(7 November)

Today everyone else from my tour went home so that was the tour officially over! I got up earlyish to go and see the grand palace with Kristina. We tried to get a tuk tuk, but were told it was flooded until 11am...still don't really get that...but one said he would take us on a tour of other places and then leave us to the grand palace for 20BHT (about 40p)...so we were like, yea that sounds good! I had already heard that some taxi drivers give stupidly cheap taxis so that they can get fuel vouchers as commission from shops, so was prepared to be taken to a few extra places haha. We went to see the big buddha, a temple which gave you good luck, had a stop at a suit shop for men where we couldn't even fill the 15 minutes with pretending to shop so that the driver could get his fuel coupon - seriously, what were we meant to buy there! Then to another big temple (I'll get the names another time, would have to go through my old maps etc haha - maybe you guys can identify them from my photos!). We stopped at a massive jewelry shop thing to the the fuel coupon, and could easily have spent ages in there, they had everything! It was mad. Too expensive for us though, so we just looked around and then left when enough time had passed. Then the driver was happy and brought us to the grand palace.

By this stage it was really, really hot. Bangkok was stupidly hot in the afternoons, which was why we decided to go sightseeing so early! We got up to the palace and walked around a bit but didn't actually go inside, we were pretty tired, and it cost 400BHT which is a fortune in Thailand...and quite frankly, it just kinda looked like it would be another temple...getting a little sick of them! So we took a few pictures in the grounds and wandered back to Khao San and had a wee dander around the shops etc.

Then Kristina took me to get eyelash extensions in the place where she had got them the day before which was a bit mental...was pretty uncomfortable, and lay for an hour with my eyes closed while she put them on, then freaked out a bit when I saw them cos it looked so weird! Haha, they were so long!! She cut them a little bit and I was still pretty freaked out but figured I'd just get used to them cos it was a big change - I really like them now that I'm used to them, they look pretty natural when it's not the crazy before and after effect haha. Bit worried I've picked up an expensive habit now though...
We had an indian street food place for dinner which was pretty good and Kristina was telling me all about some of her travelling and why she had come travelling etc - she had just come out for a holiday and ended up staying since July! And is pretty much planning to go home, pack up her stuff and move to NZ...crazy.

After that we headed back to the hostel to get ready to go to the Sky Bar. We had decided to just properly go for it seeing as the place and everyone there was so fancy, so we wore nice clothes, put a bit of make up on and even straightened our hair! Looked fairly out of place in our hostel haha.

It was such a good night, definitely worth the effort! We went into the really fancy hotel and there was a line of Thai ladies to show us where to go literally every step of the way! First we were shown into a bar that didn't have the best view but was still pretty cool, had a look at the menu while snacking on olives and peeled pistachios i think? Kristina was amazed by that lol, I don't have a clue about nuts... The menu was crazy, cheapest cocktails about £12, water about £4...the bar snacks were just mental prices...then again it was all caviar and lobsters and oysters etc. It was fun just to people watch for a while but it was mainly couples...there was one really obnoxious American man with a Thai girl who was seriously rude! Swearing at the waitresses and stuff. I tried a cocktail called the Hangovertini after the movie haha, was pretty good but not quite as awesome as the others! After that bar we went into the actual sky bar which was something else! There was a live band, a fancy dining area (god knows how much dinner would cost you!) and stunning views! It really was awesome. Nice to pretend we weren't backpackers for a few hours haha.

Unfortunately, we are backpackers, so after a few drinks we had severely dented our budgets and headed home. I chatted to a few English boys in the hostel for a bit who were in the beds beside me, they were really nice and had done a fairly similar trip to me; then just hit bed.