Return to Thailand March 2018

We flew with Emirates. The flights were great: ample leg-room, good food, wide range of complimentary drinks, superb entertainment system with films, TV, radio, music and games which kept me occupied for the whole journey.

Arriving late, our first stop was the roof-top bar at the Centara Grand Ladprao where we all got to know each other – most had never met - but it didn’t take long to break the ice.

Our guide, Anun, kept us fully informed about all things Thai on the trip to the river, he even sang the National Anthem, which, he said, is done every day at 8am by all Thai citizens! Boarding long-tail boats we cruised the Chao Prang River, viewing temples and other precincts before going through a lock into the klongs (canals) - it's another world, a peaceful residential area with small quirky dwellings, hanging gardens, small row-boats for transport, dogs sleeping on verandas and old men pottering about. Nothing like the hectic, noisy, hustle and bustle of the modern high-rise city. Returning to the main river we visited the Royal Barge Museum where there are richly decorated ceremonial barges built by past kings and then Wat Arun - the temple of Dawn, a beautiful spiritual site which dates from antiquity.

That evening we went to Asiatique, an area of old riverside warehouses which has been re-invented as a huge night market with bars, restaurants, street-food stalls, and other entertainments including the Muay Thai boxing show. We explored the shops, then my little group sat with a beer to watch the world go by before enjoying street food –Pad Thai from a truck which was excellent and very cheap. Then it was the Muay Thai show - the first half is a choreographed dramatic history of the sport, followed by two demonstration bouts by young boxers.

Back to the hotel for a final night-cap after a marvellous, action-packed day with a great bunch of people who were strangers yesterday and have quickly become friends.

The next day we travelled south to Hua Hin, a seaside resort favoured by Thai royalty, where we stayed at the Centara Grand, formerly the 1920's Railway Hotel, very stylish and evocative of that era. The main building is surrounded by lovely mature gardens, with a separate area of villas with pools - a lovely hotel and very popular. We had a buffet dinner around the pool accompanied by Thai music and dancing, then later ventured out into the town. Someone managed to choose just about the wildest bar in the place - the Panama; fortunately I was designated the handbag attendant and was spared too much of the excitement! The third day was the best so far – our Thai cookery course. First we toured Hua Hin’s 100 year old market to buy the food and our guide Dominique introduced us to all kinds of familiar and unfamiliar foodstuffs, leading us through the sights, sounds and scents of this colourful place.

At the cookery school the fun starts, we watched Dom make the curry paste and joined in with the bashing and grinding, then, after a demo of the right way to do it, we each made our own lunch: Penang Chicken curry, followed by Tom Yum soup with shrimp, both very yummy and surprisingly filling. Pudding is provided: jack fruit (tastes a bit like mango but rubberier) with two kinds of sticky rice. I really enjoyed this experience and I’ll be practicing the skills at home!

We also visited another excellent beachside hotel; the Anantara Huan Hin and after a site inspection we are provided with a buffet dinner on the beach accompanied by gentle Thai percussion music – a beautiful location and very popular for weddings.

We left for the 3-4-hour drive to Katchanburi, and boarded long-tail boats for transfer up the river to our hotel, the Resotel, quite a simple hotel but with all mod-cons. After checking in we travelled further up the river to the River Kwai Jungle Rafts – a very simple hotel built on rafts floating on the river, with no electricity or WIFI and small private bathrooms fed by unheated water. I had stayed here 14 years earlier and had loved it, one of the most relaxing places I ever stayed: swinging in a hammock with the river rushing past is very soothing.

We were here to visit the Mon village – the inhabitants are exiles from Myanmar and live here while working in the riverside hotels. The village is built from bamboo and they have a school, temple, shop etc and maintain their traditional way of life. It is larger than on my last visit but still no electricity: everything that doesn’t grow here has to be transported by river so that limits what can be done. Previously they had elephants here but now only one remains: a middle-aged matron called Wendy, with a voracious appetite for bananas.

We returned on bamboo rafts floating down the river, very peaceful and soothing, until half of the group jump into the river and, amid much hilarity, float along buoyed up by their life-jackets. After dinner there was a song and dance performance by the Mon Villagers theatre group which was fascinating.

The next morning, we visited the Death Railway museum and walked down the Hell Fire Pass: a very moving experience. The numbers of people who died on constructing this stretch of railway line and the privations they suffered is truly awful.

Our final hotel was the Centara Grand at Centralworld, right in the centre of Bangkok. The facilities here are excellent: superb roof-top bars and restaurants with some of the best views in the city, and always busy as they are very popular with locals as well as tourists.

This evening we ventured out into Bangkok at night in a convoy of 11 tuk tuks: a slightly mad race, at times with police motor-cycle outriders and at one junction the police stopped all the traffic so that we could all go through together. I'm very impressed that Travel Counsellors’ tour partners in Thailand were able to arrange this for us! Our first stop was Chinatown where we ate in a local canteen – very busy, very noisy, very chaotic and pretty basic but the food was fresh and good. Then back into the tuk tuks for another race to Patpong night market for souvenir-hunting and serious people watching - an education in more ways than one!

The last day was our last chance to see it, snap it, do it, ride it, eat it, buy it. Many of my new friends did just that but I did something that I have rarely done on my travels – sat by the pool and chilled out! It was lovely.

Bye-bye Thailand, it’s been a real pleasure.