This is part three of a five part round the world trip.
Introduction
This segment starts with me leaving Istanbul. The original plan had been to go to Baku Azerbaijan, but the Iran War forced me to change all of my plans. After a lot of searching, I found some Thai Airways flights to Bangkok and this post will focus mostly on my time there.
Getting There
Getting to the Istanbul Airport was quite a journey from my hotel in Old Town Istanbul. It took about two hours to get there via the metro. Security at the airport was pretty easy and as a Thai Airways business class traveller, I had access to Turkish Airways lounge which was quite nice.
This was within the first two weeks of the Iran War and with Middle East airspace closed, virtually all the award availability was gone. Between that war, Ukraine to the north and Pakistan bombing Afghanistan, what had been one of the best connected cities in the world felt remarkably constrained.
Eventually, I found business class availability on Thai Airways to Bangkok. Strangely, this one flight often had four seats available. I suspect it was just a route that a lot ofhe points and miles people just didn't want to fly at the time.
While researching the route, I used sites like SafeAirSpace.net to convince myself it should be safe. The flight headed east flying south of Ukraine and Russia, roughly fifty miles north of Iran before cutting across Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is a sad feeling, to see so much war in the world and to find yourself threading the needle between so many conflicts.
In Afghanistan, there is no air traffic control. Instead, there are a few safety corridors through the country and commercial flights maintain longitudinal spacing and lock their altitude upon entering the region. Afghanistan is not generally believed to have anti-aircraft capable of taking down a jetliner so, even during a conflict, there is relatively low risk of a mistake.
The flight itself was very nice with excellent service and food. I actually had Wifi for a chunk of the flight and was able to track our progress the whole way. It was a little sad to see myself overflying Baku, the city I'd planned to visit. And it was definitely nerve racking, flying so close to Ukraine, Russia and Iran.
Once I landed I took an expensive cab to my hotel. There is a train you can take to north of the city center, but there was no train from there to near my hotel on the river, and at this point it was about 9am and I hadn't slept yet.
Most of my time in Bangkok was divided between these areas:
- Old Town
- The Chao Phraya River
- City Center
Although I'd been to Bangkok a couple years before, almost everything there was entirely new to me.
Old City
My cab dropped me off directly at my hotel, after a 30-40 minute drive from the airport. Unfortunately, the hotel was solidly booked and didn't have any rooms available and didn't expect any for a couple hours. So I dropped my luggage off and headed to the Grand Palace and Wat Phra Kaew, aka the Temple of the Emerald Buddha
The Grand Palace
Built in the late 18th century, the palace is one of the most prominent tourist destinations. The grounds are full of temples, ornate buildings, spires and perfectly manicured gardens.
To me though, the real treasure is the roughly two kilometers of murals lining the walls around the palace.
My first hotel was The StandardX. This was my first StandardX and I think it is the perfect hotel for anyone visiting Bangkok for the first time, especially if you are a Hyatt loyalist. It is category two so you can get it cheaply on points, but it also often has reasonable cash rates.
It has a very quirky identity and the place is full of fun and odd art.
It wasn't the best Globalist breakfast I've ever had, but still better than the average in the US. Good fruit selection, they covered a lot of different cuisine but minimally. So for example, they had dim sum, but usually just one type, usually har gow or shu mai, there were a couple cheeses, one type of olives, but nothing like the spreads in Istanbul. I think there was also a small menu which I never felt the need to order from. The ambiance was great though as the restaurant is on the banks of the river.
Even though this was a free Globalist breakfast, Hyatt was actually running a promo across most of Asia where they had steeply discounted cash rates that included breakfast. It was literally cheaper than the standard member rate.
The best part about the StandardX has to be the location. I had rooms on the third or fourth floor overlooking the river. The first night, there was live music and I could sit outside on my balcony watching the show.
In addition, the hotel is literally attached to one of the piers for the hop on hop off tourist boats. This makes it a perfect place to stay when seeing everything on the river.
Khao San Road
The StandardX is on the river, but if you head a few blocks east of there you will find Khao San Road. This is a famous, some might say infamous, backpacker/tourist destination. It has a feel similar to a sketchier Thai version of the French Quarter, the kind of neighborhood where you can find fried scorpions, go-go dancers and McDonalds all in the same few blocks.
I bought a fried scorpion. I think the lady selling them really enjoyed watching tourists eat them. They fry them up right in front of you and this neutralizes the venom in the tail. I remember being a little surprised by the price so I think there is a substantial tourist markup, but it's still reasonable.
A single scorpion isn't very filling, so I found one of the quieter, nicer looking places with live music. The food and drinks really weren't very good. I got the feeling that this area was a place for tourists, fun to experience, but maybe not where you really want to go for dinner.
Botanic Backyard
Botanic Backyard is about a block and a half south east of The StandardX, and this neighborhood is where you want to go instead of Khao San Road. Lots of good restaurants, hotels and hostels, places for laundry, live music, but without the chaos in Khao San Road.
It's not cheap by Thai standards, but the food and drinks here are fantastic. The crispy pork belly was the most delicious thing I had on the trip and I ended up coming back and ordering it a few times. I think it was only about 250 BAHT which was less than most of their fancy cocktails.
Chao Phraya River
Hop On / Hop Off
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Icon Siam
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Jurrasic World
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Asiatique
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Wat Arun
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Tha Maharaj
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City Center
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Sky Beach
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Lumphini Park
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Leaving Bangkok
Summary
This is part three of a five part round the world trip.