Home » Thailand » Southeast Asia 2000 - Travel Diary, Part 3: From Bangkok to Chiang Mai

Highlights of the two last days in Bangkok were visits to the beautiful (but crowded) Grand Palace and to a snake farm where May Tina got to hold a python. Then we took the night train to Chiang Mai, which was slightly less hectic than Bangkok, although it still had lots of traffic by Norwegian standards. We spent one day walking around Chiang Mai and getting ready for some jungle trekking.

Southeast Asia 2000 - Travel Diary, Part 3: From Bangkok to Chiang Mai

Jan Arild Teland
2006-05-08 18:22:33

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the noodles. After dinner we used the Internet terminal in the reception for a while, before going to relax in the little park next to the river. It was very nice sitting there, although the Liverpoodlian was not around tonight. This would be our last night in Bangkok for a while, and although we found the city fascinating, it would wrong to say that we were sad about moving on.

Back at the hotel I decided to have another evening meal. I had some noodles and beef, which however turned out to be much too spicy for my taste. I had to drink at least a litre of water to stop my throat burning, and still it was pretty bad. We went to bed around 2330.

Day 7 - July 3

We got up at 0930, had breakfast at the hotel (although my stomach was still feeling a bit weird after yesterday's late meal). After having checked out we waited in the reception for a taxi, and watched as an American guy tried to explain to the woman in the reception that he wanted to charge a meal in the restaurant to the room. The hotel staff had a rather limited knowledge of English, so it was quite amusing to listen to, the woman having no idea of what the guy was going on about. In the end they apparently got it right, and he was about to pay with his credit card, when he suddenly got the bright idea that the woman should give him a cash advance on the card! She seemed to understand even less of this, so the discussion started again from scratch...

About then our taxi arrived and we were taken to the train station. After putting our baggage in the office of Richly Travel, we took another taxi down to the Snake Farm (Queen Saovabha Memorial Institute). Unfortunately, when we arrived around 1200, we found out that they were closed between 1200 and 1300. A really annoying guy tried to convince us to come with him to some crocodile farm instead, but it was quite expensive and we were more interested in the snakes, anyway.

He kept ...