The Wandering Hart

Another leg of the trip partially impacted by feeling worn down….but luckily we had extra days booked for rest in Bangkok so we were still able to see almost everything I had planned! We essentially broke our days out by category.

Our first food-focused day we went to Yaowarat (Bangkok’s Chinatown) for an amazing food tour. We must have tried almost 20 different things while walking around Chinatown. My personal favorites were a delicious green curry from Jek Pui (which was featured on Netflix street food), a full dinner including tom yum soup at T&K Seafood, an dessert Thai tacos! Hot tip from our tour guide: come to Chinatown before dark (we started around 4pm) because the vendors on the back streets close after dark!

On another day we focused entirely on temples and visited the trifecta that most people recommend: the Grand Palace, Wat Arun, and Wat Pho. We did them in that order, which I would recommend against….instead end on Wat Arun, which is a ferry ride across the river, and you could even take the metro straight back from that side of the river. Anyway, my favorite of these was definitely Wat Pho, which is famous for it’s MASSIVE reclining Buddha. I couldn’t even fit it in one picture! The Grand Palace was also nice although I think I liked the museums they had on site about Thai textiles and restoration of the Emerald Buddha temple even more than the temples themselves there. Wat Arun is fun mostly because of the ferry ride it requires – we went at high tide so we had to climb the railing of the dock to avoid getting our feet wet when boarding! The temple itself has beautiful detailing as well, though.

Our final focus was markets – specifically the floating and railway markets! We took a half day group tour outside the city to visit Maeklong Railway Market and Damnoen Floating Market. Both were really cool in their own way! At the railway market we rode the train straight through the market and watched as the train practically touched the vendor stalls (and people) of the market around it. Then we got to walk along the tracks through the market itself and ultimately watch the train go back through. It was amazing to see how smoothly the vendors got their canopies and stalls pulled down and set back up as the train passed!

At the floating market we rode down a canal past vendors selling fresh food and souvenirs from boats and canal-side stands. There were even a lot of vendors cooking fresh pad thai and other treats from their boats! There were apparently a lot fewer vendors and boats than usually as the market is still recovering from COVID but it was at least starting to come back to life. We also were lucky enough that we got back off the boat just before a downpour started – we’ve been insanely lucky with the rainy season thus far!

Other highlights from Bangkok throughout the trip included going to Terminal 21, which is a mall that themed each floor after a major city. The food court floor was themed after San Francisco and had its own Golden Gate Bridge model. We also had a VERY fancy dinner at Vertigo, which is a restaurant and skybar on top of the Banyan Tree Hotel. The views were incredible and it’s definitely worth going for a drink at sunset. Would I always recommend shelling out for the dinner? Probably not, but I love an excuse to be fancy and enjoying the views while eating dinner was a great way to cap our time in Bangkok.