Bangkok Time Out Ten Stopover SuggestionsPrepared by Harold Stephens
Travel Correspondent for Thai Airways International
Last week I wrote in Weekly Travel Feature that with the coming events in China in 2008, Bangkok will be a busy stopover for many passengers. Now the question, what to do and see in Bangkok?
First let me say, Thai Airways Royal Orchid Holidays has some excellent tours around Bangkok. There are two, three and four-day packages that include visits to the Grand Palace and Emerald Buddha, trips to the floating market and the Rose Garden, and even an overnight trip on the Chao Phraya to Ayutthaya, the ancient capital of old Siam. These tours also provide visitors with ample leisure time to do what they please on their own. That can be a tough decision with so many options the city has to offer. Often some visitors want to bypass Bangkok for they may have the impression that the Thai capital is just another big city. They are misinformed. Bangkok is a vibrant, pulsating city with more things to see and thing to do than one can imagine. I live in Bangkok and I never find it boring. I am going to suggest ten things you may want to do in your leisure time. Most of them only take an hour or two but you will find them quite rewarding.
Number One. Without a doubt the most exciting thing about Bangkok is the Chao Phraya River that divides the city in two. Yet there are visitors, and even residents as well, who know very little about the river. Unlike rivers in many cities around the world that are archaic waterways, the Chao Phraya is a river that is in use, and this is what makes it exciting. It’s alive. It’s dynamic. It’s the heart beat and soul of Bangkok, and Thailand as well. If you want to see Bangkok in motion, go to the river.
What makes it all so wonderful is that the river is not closed to outsiders. It’s open to everyone. For some people who live in Bangkok, it is a means of transportation. This is where the average visitor, the tourist, can join in the fun. Go down to any one of the landings along the river and hop aboard an express boat for a run up or down river, for as little as ten baht for an hour’s trip. At the Oriental Landing you can also purchase an all-day ticket for 100 baht and cruise up and down the river as much as you want aboard a very comfortable Tourist Boat. Of course, you can always hire a private launch or a long-tail boat. They are perfectly safe and reliable.
Aside from the sites, the river is the grand venue for some of the country’s finest festivals. Two water festivals, Songkran and Loy Kratong, take place on the river. There are many colourful boat races and, for special occasions, there’s the magnificent Royal Barge Procession.
Number Two. All the major hotels along the river have their own private riverboats. They connect their hotels with the Oriental Landing, the Skytrain terminal at Sathorn Bridge and River City. One boat, the Marriott, travels far down river to the Marriott Hotel. Hop aboard the boat and visit the hotel, more like a resort than a hotel. The hotel boats are free and operate regularly. You can ride up and down the river all day.
Number Three. Have one of the hotel boats carry you to River City, a four-storey shopping complex. The shops are works of art themselves. Here you can see Thai art at its best and you don’t have to go shopping to enjoy River City. It’s an education in everything fine in Thailand. There are some unique shops hidden away that you will find interesting, like the Maps & Prints on the top floor. You can spend hours looking through stacks of maps and prints and the owner, Joerg Kohler, might even show you his private collection.
Number Four. While you are on the river, stop at The Oriental Hotel. The Oriental is the oldest hotel in Bangkok and for ten consecutive years has been voted the best hotel in the world. Wander through the lobby and gardens. Go to the Authors’ Lounge, in the original building, and look at all the old prints on the walls or, even better yet, have high tea in the Lounge in the afternoon. (There’s also an Archives Room and Trophy Section off to one side.)
In the evening you can sit in the main lobby, have a drink, and listen to classic chamber music by the hotel’s four-piece music ensemble. What an excellent way to spend an evening at your leisure.
Number Five. Ride the Skytrain. What a marvelous introduction to travel in Bangkok. It took eight years to build, and began service on the King’s birthday, December 5, 1999. The Skytrain changed Bangkok completely. Riding the train is a pleasure. Automated ticket machines, smart pay booths, shiny escalators with an army of workers to keep them spotless, clear signs using English and Thai, all make travelling easy and tourists feel right at home. The elevated structure runs south from Chatuchak Weekend Market to the Chao Phraya River with a branch breaking off and leading down the main tourist spot of Sukhumvit Road. And as I mentioned, all the major hotels along the river have free river launch service to the Taksin Terminal on the river. There is no better place to go people watching than on the Skytrain. What a way to go!
Number Six. Silom Village. This is a great place to shop and dine. The restaurants are large open-air fairs and in the evening there is Thai music and dancing on stage. The shops carry everything Thai. It’s a great place to meet friends and to relax.
Number Seven. A stroll along Sukhumvit from Soi 4 (Nana stop on the Skytrain) to Soi 18. The area is the Arab quarter of town and, of course, there are some fine Arabian restaurants and shops. The entire avenue is worth a stroll in the evening. It’s also the expat area of town.
Number Eight. Silom Road at night. At sundown the hucksters begin to arrive pushing their carts and set up shop on the sidewalks. The entire street becomes a night market. Even Patpong Road, the notorious night street of sin, has given way to becoming a night market. The street is blocked off to vehicular traffic.
