Monday 15th April 2019 - Bangkok

This morning, in the most inopportune way, I woke at 3am. It was inopportune because we were headed off to Bangkok for three pretty full days and I really wanted to be well rested. 

But no, it was not to be.

It was not all bad news though as Angus, my son who now resides in London, had written to me asking for some help, which I attended to immediately. The joy one gets when helping offspring is worth the loss of sleep, even if the loss wasn't required.

The driver, from Hua Hin Cab - a service I cannot recommend highly enough, arrived a little early and we were therefore on our way by 8:45am.

The highway traffic was very light and we made good time, enough to be able to stop for a good break after about an hour on the road.

This is the vehicle we rode in. It's a Toyota TRD Frontrunner. lots of room and well appointed.

Here's Tiz enjoying a Matcha Latte with our driver, a really nice guy,

 playing "funny bugger" in the background.

We made it to the Ambassador Hotel in about 2.5 hours, which we were pleased with.

Their check in time is 2:00pm. A trio of Indian business men were most displeased that the hotel wasn't flexible and voiced their opinions at us, seemingly looking for some support.

We just turned around and took our bags to the concierge to hold until 2:00pm!

Simple.

Tiz loaded the Grab app (South East Asias version of Uber) and got us a car to go to the Old Town.

The Old Town was a spot that her Thai language teacher, Som, had highly recommended.

👋 A big shout out to Som too. 👋

What she and Tiz achieved together is remarkable and has made our trip so much easier and pleasant.

ขอบคุณมาก! 

I hope that came out right 😁

Here is the start of the street through the Old Town

Lee, at this point is dry, as we all were

I wish I could explain WTF (Why The Face) on Tiz, but I can't.

I do know that I'm going to be in trouble when she reads this post though 😅

Here's Tiz, in a shot that she won't mind

Beware of these two "water assasins"

Especially this one!

She has BIG squirter. 

Heading into the thick of things

Things are getting wetter

This is when you know that the perpetrators are getting cheeky. 

Big chunks of ice in the water 

Lee and I doing our best impressions of Chinese people having their photo taken.

Lunch spot

Pad Thai Prawn, for Tiz

Pad Thai Beef, for Lee

Spicy Pork, for me

This guy had his "refill station" just outside our chosen lunch spot.

Just look at the glacier he had in it!

If you are ever in Bangkok for Songkran and you see this sweet young thing, RUN!

She is a killer with a smile.

Her water pistol looked like a fire hose when it was aimed at you.

That thing in her hands defied physics!

The family that prepares for Songkran in pyjamas together always has fun

Tiz in the tuk tuk that took us to the pier for our tour

All the following shots, unless they have something written below them, 

are taken in the canals around Bangkok

Catfish being fed by tourists around the pier

The Grand Palace, from the outside, as it was closed today, unbeknown to us before we got there

Tonight we ate at Maxim's in an area that could easily have been mistaken for somewhere in India,

but what we ate was quite Thai and a little Vietnamese

Pork with wintergreens

Pork with Chinese Broccoli

and more wintergreens

The bill for the whole lot, which was more than I took pics of.

<AUD 60 for three including drinks. Not bad at all.

Tomorrow we leave the hotel at 6am to go north for the long tour, so I'll send this out tonight.

Have a great day wherever you are and doing whatever you're doing!

Sunday 14th April 2019 - Fishing Village trip, and other stuff

I was really stuck for a name today and I left the naming to my two companions.
So don't blame me if you think it's lame 😏 .... and that's even if you give a damn.

Well, it's the day after Songkran, which falls on the 13th of April, every year. We knew that the beach was going to be busy but we wanted .... 🤔 .... nay, needed to go for a walk.

We had no idea if the Songkran "water cleansing" was still going and it didn't matter as it was already 35℃.

As we walked down Narathip Road .....

I've added this pic for late comers that have no idea what I might be talking about when referring to our common reference points like Narathip Road, the main road that takes us to the beach 700m away, or Makro Food Service, which is a big , very handy and high end supermarket next door, or what I keep referring to as "the beach road" but is actually called Soi Raumijit
(or Raumjit Alley .... the Raumijit can be Raumjit depending on where you see it spelt.
Translating Old Khmer script (Thai: อักษรขอม, akson khom) into English is flexible)

..... and back to the blog

We got to the beach end of Narathip Road and turned left to walk up the the fishing village

 and this is what we saw. The pic does not do the situation off in the distance justice. 

It's staggering how the locals drive. 

Henri Poincaré, the French polymath from the late 19th century that had much to do with Chaos Theory, would have been fascinated by Thai drivers' behaviours.

This is the entrance to the fishing village. 

