Bangkok Days

Bangkok, they say you either love it or hate it. Well thats about right. My first impression when I got into the city was that it was insaaaaane. It is big, there’s a lot of people and anything crazy is possible. As I got off the plane I took a taxi to my hostel. Its very easy and well organized to catch a taxi at Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport. Just follow the signs and get a ticket from the machine at the exit. The ticket will tell you which line to que and your taxi will arrive shortly after.

After I got settled in my hostel and chilled for a bit I decided to walk towards Khao San Road. Maaannnn this street is the wildest I have ever seen. It’s sooo busy and vivid. Left and right there’s shops and stands and their owners trying to sell you anything. Mostly a lot of crap but that’s what is actually so funny about it.

On my first full day in Bangkok I decided to wander around and take a walk towards the Grand Palace and Wat Pho. I’ll be honest, Bangkok is not a city where you can easily walk your way through and check all the highlights. It is way too big for that, rather take a tuktuk or a grab car. What is a grab car? Grab is an app you can download and order a taxi or a car for a fixed price. Its like the Asian version of Uber! Grand Palace is amazing but also crowded and filled with a loooooot of tourists. It’s crazy over there, there’s not a single spot with no one around. Despite the crowd I was in awe of the beauty of this complex. There’s so much detail in every part and the colors are too beautiful.

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After visiting Grand Palace I walked towards Wat Pho. Wat Pho is also a famous temple in Bangkok with the reclining Buddha inside. I honestly prefer this temple since it is a little less crowded. Yes ofcourse tourists also visit this temple but there are still some more quiet places to find. This temple also has a lot of beautiful and colorful stupa’s but the most interesting part would be the massively big Buddha that is laying inside of it; the reclining Buddha. Ok here you will find heaps of crowds. So there is no way to get that proper selfie here, besides the Buddha is waaaaay to big to fit in a photo.

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So that was my fair share of temples so far, the next day I decided to take part in a bike tour through the city. I mean riding a bike through a city as big as this?! Hell yes and it was awesome. The tour took us to the other side of the river, also known as ‘the sleeping part’ of Bangkok. This is where a lot of locals live, it’s cheaper and more quiet than the so called ‘working part’ of Bangkok. After this the tour took us to the biggest flower market of the country, this is where all the flower business goes down. It was nice to see all the flowers being prepared to be sold for decoration. Fun fact: all the flowers in the market that day were yellow. In Thailand colors are referred to a day of the week. Yellow refers to Monday and the King and his son were both born on Monday. Outside the streets were being decorated in light blue flags because the Queens birthday was coming up, she was born on a Friday and that’s where the blue colors refers to.

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After the flower market we proceeded to Chinatown, my favourite part of the tour. We cycled through very narrow streets and alleys. Chinatown is a maze of little alley’s, it was like we were in a movie! I can highly recommend booking a bike tour through Bangkok, it shows a totally different side of the city. I had prebooked my tour at Co van Kessel, this company was the first to organize bike tours through Bangkok and is still one of the best known. There are several tours to choose from, I joined the classical tour that took about three hours but there is also a longer tour that takes about five hours and they have a night tour as well.

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Since the tour took place in the morning I still had an afternoon to fill. I had read something about the Golden Mount Temple so I decided to search for it. The Golden Mount Temple is situated on a mountain as the name says. It takes 318 steps to get up but the view over the city is amazing. This temple is actually not al too filled with tourists which is also quite nice.

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My opinion about Bangkok? You either love it or hate it and that can change within seconds. At some points the crowds and the extreme bustle drove me nuts and at other times I loved the crazyness. Bangkok is intens, it has a lot to do, see, taste and experience. It is not a city in which you can check all of it in just a few days. There is always something left to see over another visit.

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