After an 11 hour coach journey back from Chiang Mai, we arrived in Bangkok for a 2nd time on the evening of Weds 15th. Needless to say, we weren't in the most spritely of moods, worsened by the fact that a) i managed to "misplace" my ipod en route from Chiang Mai (hence no more Solitaire!) b) had pretty much overdosed on imodium and in severe pain c) absolutely knackered by the early start and lack of sleep on the moderately uncomfortable coach. It appeared Songkran was still in full swing in Bangkok - got attacked by over excitable Thais and buckets whilst in the taxi back to our hostel to the extent our driver couldn't see where he was going - in all honesty, it didn't make much of a difference to the quality of his driving. The thought of venturing out at 9pm ish after a long day of travelling and getting a bucket of skanky water chucked over our heads was unappealing....so opted for Pizza Hut takeout in bed!!

We booked a flight to Krabi on Sun 19th so had 3 days left in Bangkok. After seeing some cultural sights first time round we opted for some more shopping... spending all day Thursday around Siam Square and the various shopping centres. Ended up in the Siam Paragon ALL day, the complete opposite of the MBK Centre with its fakes and cheap slogan tshirts aimed for tourists! The Siam Paragon is like Selfridges but on 5 floors and with the most expensive price tags ever, not just designer prices but a premium on top of that too. Would have had a complete shopping spree if only I had a spare few hundred thousand in the bank....! As well as all the designer labels, there was a whole floor dedicated to supercars, Maserati, Lamborghini, Porsche, Lotus, BMW... very surreal. Ended up in the IMAX on the top floor watching Monsters vs Aliens in 3D, awesome!

The following day we decided to book a day trip to Kanchanburi for Saturday, our last day in Bangkok. In the meanwhile we just had a very lazy day, avoiding the humidity and chilling out. Met up with Beth and Tom in the evening though for the conclusion of our Thai cultural education.....Patpong! Went to an Irish pub for drinks and dinner on Thanon Silom, another main road buzzing with tourists/markets/bars etc before heading over to Patpong. Tom's mate from home, Guy, knew a bloke (?!) who got us in to a "show" for free which was a result, as lots of places charge entry fees and those that don't charge ridiculous drinks prices enforced by scary big bouncers no doubt with Muay Thai training! Albeit our bottles of Tiger cost 200 baht each (about 4 quid) but the entertainment proved to be worth it...... all started out quite harmlessly with a few ping pong balls and streamers being whipped out but soon descended into cringe worthy razor blades, needles and darts?! The final straw came when I got hit TWICE by a banana..... no doubt because I didn't give any money to the short fat saggy Thai woman who shoved a basket under my nose for appreciation of her "skills"! Left the club once they started to repeat their party tricks and went to a ladyboy bar... the best part of the evening for the sheer hilarity of wondering how the hell such beautiful women were once men! Shocking....

Struggled to get up for Kanchanaburi the next morning (7am start!) and any hopes of catching up on some sleep on the bus there were quickly dismissed when it transpired we had THE worst driver and a bus with a completely knackered suspension. Saw an Allied cemetery and the main War Museum before heading down to the Bridge over the River Kwai. Pretty impressive when you consider it was built by hand by non skilled labourers...just severely creaky and could see through to the water all the way along which wasn't too reassuring, especially when being jostled by German and Japanese tourists! We then got driven to a railway station in the middle of nowhere and waited about 45 minutes for a train which I was convinced wouldn't turn up - when it did it was 3 carriages of rickety wood with bench seats! :o) Set off on the "Death Railway" so named because 38 men died per km of track and had a pretty bumpy and exicting journey around cliff faces/sides of mountains etc (who knew wooden track could curve!?) After a buffet lunch on a floating raft in the middle of the river we headed off to see the Sai Yok Noi Waterfall... what an anticlimax that was! Full of loud noisy tourists and Thai people in lary bikinis and exposing far too much sunburnt skin for my delicate stomach, gross! Dan and I decided instead to locate the source of said waterfall with a little trek in "LOST" territory, great idea! The source was pretty non eventful but was cool to wander through the landscapes and get away from the touristyness. The only plus about the weird tourist village at the bottom of the waterfall were the banana crisps...mmmm, helped sustain us on a very long boring trip back to Bangkok. Just had dinner off Khao San at a restaurant called "O! Hungry" and packed up our bags for a flight to the beaches the following day :o)