Thailand

Hi to all,

Today we ventured to the Grand Palace, which has been one of the most jaw dropping we have seen on our travels so far. Obviously, the day didn't go without a hitch - as it never does, there were people standing outside the palace telling us its closed and they would take us somewhere better, or they would give us a personal tour blah blah blah. After getting through those hoards we eventually got inside the outer gates to the ticket office, no problem, went to the main entrance and got refused as Dom's trousers were not long enough - doh! We had specifically worn long clothes in the blistering heat so we would get in. Anyway, three attempts later to find the building which gives out long trousers we finally got in.

The builidings are very extravagant, reds, greens, blues, mirrors topped off with gold gold gold. In fact in comparison to even the temple of heaven, it was really colourful!! There are a few pictures below to give you an idea. Within the grand palace the main attraction is the emerald buddha which is apparently where hundreds of thousands of people make a pilgrimage too every year. Although its not actually made of emerald and its only 60cm high (could be 30cm I cant remember accurately). This buddha sits on a 9 metre high throne which is just blinging at every angle and there is a ceremony a 3 times a year when they change the statues clothes (something heavy for the winter, something more airy for the summer and a coat when it gets cold). As cynical as I may sound it is very impressive and well worth a visit. Unfortunately you are not allowed to take photos of the buddha so you will have to google it to see it. Within the palace there are several other temples which we took about another hour to walk around, each one still as impressive as the next.

After giving back the hideous trousers that Dom had been suffering in we went for a well-deserved ice-cream before heading into downtown Bangkok to go to the aquariam! It seems like a strange thing to do we know but why not - it boasts the largest underwater walkway in SE Asia (apparently). After paying an extortionate amount of money to get in (9 Euros) it turned out to be well worth it. We had our pictures taken inside a sharks mouth (unlike the tigers this was dead), watched a shark feeding show and felt like 10 year old kids for the afternoon.

Seeing as it took about an hour and a half to walk to the aquariam, we didn't fancy walking back, but then again, there was no metro that went back towards the direction of our hotel and there was so much traffic on the road that we would make it there before a taxi. Therefore...we put our lives in the hands of a tuk tuk. It was horrifying!! We were not quite sure if he was trying to scare us on purpose or this was just the way of the tuk tuk but we did almost shat our pants. Swerving in and out of the traffic, stopping within an inch of the car in front and almost being squished from the back...but...we made it, and surprisingly in one piece.

Tomorrow is our last day in Bangkok which is a shame as this has been a great city to relax in for the last couple of days. We have seen a ton of sights, areas within and outside the city and most importantly sampled several bars in the area.

Onto the floating markets and Chiang Mai...

Team Domro

Hello,

As we were fit for practically nothing yesterday we thought it best to finally get our backsides into gear and not waste another day on the beer or hungover.

So today we were off on a one day tour to Kanchanburi (more famously known for the River Kwai) followed by a visit to the Tiger Temple.

The day started at 6am (as you can see we are definately back to the early starts!) as we had to catch the bus at 7am. There must be at least 500 of these small travel agents in Bangkok that sell one, two, three and more day tours very cheap so it is definately the easiest way to see stuff. What you soon come to realise is that they actually all sell the same tours and its a matter of just playing the price off each of them to get the best deal. Anyway, the minibus worked its way down to our travel agent after picking people up at the 499 agencies before us and we set on the way.

The first stop was the WW2 cemetary for the POW's that died building the bridge (over the river Kwai). Even though it was just a cemetary, it was quite emotional in the fact that you realised over half of the headstones said between the ages 20-30 years - so it like a whole generation wiped out. Being very fair to the area, the cemetary was very well maintained with the grass cut, sprinklers going and flowers on the graves, so they are taken very good care of which is nice to see (even more so surprising as it is not somewhere you have to pay to visit). Our next stop was the museum which carried artefacts from the war both the Japanese side and the POW's. It was really interesting finding out the full history about the war and the building of the railway, if not very sad at the same time. After we visited the museum, Dom and myself walked across the bridge - thats right, walked! There was no barriers on the side or safety net underneath and only room for one person in the middle of the tracks, so pass by other people you had to stand on the rail to the side which was quite scary. You would never be able to do that at home! I kind of figured that the trains must not use the bridge anymore and thats why we could freely walk across it - so you can well imagine our surprise when we hearD an ear blasting horn coming from behind us when we were only half way across!! Apparently they do still use the line!! We were literally on the bridge when the train was going across it - made for a great picture.

I forgot to mention that even though these tours are great, the person who takes you can't really speak English very well, so the two of us got very confused at this point and just went where the man pointed - which was back onto the bus. Next thing we know we have been brought to a train station, told to get on the next train and get off after 40 minutes. It then clicked to us that we were going to ride on the death railway. This was actually quite an experience. To look out the window of a train which is moving on a wooden track which looks less studier than lego is fairly nervewrecking. Still, we got some great photos (which we have figured out how to put up on the website). Oh, we were also able to then give out about the silly people who wouldn't get off the tracks when we were crossing the bridge. And believe it or not, the driver was actually at the other end of the line when we had to get off the train!

A great morning and a real experience into a part of history: we are really glad we did it.

