Grand Bangkok Tour

Today was touring day. We are still really jet lagged and had a hard time sleeping. Up for awhile then asleep, then Judy woke up and stayed awake reading her book. By the time morning arrived we felt that it was just time to go to sleep! That feeling lingered all day.

    After breakfast in our room, we were on the bus at 8:30 for the Grand Bangkok Tour. The first stop was the dazzling Golden Buddha temple that houses 5.5 tons of real golden Buddha image. We were surprised to see that it seems to be right in the heart of the city although the actual temple building is not that old. You must remove your shoes to go in but they allow photos to be taken. The place was overrun with tourists. Some locals were there offering flowers and other items. A very interesting place.

Next stop was the Grand Palace and the Emerald Buddha Temple. As the name suggests it is the palace of the king. This Buddha is very small and you might miss it if you did not know where to look. It was the only building that we were allowed to go into. Again, it was packed with people. It reminded us of the Forbidden City in Beijing only on a much smaller scale. Then it was off to a boat cruise along the Chao Phraya River, the main river in Bangkok. We did go up a side canal and saw what you might expect to see here. Very old building, some falling down into the water. We did come across 3 small boats of vendors selling their products. When we got back to the main river we travelled some distance to the international/Thai buffet lunch. The river is used by many people moving goods and people us and down. At lunch we tried a variety of Thai dishes all of which were quite tasty.

The final part of the tour was a stop at a friendship store for shopping. What a waste of time. It had mainly diamonds, gold, fine silks, etc. One woman was looking at some earrings and a necklace that started at $12,000! By the number of tourist that “made this stop” the kickbacks to the companies that send them there must be enormous! As I said what a waste of time.

When we finally got back to the hotel we needed to do our pre check in for the cruise. Our luggage was picked up at 7 pm and will be taken directly to the ship as we are on tour all day again tomorrow. A brief dip in the pool and then we headed back to the Night Market for dinner. We did stop to ride the giant ferris wheel. It looks something like the Big Eye in London. I posted a picture of it last nigh. Finally back here and ready for the early wake up call.