20.12 - Day 340 - Bangkok, THA
Friday 20th December - Bangkok (Day 340)
Our last full day in Bangkok and indeed for the whole year of travelling. Thankfully I’m feeling better so after a popular breakfast of grilled pork sticks, fried doughnut pieces, yoghurt and juice from the street stalls across the road, but eaten in our room at The Lancaster, we head on out.
The traffic/security guard at the front of the building is as happy as ever to see us - well Seb, then Sienna, then Kate and I in distant third spot.
It’s a simple single bus ride from outside our local 7/11 to the Bangkok City Library (Sienna and Seb’s place of worship as we won’t be visiting any temples this time round), should take 30 minutes.
Two and half hours later we arrive after our original bus was emptied half way along. A couple of locals try and help but we get kicked off / dropped off by a further two buses (only when you get on does a roving conductor ask where you’re going). They and the bus stops contain no English though.
Three Grab taxi’s are requested and called for being too far away and a vacant taxi refuses to take us when we show where we want to go. 1st bus 3km, 2nd bus 0.5km, 3rd bus 0.5km, 2.5km to go which we end up walking. It’s hot but more manageable than we remember, when in the shade.
A stop for a smoothie takes 30 minutes because it’s busy, but the friendly owner and also two locals keep Sienna and Seb entertained. Meanwhile I discover a food court of sorts, snaring what I’m later told by the lady in the smoothie queue is the juice from shrimps head. Tastes good though.
Eventually we arrive at the library, where after showing our passports (a quick scan of the reviews beforehand helps here allowing us to come prepared) we’re given day passes, buzzed in and settle down in the Children’s section for an hour of noses in books. It’s right in the centre of Bangkok so obviously searching for libraries wasn’t in our thought process at the start of the trip.
Once Sienna and Seb have had their fill; Khao San Road is just around the corner, these days filled with repetitive souvenir shops, massages (where price collusion has definitely occurred) and restaurants.
After a snack and scarf buying we try a different form of transport home - the ferry. This is much more successful; we only get kicked off once, but so does everyone else and we board another one immediately after.
The significant wake from the ferry crashes into the sides of the narrow canal under a mixture of tin shacks to modern office blocks. Back in the hotel we all take a final plunge in the pool on the 12th floor.
Our hunt for dinner takes us to a weekly night market just past our ferry stop on the campus of Srinakharinwirot University where we pick a varied mixture from the 30 or so food and drink stalls. We sit and eat on a grass field where a band is playing which excites the crowd no end. It seems a suitable final supper, quirky but tasty and with that we call it a day.
