Finding the Unicorn

The flight from Hyd to Bangkok was uneventful, the most notable thing about it was the lack of sleep. This time on arrival I took the Airport bus into town. Very convenient!! No haggling with taxi drivers (some were trying to get me to pay 600THB), a set fee of 150THB to my destination and I was dropped off about 400m from my hotel – the Suk.

I walked in the front door and immediately saw Natalie, up bright and early and having her breakfast. I had stopped at a mini-store on the way there to get some yoghurt so ate with her for a bit, before going to the room to shower and then collapse for an hour. At 9am Kanuka (Natalie’s friend) picked us up. She had brought her brother’s car to drive us around in. We went to the JJ Market (a Saturday only affair) and met up with Arari. We must have spent about 3 hours wandering through there, then went on to a shopping centre that has a type of Electronics Market.

After the shopping side of things we went to the River and boarded a Dinner Cruise boat. As we pulled away from the jetty the sun was going down and the edges of the river started to light up. We were treated to a seafood and curry feast followed by dancers. I took heaps of photos of it all. Unfortunately I had those photos put onto a DVD instead of a CD – do you realise how hard it is to find an Internet Cafe that has a DVD reader??? I’m afraid you will have to wait to see these and photos from the train trip to Hyderabad. I’ll let you know the moment I find one and manage to get a few specimens uploaded.

Suffice to say that I was one exhausted puppy after today.

The next day we didn’t have to get up early – YAY. Kanuka picked us up at 11am to take us to the Emerald Buddha and surrounding magnificence. She dropped us off near the entrance while she found a place to park the car. Looking like a pair of lost tourists, Natalie and caught the attention of well dressed bloke claiming to work for the University (nearby). He informed us that the temple was closed and would we like to see the “Sitting Buddha” located not far away and free – I thought this was odd seeing the number of other people going in and out. We ummed and ahhhed and then decided we should wait for Kanuka to decide what to do. We told the man that we would wait for our Thai friend to decide what to do. Wonder of wonders he then said we should go in to where we were planning to go. This confused me a bit until I saw some signs inside the grounds warning of scams similar to what this guy seemed to be doing. Later that night I read through a Lonely Planet in the Hotel. Under the warnings bit was described exactly – blow by blow – what this guy was trying to do to us. I am getting more and more cynical by the day!!

Afterwards we went to Kanuka’s house and met some of her family – they were lovely. We also got to have a look at a new house / mansion that her sister is building with the help of others in the family. They are all in the construction materials business. It is going to be absolutely gorgeous. There is a separate building for cooking and laundry!! They then took us to dinner, again by the river, then Kanuka drove us back to our hotel. She must have been exhausted after all that driving and touring with us.

Thank you, thank you Kanuka!

The next day Natalie and I were up early for a tour to “The Bridge Over the River Kwai”. We were taken to a museum next to a cemetery for Westerners that died building the railway. I have photos from a large section where there a many graves of Australians. From there to the actual bridge (not the one in the movie) that was relocated from Java by the Japanese (or rather their labourers). Then we boarded a train that traversed about 1 hour over the railway line as it snakes into the foothills. After lunch we had a short boat ride on the river and then the long way (i.e. not on expressways) back to Bangkok.

The next morning I saw Natalie off to the Airport, changed rooms and then wandered around to think about what to do next. I was still on “go” mode from the last three days and it took me another couple of days to slow down. One day I managed to go no further than the corner of Sukhumvit Rd – I was proud of myself. Besides I needed to give my legs a day in air-conditioning to try to get this swelling and rash to go away. In the end I decided on a two week stint in Vietnam, got myself a visa from the embassy not far from my hotel and found a cheap flight – yes I have been writing this entry from Ha Noi!!

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 3rd, 2007 at 7:08 pm and is filed under Thailand, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.