10 May, 2005

Howdy.
Well, we spent 3 days or so in Bangkok and did loads of exploring, which we were able to do this time - no water fights! So we actually found out how wonderful Bangkok really is. I love it there! We visited the deservedly-famous Reclining Buddha statue (100 feet long and 50 high, or thereabouts), went to Chinatown and busy Sukhumvit Road, and spent time in the main downtown shopping area in the company of Christian Dior, Gucci, Versace, Prada.......to name but a few. No designer purchases, though.
We did a LOT of walking and wore our sandals down a little! The river taxis were a blessing, though - you can travel much of the length of the city really easily and cheaply, so it's no trouble to get to the various parts of town. We also used the Sky-train a few times - it's similar to the Underground, but is elevated above the streets on concrete bridges. It only has 2 lines at the moment, so you can't travel all over the city, but it suited us pretty well.
So it was really good to be back in Bangkok and explore a bit. And now we're in the east, in a small market town called Trat, near the coast and the Cambodian border. We have a gorgeous guest house, we're the only guests, and we're only paying 120 baht, which is about a quid 70 per night for the room. So per person it's very cheap!!
Yesterday we went into Cambodia to renew our Thai visas - an hour in a minibus, then officially left Thailand at Passport Control, crossed into Cambodia where some friendly young chaps helped us out and directed us to the right offices, and filled in one of our forms for us. Then all that was left to do was to go back to Thai immigration and enter Thailand again! Quite a funny situation, it was all so low-key and low-tech - just formalities. We basically walked about 50 metres one way into Cambodia, and then back again into Thailand, and home to Trat.
So we now have another month in Thailand. Yay!!!!!! I love it here, we both do. Trat is a bit more interesting than Prachuap Kiri Khan - there's more to do here in the daytime. Good job, because the rain has been on and off for the past 2 days now. Yesterday didn't matter really, we spent most of the daytime doing the visa run. Then found a great restaurant that was mentioned in the guide book, and spent a few hours there with a gorgeous meal and a couple of beers. And today we hired bikes and cycled to the lake just outside the town, and rode around the edge of it, which took about 40 mins! It was raining, though, so no one else was really there - we had the road to ourselves and could enjoy the peace and quiet and hear the birds and frogs (about 3 different types of frog!).
So we'll most probably be here in Trat for Rob's birthday on Sunday (14 May). Definitely want to go back to Bangkok again, which is simple enough - though our journey here from Bangkok in a minibus on Saturday was to be 5 hours, according to the travel agent.........Great! we thought, and handed over our cash. And in the end it took almost EIGHT!!! So we'll go back on a public bus, and organise things ourselves this time.
We've got a really lovely map of Bangkok, drawn by a woman called Nancy Chandler, who's lived in Thailand for about 30 years and has made her name with this map. Have a look at www.nancychandler.net - you can get an idea of the style she draws in.