This afternoons adventure could of taken a real turn for the worst had anything gone wrong - without spoiling the ending too much we are here to tell the tale - we went to the Tiger Temple, which is basically a wildlife park predominantly for tigers, but also has pigs, horses, chickens, cows etc roaming free as well. Not to confuse the situation it is the latter animals that roamed free, the tigers don't have that privilage. As you can imagine, Dom being the great lover of animals that he is, he couldn't wait to get in there with the Tigers! The beauty of this place is you can actually touch the tigers. There were about 10 tigers chained in a valley area where the staff would take people in one by one to sit with the tigers and have your photo taken. For every person that goes in there are 3 members of staff continuously watching you and the tiger that you are annoying to ensure you don't get your head bitten off. To no surprise, Dom didn't go in - considering he won't go near Holly at home, I let him off for not going into the tigers. However...I braved them! (although you can see from the pictures I didn't touch them - why annoy a tiger any more than you have too?!?) Twas fantastic though as like walking on a railway bridge, this is something you would never get the opportunity to do at home.

Later on that evening after a day like today there was no beer, restaurants or galavanting. It was dinner off a street stall, (cheap and tasty) then to bed. We switched on a film at ten and fell asleep by five past...zzz...dreaming of the tigers.

Team Domro

A groggy hello,

Well, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that today was practically a write off in terms of doing the tourist thing. I would love to have blamed last nights curry, but I have a feeling it was all about the beer Chang. I had the most crippling headache, worst in a long time so i am going to partially blame the malaria tablets as a side effect can be headaches. So after finally getting up at about 2.30pm we decided to take it easy and actually spent the rest of the afternoon at the markets. Found the most fantastic bargains. Khaosan road is just made up of restaurants, bars, cafes, clothes stalls, food stalls, hair braiders, massage places, DVD stalls - it is the place where travellers feel like they are 'living the dream' - although were totally convinced that its a place where we would want to stay for months on end as some people do. Anyway, got a whole new wardrobe and a ton of DVD's to bulk up the collection even more.

Really truely, we just spent the day spending money as we were fit for nothing else...

Funnily enough, we didn't go near any alcohol.

Team Domro

Well we got up today with great hopes for seeing many things around the city Bangkok. We had planned to hit the Grand Palace, get a boat from the pier and everything, well none of that actually happened.......

We headed off from the hotel after a bit of a lie in at round midday. Our first aim was to get to the Grand Palace, we walked around for a while aimlessly, we got the map out but i dont think our hearts were in it today - the heat is very tiring. So we decided to go for a quick cold beer to settle the heads before heading off sightseeing again. We headed to Khonsan cause we knew there was plenty of bars there. Roisin decided to have a Black Russian as her first drink which i suppose is always a sign of things to come! I just had a beer and a club sandwich, Roisin got some spicy chicken sandwich which was so spicy she had to neck the Black Russian. Anyway we enjoyed that drink so much we decided to go to another bar and have another drink. I went up to the bar to get a couple of glasses of Chang, I ordered 2 pints, after he poured them i noticed that one of the glasses had a huge lipstick mark on it, straight away i thought classy establish! The next bit was great though cause when i pointed it out to him he wiped the lipstick off with his finger and looked at me as if he had done me a favour, so i asked him for a new pint, i assumed he knew what i meant but i was wrong, he poured the same beer into another glass,eventually i got what i wanted. We actually stayed in that bar for another pint after - must have been the service or something! We then found another bar down one of the Khaosan sidestreets. We originally ordered 2 Leo beers but the guy convinced us that Beer Chang was the best, well we took him seriously and proceeded to ordrer another 6 bottles. Every order was followod by a roar from the waiter of Beer Chang Gud!

Now my memory actually starts to waiver here so im gonna have to get some information from Roisin. We decided we wanted something to eat, so set about looking for somewhere, ***We actually wanted to look around the markets before getting something to eat*** Roisin had gone into a shop to try on a skirt,which i dont remember***he thought it was light blue and short, it was actually dark green and long*** any somehow i realised that we had left our book of Thailand in the last bar but didnt have a clue were the bar was! I went into tell Roisin. We eventually found it***I (Roisin) actually knew where the bar was*** and ended up settling down for dinner and a few more Chang's (of course) in a restaurant nearby. We ordered One Thai Red Curry and one Green Curry. Now my memory wasnt the best at this stage but fuck me ive never eaten anything so spicy ***I cannot disagree, bugger me, it was the hottest thing ever***,the 2 of us were literally pouring sweat eating these dishes, we had a 2 litre bottle of water which we were chugging down at the same time. ***Dom has actully given up writing at this point as he doesnt actually remember anything else***

So...there we were sweating to bits looking like two pissed tomatoes when two Germans sat down next to us for their dinner, they asked us would we recommend the curry but our look said it all - he was obviously up for the challenge though and ordered it anyway. The four of us ended up chatting over dinner although neither of us were really concentrating as were too busy wiping the tears that were now pouring from our eyes...every sip of water we could feel the steam coming out of our ears...it was hard work eating this...I personally had also established a lisp at this stage as my tongue had given up with the heat. Once dinner was over we decided it was a good idea to head back to the hotel...after a nightcap on the way, so we pulled into another bar where I had a Pina Colada and a banana split and Dom had a JD and Coke and ordered onion rings even though they weren't on the menu (funnily enough the onion rings never came!). After this one we definately went back to the hotel...twas about time!

Was not looking forward to the hangover to come.

Team Drunkards!