After a very tearful goodbye, two flights and three train rides I arrived at my hotel for the next two nights. The Hansar hotel, winner of 'most luxurious hotel in Bangkok for 2011' (courtesy of a certain Mr M Hagan, Legend) and I can see why. Walking in with my rucksack on, hair all over the place and just generally looking a sweaty mess I thought they were going to laugh at me and tell me that I had the wrong hotel, infact I've never felt so welcomed before in my life, everyone actually looked happy that I was there. After checking in and being told I had been given a complimentary upgrade to the 'sky suite' I had a quick shower and then jumped back on to the sky train to meet up with this guy Mitch I met on the train from the airport. It felt incredible to be walking trough the streets of Bangkok, my trip that I've had planned in my head for so long had now become reality and I was buzzing! I only had a few beers and then decided to head back to the hotel as I knew I had a lot to sort out the next day. After bartering with a few tuk tuk drivers I got them down to a price that was reasonable (about £1.20) and jumped in the back. Wizzing in and out of the traffic was so much fun, put a massive smile on my face, I loved it.

The next morning I woke up, went down to breakfast and planned what I was going to do for the day. Sight seeing and buying a bus ticket. I jumped into a taxi, made sure the price was done with the meter, otherwise they rip you off good and proper, and headed to the Royal Grand Palace. To visit this place you can't be showing any leg or shoulders and if you aren't dressed apropriately then you have to borrow clothes. A woman that I was speaking to earlier in the hotel thought this would be the case so kindly gave me her pashmina to take with me. Unfortunately that was not enough and I had to put on the surong style skirt and pale blue shirt that I don't think anyone could pull off. Not a good look. Luckily none of the other thousands of tourists got the memo about the dress code so we all looked equally as stupid. I paid 400 baht to get in and spent about an hour and a half looking around everything. I've come to the conclusion that as beautiful as the temples are I would have prefered to spend 400 baht on beer. It was quite boring, seen one temple seen them all kind of thing.....I then wandered around for a bit and got a tuk tuk to show me around the rest of the city for 20 baht (about 40p) then I got ripped off in the tourist information centre for a bus ticket to Chiang Mai, only by about ten quid but it annoyed me quite a lot. Somehow in my fury I managed to find Khoa San road, I was quite proud of myself for this as all I had was some Thai map that made not a lot of sense, who needs GPS? I found a lively bar and got a large Chang beer, it was needed! I was on my own for about fifteen minutes before I started talking to two guys (Stephen and Mike? Working in a pub for 3 and a half years has definitely not helped with my ability to remember peoples names) who were both also travelling on their own. Long story short, one chang lead to another and we ended up in some thai nightclub until five o'clock in the morning, dancing on podiums and having a wiked time! Back at the hotel I was in desperate need for food, I hadn't eaten a lot in the two days as the temperature was just not making me feel hungry. Needless to say the club sandwich and chips were amazing! (thanks Nige :-)) Last time I remember looking at the clock it was 7am.

Up at 9am for breakfast I headed down feeling not my best, showered and then checked out before heading into one of the cities biggest shopping centres to pick up my legit bus ticket. As many of you know I dont like shopping and as much as I tried to appreciate this massive store with designer clothes half the price of back home I only lasted about twenty minutes, the hangover didn't help. The rest of the day was spent back at the hotel taking full advantage of every luxury before I spend the next five months in hostels.

At about 7pm I took the sky train (way better than the tube, costs pennies, is a lot cleaner and is always on time) to the northern bus terminal, my bus wasn't until nine so by the time I got to the station I still had an hour to kill. Having only eaten breakfast for the whole day I headed to the food court, stall after stall selling Thai food and then a large KFC restaurant in the corner. As like most KFC's back home there was a queue a mile long of Thai people trying to get their bit of kentucky, being the only non-asian person in the whole of the station (it was the first time I had experienced this as Bangkok is full of us backpackers or families on holiday) I decided to grab some proper food from one of the stalls. I had no idea what I was ordering because once again for the first time nothing was translated in to English underneath the Thai writing but it was delicious and definitely filled a spot. I boarded the train and was chuffed to see the seats went so far back it was like you was laying in a bed, and with only two hours sleep the night before it was all I wanted. After all the saftey instructions and dinner handed out on a tray as if we were on a plane we were on our way, Chiang Mai bound!

I'm now six days in and absolutely loving life, I'd say I am missing home but then I'd be lying.

Speak soon

Love Alice :-)