Week in Bangkok and surrounding areas.

[NoNameNoNumber]

We were thinking of spending 2 days in Bangkok and then moving south to an island, Koh Samui, Koh Toa et al. Worry is spending too long travelling though given were only there for a short time.
Therefore I've been looking along the lines of staying closer to Bangkok, it has been suggested that we stary in/near Bangkok itself but I would like to cram as much in as poss.
Ko Lan, Ko Sichang look like decent islands and they are much closer to Bangkok.

We would like to spend some time with some elephants out there too but so far finding a sanctuary with the elephant's welfare at heart is proving a little difficult, not interested in riding a drugged and beaten elephant!

No party/drug fueled, hippy, hedonistic, backpacker activities required ta.

Any experiences and tips you guys could share would be awesome. Thanks in advance!

 

[NoNameNoNumber]

Chang Mai is very good

Looks it, but it's not gonna work with our timeframe this time

Spent 3 weeks last november in Thailand. Had 4 days Bangkok 3 days up in Kanchanaburi to take in the bridge over the river Kwai and hellfire pass.then 5 days Hua Hin for a bit of pool and beach time at the hilton there, i then got the ferry across to pattaya mainly for the sanctury of truth. I then went back to Bangkok for 2 nights before flying home.

Bangkok is great you could spend 2 days doing the temples, Grand Palace and Lumphini Park. Take a day trip to Ayutthaya which is the old capital and is on my to do list for this years trip, a day taking in some of the massive shopping centers that a doted around and an evening boat ride down to Asiatique. A trip to Nana and / or Soi Cowboys is an experince even if you are not there for that kind of activity the areas have good bars for just having a drink and people watching.

Travelling while in Thailand is cheap. I was not on a tight budget so I was hirering a airconed car and driver to take me places and wait while I did the tourest bit then drive me back and it was costing me about £25 a time and these places were around 60-80 Km distance from where I was staying but there are other cheaper options like Train, Boat, Mini Bus & coaches.

I staid away from elephants due to the same reason as you but I know there is a santury near Hua Hin that treats them well.

Hope all this helps

Thank you, very helpful and certainly given my something to research, the private taxi service sounds ideal!
I could happily spend the duration in/around Bangkok tbh but it's the OHs birthday and she's got it in her head she wants a 'paradise beach' setting for a few days, so looking lik a trip to some islands is inevitable.

Although I’ve been to koh Samui twice it’s not somewhere I’d recommend as there’s some much nicer places, I didn’t really like the beaches but there’s some good speedboat trips out to the Ang Thong national marine park

I’ve never been to Chiang mai but I’ve always heard it’s worth a visit

Phi phi is a really nice relaxing island , you can hire a long tail boat and pilot quite cheap, go snorkelling, diving , plenty of walks, get drunk on a beachside bar watching fire dancers

Bangkok is awesome , there’s loads to do

River cruise , cheapest is just use the regular ferry service

Hire a Tuk tuk to take you round, visit the zoo, visit one of the many temples , shopping malls, I like terminal 21 for the cheap food court and culture themed levels and the Siam paragon mall with the aquarium , watch some Thai boxing at the stadium , people watch at red light areas ,take a trip to the river market, go to the sky bar at Lebua state tower (some scenes from the hangover 2 were shot here)
There’s so many places to eat it’s unreal, from your street food to fine dining there’s the lot, I prefer to go to the high end buffets so I can try a bit of everything

Wherever you go you can travel easy and cheap , there’s plenty of tourist offices so most can be arranged while you’re there

As you say, most could be sorted as we arrive, I just don't want to land in Bangkok and bumble around aimlessly. We've kinda crossed Koh Samui off the list, maybe all of those islands actually given its another 11hrs travelling in an already short week.

I guess the street food rules applicable across Asia still apply here?
No salads, ice cubes, or cooked then reheated stuff.

When are you looking to go? It's quite important as the weather can be very different in the various regions of Thailand.

