Bangkok in style

We decided to live in style for the last four nights in Bangkok. We booked into the Royal ThaTien Village, right in the middle of all the top attractions of Bangkok. The hotel is in an old shophouse with wooden floors next to the Chao Phraya River across from Wat Arun and next to the Wat Pho and the Grand Palace.

Our room was large with wooden floors and wooden shutters opening to the street below.

The first evening we took the ferry across the river to look at the marvellous Wat Arun with its five signature prangs. We marvelled at all the intricate sculptures and carvings for hours.

The next day we visited Wat Pho which houses the giant reclining Buddha.

On the second day we got up early to be first in line at the Grand Palace. Our plan worked and for about 10 minutes we were completely alone at the temples around the Temple of the Emerald Buddha. But soon the literally thousands of tourists arrived, around 20 000 tourists a day visit the Palace complex.

Included in the Palace pass we got to watch a condensed traditional khon (Thai masked dance) performance at the Sala Chalermkrung Royal Theater. We really enjoyed the show and the traditional music that is performed live on local instruments.

In the evening we took a taxi to China Town where we snacked on some street food. Caro even enjoyed a bowl of Pork tripe. To get back to the hotel we spotted a local bus with a number that we’ve seen coming past the hotel. We got onto the old bus with wooden floors and paid the 8-baht fee (ten times cheaper than the taxi). The conductor uses a metal tube to store the money and cuts the tickets with the lid all in one smooth motion, while swaying with the motion of the bus.

For our last full day in Bangkok we decided to try out all the different transport options. We took a ferry downstream to a BTS Skytrain Station. We then took the Skytrain to a gigantic mall (the train basically stops inside the mall). Afterwards we spent some time in the Lumphini Park. For the journey back we used the underground metro that ran all the way to a new station that hasn’t officially opened yet, within 300m of our hotel.