Number Nine. Its rightful name is Chatuchak but it’s also called the Weekend Market and the Flea Market. By any name it’s the same, a must for any visitor to Bangkok. Unfortunately, it’s only open on weekends. Chatuchak covers 35 acres and has many hundreds of booths and more than 5,000 vendors selling everything imaginable. They may still refer it as a flea market but it’s more like a 'one-stop' shopping mall.
The best introduction to Chatuchak is to walk the perimeter before entering the maze of passageways. Here you find all kinds of farm produce and nursery products. Lots of plants, including orchids and ferns. Here too you can also see goats and sheep for sale and, when you round a corner, don't be shocked if you come face to face with dairy cows and perhaps even a bullock. There are carts for sale, with wheels two metres high, and the oxen to pull them as well. Inside the alleyways it’s something else.
There's more than shopping, however. There’s entertainment and it’s free. You can watch craftsmen at work, artists or wood carvers, or even see a cockfight or witness two Siamese fighting fish battling it out.
Number Ten. Bangkok has some very interesting, little known museums. The Peninsula Hotel, for example, has a small museum on the top floor. You certainly won’t expect to find what you do when you step off the elevator. You might think you have stepped into a space ship. At this point the receptionist will welcome you to the Paribata Lounge. Even more confused? The Paribata Lounge is a sky museum that honours Prince Paribata, Minister of War during the reign of King Rama VII.
The walls of the lounge carry displays of historical aviation photographs. There’s a plaque denoting that the museum was opened Friday, 21 May 1999. It’s dedicated to “the spirit, progress and bright future of aviation in Thailand.” A second plaque details the history of Thai aviation beginning in 1911 right up to 1997. Certain to capture anyone’s attention are actual aircraft controls displayed at various locations around the lounge from earliest aircraft to modern fighters.
Next is Bangkok’s Human Imagery Museum, a bit far out of town but taxi drivers know the place. But be careful when you enter. The attendant at the door asked for my name card and said the receptionist must sign me in. He then handed the card to the receptionist, but she kept writing and did not look up. I was becoming a bit annoyed and pushed my card closer to her, and I probably would have stood there another ten minutes had not the attendant nudged me. Did I feel like a fool. The receptionist wasn’t real. She was one of the figures at the museum, as was the man reading the newspaper next to her. So now you know what to expect inside. Enter and you live not in the present but in another era with past kings of Siam, farmers and laborers, poets and aristocrats, monks and, yes, even slaves. The displays not only depict slavery but they show the entire history of slavery beginning in prehistoric time down through the Greek and American periods to the freeing of slaves in the Kingdom by King Rama V.
If you are down around Charoenkrung Road, better known as New Road, near the Central Post Office, check out the Bangkok Folk Museum. If you have ever wondered what it was like living in Bangkok prior to World War II, before air-conditioning and luxury hotels, then you might want to visit a real Thai house built more than seventy years ago. This is what the Bangkok Folk Museum is all about. The house turned museum is not an old palace or a past royal residence, nor is it one of those traditional Thai teak houses that have begun to appear around town in the last decade or two, the kind of classical house that Jim Thompson bought up-country and reassembled in Bangkok. This is a Thai house, with its collection of household antiques, that, as the plaque in front of the museum reads, “…presents a living scenario of the middle level Bangkokians in the period of pre-World War II.”
On every tourist list is the Jim Thompson House; but there’s another traditional house that is just as great and that has been turned into a museum. It’s the MR Kukrit Pramoj Heritage Home and offers the chance to explore the life and loves of one of the greatest Thais, both artistically and politically. This complex of traditional Thai-style houses with well-manicured gardens is to be found at 19 Soi Phra Pinit, South Sathorn Road, and has been classified as a "Home of an important Person" by the Department of Fine Arts at the Education Ministry. However, the title has not turned the houses into a museum-style environment: they still feel like a lived-in home showing the lifestyle of a former prime minister and literary artist. When Kukrit was alive, his home welcomed numerous prominent figures in politics and society, both local and foreign, and these guests helped make the houses what they are today.
Next week my column will be Beijing Time Out. Since many visitors will be traveling to Beijing in the coming months for the big games, I would like to tell readers what they can see and do in this grand city—other than sports that is. QUESTIONS & ANSWERSQ. Dear Mr. Stephens. Is it possible to take the train to Chiang Mai and fly back to Bangkok? I would like to see come of the countryside. —Daisy Limbu, Taunggyi, Myanmar
A. Dear Daisy. Yes, you can take the train to Chiang Mai and return by a THAI flight to Bangkok. But I hate to disappoint you. The train to Chiang Mai is a night train and there is not much to see in the dark. You could travel one way by bus, or by rented car. —HS
Harold Stephens
Bangkok
E-mail: ROH Weekly Travel (booking@inet.co.th)
Note: The article is the personal view of the writer and does not necessarily reflect the view of Thai Airways International Public Company Limited.
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