I've found this site pretty accurate.

22nd April.
Thanks, I'll take a look.

If you're like me, a couple of, days in BKK is not going to be enough. I've been twice for a week at a time so far and it still hasn't been enough for me. I want to go and spends another month in BKK at some point in the future, then a couple of weeks in chiang mai and then some of the lesser known parts of Thailand. There's so much of BKK i still haven't seen yet. It's definitely the top of my visited cities list so far. My plan is to wait a couple of years whilst i build my restaurant up (it's going well so far), then when i sign my next 3 year lease, the plan is to sell the business and then literally get on a plane to Bangkok, start there and travel all over SE Asia / Tibet / China / Mongolia etc until the money runs out, then come back to NZ and start all over again

Congrats on th restaurant, sounds like an awesome plan you have.
Its my first time in Thailand although I've done other parts of Asia, (Taiwan, China, Vietnam) and I NEED to go back to all of them. Fascinating places for sure. So yeah, fully appreciate a few days isn't gonna cut it. We're in Beijing for a surprise party and didn't want to spend 12 days there so booked BKK

 

[NoNameNoNumber]

Back from our travels.
Arrived in Bankok around midnight last Monday. In our hotel room for 01:00 about 5 min walk from Khao San road in a place called Rambuttri Village inn. Decent place, quiet enough with a nice rooftop pool. Good breakfast, and cheap.
Went for a walk around first thing, got on a Tuk Tuk and asked to be taken to pick up the hop-on hop-off boat tour of Chao Phraya so we could see the sites from the water and get about easily... He took us somewhere else where his friend would give us 'good price' on private tour... 2400Baht each! Sacked him off and walked.

Picked up the boat we were looking for, around 200 baht each I think for the whole day. Saw Wat Pho and Wat Arun, had a mooch then went to the Grand Palace. 1 hr free tour with free entry to a traditional Thai dance show for afters... That was well worth seeing, the heat was mega though, and having to wear trousers on the palace tour was a killer.
6:30pm and we went to meet a friend and his wife who have lived here for a while. Had a nice meal then we went to see the sites on Soi Cowboy. We had a laugh, got many a hard on, and crawled in around 4am

Next morning we set off in a Taxi to Ban Phe Pier and over to Koh Samet. We stayed about 20 minute walk from Sai Kaew on a beach called Ao Wong Duean, The C Samet
Meandered around the area for day 1
Chilled for day 2
Walked the circumference of the island on day 3
Boat tour with 6 islands and some snorkelling on day 4
Then a taxi back to Bangkok on day 5

Met up with the same couple from before, watched sunset from their 37th floor infinity pool then went for cocktails and decent food before a looong trip back

Bangkok to Beijing 5.5hr flight
3hr wait
Beijing to Helsinki 8hr flight
2hr wait
Helsinki to Heathrow 3hr flight
3 hr drive back home.

Overall I wouldn't say I was wowed by Thailand, although I do appreciate it was a very limited stay, I feel they're happily watching tourism kill the place. Sad on Koh Samet, the tour tells of the beautiful coral teeming with life. For the first 30m from the beaches all of the coral is dead though, and what coral does remain lies in such murky water it's difficult to really feel good about it. Many of the beaches littered with plastic debris, lots of the rugged west coat has piles of rubbish that has washed up. And yet, everywhere you look there are Thai National Park rangers charging visitors 200Baht each... Wouldn't hurt them to walk around with a bin bag. Ao Wong Duean was by far the nicest beach we saw though.

Khao San road is just like Benidorm. Officials everywhere but nobody taking pride in anything, nobody is cleaning the place with any intent. I'm a pretty worldly guy, I get by without needing much help, but when trying to talk to locals they only seemed interested if I was waving cash around. Very hostile people, I've been to far poorer places that are much friendlier.
There are obviously much nicer places to be in Bangkok, we saw some of them, very nearly had a high speed crash in a cab with a pick up locking up and spinning trying to avoid us!