We visited Thailand earlier this year. It was a departure for us as we do not do a lot of long haul travel. We flew with Qatar Airways which was a comfortable and pleasant experience. The seats were comfortable and there was a good choice of in flight entertainment.We had a stop off at Doha and finally arrived in Bangkok at 6am.
Our hotel (The Lancaster) was fabulous. It was beautifully decorated and air conditioned. We had an in room bar, and a plate of fruit was in our room on arrival.
Bangkok in May is VERY humid. We didn’t see any sun due to the smog and it took a while to acclimatise to the oppressive heat.
There are many beautiful temples and places of cultural importance to see within the city and we chose to take a hop on/off tour to explore. Big mistake! The tour company was new, the bus stops weren’t marked, so you didn’t know where to wait, the driver and guide didn’t speak English and the traffic was atrocious! Bangkok is a very busy city and many roads are four or five lanes each side. We did manage to see most of the main attractions but it took most of the day.
We then discovered the train system was really clean, efficient and reasonably priced and we subsequently used this.
The people are so friendly, polite and respectful. The food is also amazing.
On our fourth day, we took a flight south to Kao Lak, and visited Phuket. I’m glad we did. The south is verdant, fresh and beautiful. The beaches are like something you see on films – beautiful golden sand and gentle waves. We stayed at the Apsara Spa which was beautiful and right on the beach.
We visited the Tsunami site, which was both poignant and tacky. There are several local ’museums’ where you can read about this awful natural disaster, but there are lots of photographs of bodies, which I’m not sure that some of the families may be aware of.
Visiting in May is not high season for this area, so many bars and restaurants were closed but it was still full of visitors.