You can barely see the sign I'll be referring to in the background.

As soon as you step inside, and off to the right, this is what greets you.

A few days ago I made a comment about developments that start up and after a short while stall and or are abandoned.

The Triple Tree Resort, as you can see, is yet another an example of this.

Here's a panoramic view taken from the same spot as above.

If you follow the truck about 200-300 metres you eventually get to the fishing village. 

As in a real working area with real working local folk, not some facade like this "resort"

Lee at the fishing village market

One of the many crab only vendors

Me at the bridge over the canal.

This a view looking north from one of the dock bays.

On the way back to the beach we came across this family sporting matching t-shirts.

I couldn't resist taking a pic and once I had taken the shot the woman on the left obviously told them.

They all spun around with big proud knowing smiles. 

It sort of took me by surprise as the reaction from many other countries would be a scowl.

The walk back was going to be slow, given the amount of traffic, and so I thought I would make it a "car observation and picture" day. 

Like I have mentioned before, keeping tyres within the confines of the mudguards isn't a requirement, by the looks of it.

Carbon wrap is very popular, but used in odd and cheesy ways 

Any vehicle can be a taxi

 .... and many can be a bus. Think Jeepney, if you know what one is.

If not, click on this link

Check out the two black Michelin men, high up on the back of this bus

I love the "paved brick" steps to get into this bus

Look at the front of the bus on the left.

A sunvisor can also be a boom box with 17 speakers! 

A trio of fat little french tyremen on the side.

There's no way this guy was going to be outdone when it came to Michelin men, 

or at least he wasn't going to lose without trying. 

And if that didn't get him a prize then the 41 lights should.

High top  luxo vans are very popular, and I quite like them

Oops, my wheels and tyres are poking out.

Ah, no problem!

Not an uncommon sight.

Neither the amount of people in the back of a ute 

nor that they are wearing hoodies on a 37℃ day.

There just wasn't going to be a lot exciting stuff to snap today but that didn't mean I wasn't going to have fun, especially with every car in Thailand being here ..... or at least it felt like it.

During my brief stay here I could not avoid noticing the wheel fashion(s) in Thailand.

Therefore, in the following pics I will impose my opinion on you with 

a  👍  or 👎  for each wheel

 *** WARNING WARNING WARNING *** 

MOST OF THE CONTENT THAT FOLLOWS IS PURE PETROL HEAD RELATED

👍

👍

👍👍👍

👍👍

👎👎👎

👎👎👎👎👎

Oh, I get it. So you really liked Centreline wheels ...... in the '70's! 

👎

👎👍 

Yes, I was torn by these three. Nice profiles but black and/or silver!?
That gunmetal look is THE look these days.

👍

👍

👍

On the way home, heading west up Narathip Road, this crew of hardcore and so very cute, Songkraner kids, which is obviously a term I've just made up, were still "cleansing" passerby's.

They were just so sweet we just couldn't ignore or avoid them. 

They were ecstatic at our stopping and engaging with them. 

We also stopped at the stall opposite our little soi to buy a durian.

They sell it by the kilo, at THB300/kg.

Which when cut up and the skin is discarded comes out to about THB600/kg of edible product.

Pretty expensive!

This is the fruit salad that Tiz made up for lunch from various fruits, 

which include banana, durian, rose apple melon, mangosteen and pineapple. 

Exquisite!

Mangosteen. Yes, not that exciting to look at, is it?

Durian. Even less exciting to look at, but a curious taste sensation 😀

"Curious" as in it's illegal to have in most, if not all, hotel rooms in Asia, 

as well as a lot of forms of public transport.

When they are really ripe, which ours wasn't, you can understand why a lot of people hate them.

The afternoon was spent drinking a beer or a G&T and going between the pool and the lounge. 

Yes, life is good. 

The other day, at Makro, we shopped in preparation for Songkran, due to restricted shopping hours.

To say we just "shopped ... for Songkran" is a bit of an understatement, 

mainly because we always over-shop, but it is what it is.

Pork here is cheap and pork belly is ~AUD6/kg and it's great quality.

We bought a nice big slab of pork belly on which we used a Swedish dry rub we found in the cupboard and made a trivet using carrots, cauliflower, Japanese sweet potato and onion 

for tonights meal, which we oven baked.

We couldn't find a single large enough tray in the villa so we used two oven proof dishes. 

Simples.

Baked.

Served.

Yummo, was the unarguable consensus.

Tomorrow we go to Bangkok in preparation for a trip to the River Kwai, on the Tuesday. 

 I hope to have a lot of exciting stuff to report on so stay tuned.

Hasta luego, mis amigos.