Khaosan

11:00
Needn’t have worried about sleeping/jet-lag. We both sleep pretty much through the night. I wake up a shade before 10:00 feeling hugely refreshed. I wake Vicki as agreed at 10:00, and she declares she needs just a few more sleeps. Gives me a chance to catch up on my travel musings. We’ve nothing much planned today. Some general mooching and exploring. Feels deluxe to be able to take the morning very very easy….

14:45
Vicki attempts to wake up on several occasions, and fails. At 12:15, I decide I’ll try another sleep, and have a fab 45 min doze. I decide 11 hours is definitely enough. Vicki does not. She finally wakes up at 14:00, after 13 1/2 hours. A tremendous effort. I’ve long since given up trying to persuade her against these kinds of sleeps. I’m no longer jealous of them, as I can all but match her on the sleeping front when I need to. I’ve also just learnt that there’s no point. When she’s minded to sleep for as long as possible, there’s nothing I know of that will change her mind. While she’s slept, I’ve been updating our plan for today. That’s a bit of a misnomer really - I’ve been gradually been deleting stuff that we now won’t get to. It’s all good - nothing during our stay in Bangkok is set in stone, and I’d far rather we were both rested and relaxed. I think we’ll head out this afternoon to the Khao San road, and maybe on towards the Riverside neighbourhood. We need food first though…

22:00
Admittedly, we only make it out of our room around 15:00, but it feels like we’ve had a full and productive day. Leaving the hotel, we’re met by a wall of heat - proper shock to the senses. We march (lies) up the Samsen Road in search of lunch. There’s a well reviewed place not far from us. Walking through their door, it’s beautifully cool, and as we sit at our table, we walk past a giant wine fridge. Much like my time in Sri Lanka, wine will, I suspect, be fleeting in Thailand. Grab it while you can etc etc. The bar has a cool sounding Thai IPA on draft which I order, and we spend a little longer than we really should asking for a glass of Chardonnay for Vicki. My beer arrives quickly, along with the water we’ve requested. There’s some confusion about Vicki’s wine. Our server spends several minutes stood in front of the wine fridge looking confused. She phones someone to request help. None is forthcoming. Eventually, she brings over a completely different bottle of white wine, and asks if it’s the right one. It’s close enough, so we acquiesce. It’s actually pretty decent - an oaky Aussie Chardonnay. Vicki looks very pleased with herself.

Looking at the menu, the food sounds amazing, albeit much pricier than the tiny place we ate in last night. We both remark that it takes very little time when we’re travelling to stop converting everything from Baht (or other currency) to £ each time we see a price, but rather to compare prices to others we’ve seen nearby. This place is comfortably double what we paid last night, which makes it a treat. We order some braised and stir-fried pork with holy basil, and some grilled sirloin with Thai fried rice. Both are delicious.

Sated, we head back out, aiming for the Khao San Road. This is the backpacker hub made so famous by The Beach, but changed beyond all recognition now. It’s seen a significant upgrade in the past 20 years, and is now a neon lit, paved highway of bars offering buckets, and weed shops. There is, of course, an Irish bar.

The sun’s beating down, and we deserve a beer. We walk along one of the streets running parallel to Khao San, and plonk ourselves onto a sofa outside My Darling. It feels like a beach bar without the beach. As we drink our Tiger (me) and wine (Vicki), we watch the street hawkers selling their wares to the customers. Nearby is an English family. Looks like Mum, Dad and two boys, both of whom look to be around 20. Dad buys a bifta from one of the hawkers, and shares it with his boys. Another hawker proposes some sort of taser device, which they snap up, and then proceed to shock each other with. It’s top drawer entertainment.

The booze makes us hotter than we were, which feels like it’s defeating the object. I find us a bar a couple of hundred metres up the road that looks air-conditioned. We make for it with very little haste. Walking into the chilly bar is a bit of a moment for both of us, It’s about 38C today, and feels every bit of it. There’s some sort of Happy Hour deal on at the moment on cocktails, so Vicki orders several strawberry daiquiris. I grab a glass of wine, but promise to help out with the third cocktail. We spend a lovely hour or so chatting, catching up on our correspondences, reading, cooling.

When we leave, the sun has set, and it’s starting to cool a little. We make for the rooftop bar of the place we had lunch earlier. There’s a lovely breeze at 6 floors up, and there’s some very cool house playing in the background. We grab a bottle of wine to share, and hit the off switch. There’s a very pretty, glam Thai lady sitting on her own at the bar. I more than slightly suspect she’s a hooker, working a smart hotel bar. She starts chatting to us, and I feel a little ashamed. She is Shaanxi, a Thai born US citizen living in San Diego, who is in Thailand for work. Well - she’s actually in Thailand for fun, before she heads to Malaysia and the Philippines for work. I would have pegged her at around 30-35, but she’s actually mid to late 40s. She has a bit of a horror story to tell us about an allergic reaction to a mossie bite that leaves her in hospital in Bangkok for 2 days, coughing blood, and with a massively swollen face. She’s a very pleasant distraction for half an hour, but at no point do I feel like telling her I thought she was on the game.

Our boozing has left us peckish, and we head back into Banglamphu, stopping at a hostel restaurant not far from our hotel. We have another Som Tum (think it was 2 chillies this time, noticeably warmer), some shrimp fried rice, and some pork Laab balls - all tremendous. The wine’s not bad either. We’re both flagging a little, so I suggest to Vicks that we head back to the hotel for a rest/ recuperate.

Bless her - she’s fast asleep next to me. It’s been a tough day…Read more