YVR - BKK

Monday March 14th & March 15th (Vancouver - Bangkok)

Our journey started a week ago when we decided to stop beating around the bush and book the cheapest/soonest flight possible. We lucked out and were able to find a flight for $860 round trip leaving in 7 days and before we knew it we were taxiing down the runway. I expected the flight to be extremely hellish but Air China exceeded all expectations with the personal star alliance entertainment system. We had a 3 hour lay over in Beijing before taking another 5 hour flight to Bangkok. We crossed the date line and jumped ahead 14 hours, so we finally arrived at 2 am Wednesday morning bagged tired. Amazingly enough still more astute then our taxi driver which pretended to not know where he was going in the airport district and then when we suggested calling the hotel to get directions he forgot how to dial a phone.  Lucky for us Lisa had booked a room and the told them when we were to be expected... the night watchman was happily waiting for us when we finally showed up which was a huge relief. 

- Jason

Wednesday March 16th (Bangkok)

7/11 on every corner selling prepackaged mini instant coffee

We didn’t get much of a full nights sleep last night, arriving at our hostel at around 2am, our minds were still trying to adjust to the major time difference and the little naps we took on our second flight. We got into our taxi pretty early to head into Central Bangkok, not really too sure how far out of the city we were and it wasn’t until we had been in the cab for an hour that we realized it wasn’t exactly close. We battled traffic the entire time and paid a toll just to ride on the express highway. At the end it took us about an hour and a half. When we got the street that lonely planet said our hotel was on, the taxi driver had no idea which way to go and literally dropped us off on an extremely busy and overwhelming street. If it wasn’t for a nice lady how could see the stress in our eyes giving us general directions we would have been searching for hours. Trying to understand a Thai map, not our strong suit. We got to Lamphu House with our fingers crossed that they would still have a room available. When we got there we saw just how popular the guesthouse was. The line up was huge and the receptionists were constantly busy with travelers questions. We were lucky enough that they had a room, because it wasn’t too long after we arrived that a “full” sign was put up on the counter. Our room wasn’t going to be ready for a little while so we went on a little walk around the get used to everything around us and grab some lunch. Our first Thai food experience was a success for me (veggie pad thai) and not so much for Jason who in the end preferred my meal. We went back to our hostel and had a much needed nap. Getting used to the time difference is a little more difficult then Central America. We woke up, found our favourite store 7-11 (no slurpees though, disappointing) and headed to Khao San Road to see what all the fuss was about. What we were faced with was endless market stalls, with everything from knock-off Havaiana’s and casio’s to clothes galore. We ended up buying a few things and realized that we should have come with barely anything from home because all the essentials that you need (tanks and flip flops) never cost more then $5. Lesson learned. The weather isn’t very good here, overcast and rainy (hello Vancouver) so our hoodies and pants that we brought actually came to good use. We headed back to the hotel for an afternoon nap before dinner which ended up being bed time for us at 6pm.

-Lisa

Thursday March 17th (Bangkok)

After waking up from a 14 hour.... much needed slumber we were ready to get at it.  We got dressed and headed down to the street to test out one of the many restaurants in the busy back packer area. Food is cheap but after sleeping for so long and skipping dinner the night before I was literally starving. As you would expect, portion size really doesn't stack up against North American Standards... Lisa and myself both ordered two meals and were still hungry. Feeling fully recharged we set out the day to go and see some of the famous sights... by foot, after turning down a tuk tuk drivers service, we turned back on the recommendation of wearing pants if we planned to go to some temples. We were determined to walk around and get some exercise but we caved when we were offered a 40 Baht ($1.50) temple tour and were getting rained on, we jumped in. Riding a Tuk Tuk was on my list of things to do after missing out on them throughout central america. 

The Tuk Tuk Scam

We knew he was running some sort of angle... He ended up promising a tour to take us to some of the Budda sights, a tourist info center and then drop us off at the Grand Palace which didn't open until 1... our tour started at around ten. He first took us to some close by lesser temples which were neat to see, but in between these temples he'd pull into different places (travel agencies and suit tailors) where he'd pimp us out to get  200 Baht each ($8 gas vouchers from the government). We finally got tired of seeing these sub-par smaller temples and being rented out to pretend like we were interested in whatever they were selling and asked to get dropped off early at the Grand Palace. He ended up driving us some random place that looked almost like it could be the Grand Palace and demanded payment before peeling off. Turns out he drove us around about a 5 block area and didn't drop us off at the Grand Palace. Tired, wet and slightly ticked off at anybody Thai (other then nat) we walked back to our guest house. 

Not the Grand Palace :(

We ended up booking our next weeks adventure at the Thai Government Travel Agency which after asking around turns out to be the best place to book through... however I'm pessimistic about how it'll turn out. We booked all of our transportation, accommodation and meals as well as a 3 day trek in Chiang Mai staying with locals, riding elephants and bamboo rafts. Then heading to Laos and taking a 'slow boat' down the Mekong River to Luang Prabang. It worked out to be slightly less then $35/day