Bangkok - By Tuk-Tuk

Today was an odd day, and when you've spent three months traveling around the world, it takes a bit to make it a weird one. It's not that it started out strangely - in fact, the morning went according to plan.  Erin (as nearly always) was up before James, using our consistent internet access in a country that does not ban VOIP (unlike Dubai, India, China, etc.) to call her parents.  We breakfasted on food we had purchased from Tops the night before, and planned out an aggresive day of Bangkok sightseeing, figuring that if we could see what we wanted today, we would have time for a day trip - or two! - to some of the outskirts of Bangkok.

Erin had wanted to see the Grand Palace, one of Bangkok's main tourist attractions.  On the map, via Sukhumvit road, the trip looked like a 2.5 hour walk (or about 6.8 miles).  We've done walks like that before - in fact, we were averaging 15-20 miles a day in Europe.  Of course, it wasn't so hot or humid there, but we were optimistic.

Instead of simply window shopping as we walked east along Sukhumvit road, we actually stopped at some of the markets along the way.  In fact, in a dramatic departure from her spending habits on the trip, Erin even got some earrings.  Now, this may not sound like a big purchase to our readers, but Erin had lost one of her earrings early in the trip - and had waited until now, months later, to even purchase some replacements. James certainly thought they were well-deserved.

Erin models some of her new earrings outside the open-air department store.

With one purchase made, the floodgates were opened.  Well, not really.  However, throughout our travels, James has been interested in finding shirts from the different countries we visit with that country's language printed on the shirts.  We opted against it in Europe, due to the large number of countries and Americanized culture, but thought it would be fun to pick up a couple shirts in India and Thailand.  As he discovered, most shirts - or nearly every shirt with writing - is in English.  That's simply the look.  In India, there were few shirts with any Hindi writing, and in Thailand, the only shirts we noticed with Thai writing were either energy drink shirts or beer.  There were lots of beer t-shirts.

With this in mind, as we continued walking east, we left the basic tourist section of town, and found ourselves near Bangkok's national stadium.  There were less "shops" here than stores devoted to sports, trophies, and screen printing.  James had a brainstorm, and stopped in one of the silk-screening shops.  After a language-impaired 20 minutes, we ordered two specially-made t-shirts in Thai, and promised to return later that afternoon to pick them up.

As we walked around the neighborhood, we saw a number of stores that sold some very non-American goods - such as very large Buddha statues for home or office use.  We couldn't resist...

Tabitha sits pretty while the ornamental Buddha looks on skeptically.

We continued further east.  We crossed the river, and stopped to look at our map.  A Thai man then approached us and told us that there were protests near the national palace; he also said that because there was less tourism in Bangkok than in years previous, there was a special deal for western tourists where we could do a full run of Bangkok's tourist stops for 20 baht - or about 70 cents.

With that in mind, we continued walking until we came to a corner where a tuk-tuk driver stopped us and indicated that (again, looking at our map) he would take us on a tour for that 20 baht. It sounded like it was too good to be true - but, it matched up perfectly with what we were told on the street. 

At this point, we were tired, dehydrated, and, according to the map, still very far away from the tourist district.  We accepted the offer, and hopped in the tuk-tuk.

James holds on for dear life in the tuk-tuk.

Our tuk-tuk and driver, looking just a touch sketchy.



Erin is a bit apprehensive...

And we were off - without a real good understanding of exactly where we were headed, except that we were supposedly on the official government tourist track.  We sped around the city, visiting a nmber of very lovely temples and grounds, but, oddly enough, none of them showed up on our tourist map.  The driver kept us going so quickly that we had little time to determine exactly where were were - but everywhere we went, we ran into other tourists evidently on the same tour.

Instead of listing the places we visited, it will be more fun to play photo tour - besides, we've heard rumors that many of our readers just visit us for the photos.  This blog section - is for you, dear readers:

One of the temples - reminscent of a wedding or birthday cake.

James caught in Erin's lens mid-temple walk.



The giant Buddha we visited - it was 45 meters high!

Those flowers by the feet of the towering Buddha are for offereings and for reference.

Different cultures, different requirements.

One of the lovely temple interiors.

An outside shrine on the back of a temple.

Some of the very intricate gold filigree work at a Bangkok temple.

Bells feature prominently in many of the temples.

A long line of Buddhas stretched along all four sides of this pavilion.

Tabitha makes friends with a very different-looking dragon.

Most temples require you to remove your shoes before entering; not all warn you in English.

Another pavillion ringed with Buddhas.

This Buddha cradles an offering left by a petitioner.

Another temple, this one unique due to its masonry.

This golden dome soared high into the Bangkok afternoon.

One of the spectacular temple structures.

One of the many elaborate fantastical animal figurines.

Interspersed among the tuk-tuk ride to the various temples were three "visits" to tourist-trap-type establishents - one seedy-looking jewelry store, a tourist travel booking agency, and a bespoke suit store.  We finally ended by convincing the driver to take us back to where we had started.  James then tried to pay the fare, and the driver, perhaps embarassed by the places he had taken us to (he received gas vouchers for credit for each tourist-trap we visited) actually refused the fare or any tip.  Bewildered, we wandered off, back across the river to pick up our t-shirts.

Now freed, we headed into a Tesco's ground floor food court for some much-needed lunch.
 

James's curry, salad, bean sprouts - and something with an "8."

We walked the rest of the way back to the hotel, only stopping briefly to take a picture with Tabitha and the Madame Tussaud's Michael Jackson replica:

Tabitha's Bangkok Thriller.

And that was our random, random day.  We never made it to the Grand Palace, but we did see a good bit of Bangkok - and it was a free ride (kind of).  We wouldn't do it again, but all's well that ends well, and we made it back to the hotel in time for a movie before bed.