Hi! Today we flew from Shanghai to
Bangkok and took a riverboat tour around the central Bangkok area.
First, here's how we got from Shanghai to Bangkok - flew over China and
Vietnam.
On approach to Bangkok, here's the sights. Industry and farms
primarily. Some housing is visible below.
In this picture if you look off in the background you'll see some grey
lines, that's the Bangkok skyline. To our surprise, Bangkok is a
huge city with many skyscrapers. We didn't do our research,
obviously.
The new airport, which was fine to fly in and out of.
It's the king's 80th birthday and signs wishing him well are evident
all over the city. Many people are also wearing yellow shirts in
commemoration of it - check the pictures later on.
A typical highway sign on the way to the city.
The Thais love American food - Dunkin Donuts, McDonalds, Pizza Hut,
Burger King, Subway are all well represented.
This little boy was answering nature's call under his mom's watchful
eye.
We got to the hotel right before the sunday brunch ended, and we wanted
to eat something then go out touring. Here's some of the items we
picked off the vast, but, erm,
very
expensive brunch. More on that when our accountants are not
looking... Anyway, here is prime rib with asparagus, a thai beef
soup, some pastries,
Some excellent risotto, and some prawns. This was not all just my
meal...
The lobby of the Four Seasons
We took the Skytrain, an elevated train which runs through much of
downtown (25 Baht or about 73 cents) down to the waterfront where the
conceirge told us we could rent a long-tailed boat for a tour. It
was too late in the day for the larger boat tours but this worked out
just fine. I'll post some videos when I get a chance.
The tour took us down the river and up several of the many canals that
are offshoots of the river. Here in the main river is a shipyard
with ships under repair.
Barges were being pulled up and down the river, usually 4-6 connected
together. It seemed families lived on some of them, judging from
the number of children we saw on them.
Some local housing.
The long-tailed boats used regular car or truck engines with long
shafts with propellers on them, and a gear-shift contraption at the top
to control speed. They were very noisy.
There were sights on the river, none of which we stopped at.
There are many temples, or Wats on the river, as well as many images of
Buddha.
The Grand Palace, Wat Pho and Temple of the Dawn are some of the
highlights. On this day we just motored past them but on Monday
we went to the Grand Palace.
This is a Chinese temple on the river.
That was the sights for Monday. We didn't go out at night because
we were just beat. On to
Tuesday...