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Bangkok chinatown

Travel diaries in Bangkok

Tuesday 27th of March

Finally in Bangkok. Warm. Lots of people. Happiness. Joyful to be in a big Asian city  as we like. We go straight to the neighborhood we sleep: Bangkamphu, the guest house is quiet and in a calm road away from the effervescence of the old part of the city. A shower and we go out exploring. Everything is happening on the street, apparently without order, people walking in a rush like ants, restaurants, houses, the old lady selling juices, cars, the young guy having a smoke, tuk-tuk, apartments, commerces, school students, markets.

First, we stop in a little stand under a bridge to buy a fruit juice from the previously mentioned old lady. We keep walking on Samsen road which is in the old part of Bangkok. Our body still not used to the hot and humid weather (understand: we sweat like pigs).

Our steps takes us to the iconic Khao San Road. Now is time to eat, we go for our first Thai curry and tom yam soup. Following we find a tuk-tuk and engage in an endless negotiation with the driver to get the best deal. It’s fine with us, we jump in! The driver bring us in a temple, for luck he says. But we need to say now we are fed up with temples after our last trip to Myanmar,  so we don’t stay long in here. We head to our next stop in the tuk-tuk but by this time we start to understand the game the driver is playing, an imposed list of the most touristic spots in the city, but surprisingly the golden mount is pretty nice, lots of big bells on the way up and a 360 degree view of Bangkoks skyline. The driver takes us to a first and then a second “tourist information center”, but hey folks, here we need to make emphasis on this situation, in case you happen to be in the same place as us, this is a scam! the guy from the information center started to play a sketch in front of us on how everything in Thailand is “booked” on the low season and we need to plan and purchase our whole month trip with him. Of course we go running out of this place and completely understand that there is a mafia between “official” tourist centers and the tuk-tuk drivers.

Of course by this time our driver is pissed off because we didn’t buy anything so he says our ride is over, now we walk to chinatown from here. A maze of streets, shops to find everything and nothing, rats, stands for juice, scooters in the alleys, cockroaches, people everywhere, street food, yes we are now in chinatown.Inside all this buzz we find an oasis, a hidden and contrasting cafe that seems to be totally out of place, you know how in Cobalt State we love to discover places like this, that stand out in the place they are.

chinatown bangkok

We see the sunset from the river’s edge, looking for a recommended place to have dinner, that by the way we don’t find. It’s now night time and we stroll down the streets of busy chinatown and admire the crazy colors of the neon lights everywhere, take some pictures of this iconic corner and decide not to grab food in here as apparently  this is one place to go loco on the seafood! you can grab whatever fish, shell, scallop or sea creature that you can imagine, but guess what? I’m allergic to seafood! (I like it, but last time I tried I almost die in Singapore) Floriane loves it but she is always very empathic towards me since this episode, so we decide to go eat in a joint near our hostel, where they serve a delicious vegetarian Tom Yam soup.

Wednesday 28 of March

Today we woke up late, still having some issues with the jet lag, we go straight to get a fruit juice and a yellow curry. We take a boat from the pier that takes us up in the river, we get down next to the ghost tower in the Sathorn district, we are very interested in going up this old abandoned building, but its not easy to do and there is a lot of people watching and warning us not to go up, we decide to stay on the ground and go search for a legal place where we can have a view point of the city and enjoy a cocktail.

After taking the longest and coolest tuk-tuk ride, we arrive to a street full of tall buildings in Lumphini district, we are looking for a recommended rooftop bar: Char. after going into 2 wrong buildings asking for the place finally we got the third one right, its inside the indigo hotel on the 26th floor.

The staff received us with a big smile and asked us four our reservation, of course we didn’t had one! but the guy tell us he has a place for us where we seat and order some drinks. they are delicious! not as good as in Singapore but very decent, we order some guacamole as appetizer and we sit to enjoy the amazing view and sunset in front of us. This is definitely a good spot we recommend, as a tip: when in the city is super warm weather just go up and take some height, the wind in there is going to help you cool down and feel more chill.

It’s the beginning of the night and now we want to go check out the famous red district (one of them, because you can find a few). So basically you have a big night market where you can find all sorts of dodgy things, and on the side is full of girls or should we say « girls », inviting you to have a drink inside this shady bars, they proposed to us to watch the polemic ping pong show, which we politely declined, we let you make your own research on this topic.

During all our visit to the market we had vendors offering us cheap prices to check the pussy show, we felt a little bit uncomfortable by the insistance so we walked to the parallel street, just to find a road full of suspicious  bars crowded by half naked ladyboys, winking at us and inviting us to join them in the party.

We had lots of fun watching this exotic side of Bangkok.

We finished the night in kahosan road, which was packed of tourist having the party of their lives! everybody drinking in the street and taking laughing gas off ballons, dancing and jumping around. On our side we decided to try some of the insects the vendor was selling in the street, we go fore a huge black emperor scorpion!  Yes, there is no doubt we are in Thailand.

Thursday 29th of March

We hang around Bangkamphu, a slower day after the 2 previous ones packed of activities. In the afternoon we found a coffee in which we spent a few hours because we were not feeling ok and they had a good A/C. Later we went to take a drink in a close by rooftop bar and have a delicious papaya salad, which later will become one of our favorite Thai dishes.

Friday 30th of March

During our last day in Bangkok we decide to go to a modern district in the city, searching for the largest rooftop garden in a big shopping complex, we didn’t find it open because they were doing some maintenance works on it, but we had a great experience looking for the place. Was the first time we tried a public bus in Thailand, and even if the buses look very old and the system seems complicated at first, we realized that it actually works  fairly well. We stop the bus, route 150, we get on and a friendly lady comes and charges us $22 bath for the both of us. After 25 minutes in the bus we arrived to a street with a lot of traffic and high buildings, we stop infant of Siam Center and the lady very polite tells us that this is the stop we are looking for.

We walked just a little to discover a gigantic shopping mall, we go directly to the one of the food courts to find a little Japanese stall that sells fried gyoza, a small slightly fried dumpling filled with vegetables and minced pork beef, served with a coleslaw salad and soya sauce to season.

After hanging around this place and having a coffee, where we had the chance to look at a different kind of lifestyle of Thai people, one that is heavily influenced by western costumes.

We finished our travel in Bangkok by picking up our bag packs in the hostel and going directly to the bus terminal, where our bus to get to Ranoong a little port city where we need to catch a ferry to finally go to Koh Phayam a small island where chill time awaits us.

Comments

  • 6 May 2017
    reply

    Fan de votre univers photographique ! Je suis ravie qu’il y ai un blog maintenant 🙂

  • 7 May 2017
    reply

    Ravie de la sortie du blog ! Il est très bien fait et très complet ! Hâte de voir la suite.

  • 7 May 2017
    reply
    Catherine

    On voyage avec vous c’est génial.

  • 7 May 2017
    reply

    Wawww, fotos, expectaculares, muy padres, felicidades.

  • 8 May 2017
    reply
    Laura

    Mucho movimiento, tan diferente que lo hace muy interesante. Parece un viaje increible, suerte.

  • 8 May 2017
    reply
    Cristina

    Hermosos lugares, disfruten mucho y suerte en su proxima parada!!!

    Besos

  • 11 March 2018
    reply

    Excellente synthèse, écriture plaisante autant que pertinente, toujours appréciable de dégoter une telle qualité via internet !

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