a litre of water I brought with me...

The reclining Buddha was in the temple right in the centre of the whole complex.

Every door to every temple is guarded by two warrior statues like below

Normally before entering a Buddhist temple you leave your shoes outside but in this case they had this handy carry bags so you just stick you shoes in it and take it with you inside so you don't find yourself wondering who and why did they steal your old sandals at the entrance.

The reclining Buddha is 46 metres long and all the walls are decorated by many murals

Despite of the 46 metres it was still difficult to walk with so many people

The head and the body are not very impressive...

but the feet were another thing altogether

And these are some of the surronding areas of the temple...

Some of the warriors guarding the doors were quite impressive in the detail

Looks like the Thai Massage was already popular back in the day...

 Some of the smaller temples

And more guardians

By now I was completely dihydrated but there was a nice coffee shop by the exit so a good lemonade and a new bottle of water allowed me to continue the visit to the  Grand Palace ... but that will go in the next post as this one is getting too long... due to the many pictures...