Monday 23rd February
After the blissful 6 days on Lanta it was time to pack the bags and
get back on the road. We decided to take the train up to Bangkok from
a town called Trang. Left Lanta for trang in a minibus which was
packed to a ridicules capacity, in the front row of 3 seats 6 people
were crammed, only in Thailand!! Got to Trang without incident and
boarded the sleeper train, which is a pretty comfortable way to
travel. They get you with the beer prices though!!!

Tuesday 24th February
A very exciting day today, we met up with Trish's good friend Hannah
who I have been wanting to meet for a long time! We took a water taxi
down the river and met Hannah in central Bangkok, went for beer time
and all had a good catch up. Spent the evening at the lampini night
bazaar where we were introduced to Hannahs friend Lenka who lives and
works in Bangkok. Hannah and Trish put their best bartering hats on
and hit the market, Lenka and myself decided to hit a bar instead! Had
a delicious Thai meal with Hannah, Lenka, Nick and Plue (2 of Lenkas
friends).

Wednesday 25th February
Explored the famous Kho Sahn road today which is a travelers haven!
Nothing but bars, restaurants and markets stalls all highly
competitivly after your business! We could both eat for about 1.50
from the hawkers here! Watched the sunset over bangkok from the roof
terrace of our hotel and met some new buddies. Ant and Nina were
traveling the world practicing karate, which led to very interesting
conversation, particularly for Trish.

Thursday 26th February
Up bright and early today for a trip to the famous floating market,
which as the name suggests is boats traveling around the narrow canals
selling their goods. We were both pretty dissapointed with the
floating market, it was full of very pushy stall keepers who would
literally force food into your mouth and then expect you buy from
them. We were also told we had to pay for taking pictures of the fruit
on display, obviously didnt pay! The food on display didnt look good
at all, lots of flies and dried up fish! We were later told that the
Thai's dont shop here, its just a tourist attraction. It was good to
see it though and we got some good photo's. Spent the evening with Ant
and Nina, had some great Hawker food for dinner!

Friday 27th February
No trip to Bangkok would be the same without it..... it was Temple
day!! Hooked up early with Ant and Nina and headed off to the first
sight, the giant standing buddah. This was pretty close to the hotel
but we still manged to get lost finding it!! Jumped on the water taxi
and headed down to the temple district, first stop was wat arun. This
is the oldest temple in the city, I wont try and describe it so check
out the pictures. This had some beastly steep steps to get up to the
top, it was pretty daunting coming down them!! Next stop was the
reclining buddah which is absolutely huge!! After a spot of lunch we
headed up to the grand palace which I decided not to go in as they
have seriously hiked the price up and I have been before. Trish went
in with Ant and Nina while I relaxed in the shade. It was proper hot
today and after they had finished in the palace we were all templed
out, headed back to the hotel for some much needed aircon time! The
evening was spent doing another bangkok must do, a night out on Kho
sahn!! Met up with Lenka and Caroline (another friend of trish's) and
went for a slap up meal on the river. Headed up to Kho Sahn road for
what I have been wanting since we arrived in Bangkok, a chang tower! 3
litres of beer later we were all in the mood for a big night out, it
was bucket time! A bucket contains at least 1 bottle of whisky, 2
bottles of the thia red bull and a can of coke, they are rocket fuel!
To my extreme delight I noticed this bar sold beer lao, which is the
best beer in the world!! When the beer was flowing we decided to try
and find a karaoke bar, Lenka speaks Thai and discovered that there is
a place not too far away. We walked around confused for awhile not
being ablew to find it or see anything that looks even like a bar. So
Lenka asks a police man who very keenly shows up this back stairway in
a restaurant. It looked pretty dodgy in hindsight, the middle level
was derelict. But the top level was indeed a karaoke bar, a very local
karaoke bar. The police man very kindly took our drink orders and the
waitress bought over the very limited number of songs they had in
english! We sang a few songs to the delight of the thai's in the bar.
I had the pleasure of dueting the 'hip hop' version of zombie with a
thai girl! Was a very fun very random evening!!!!