Day 1-6: Bangkok to Chiang Mai

So we arrived in Bangkok and took a taxi to our hotel. It was located about a 10 min. walk south of Khao San road, which apparently is where all the backpackers hang out. The immediate neighborhood was aweful. Spend the first day resting and exploring the streets close to the hotel.

Second day we went walking for real. We went to the train station to buy tickets for Chiang Mai and continued on to Siam Square and the huge department store called MKD (or something similar). Strange that we should end up spending our first full day in Bangkok exploring bookstores! Other than that, there is not that much to tell from Bangkok, which seems to be a really big, hot, noicy city. Unpleasent.

The train trip up to Chiang Mai was fun. 12 hours with reasonable good food onboard and an unexpected change of trains in the middle of nowhere. Arrival in Chiang Mai was nice as our hotel here turned out to be really pleasant. Basically we have been walking around Chiang Mai for a couple of days, doing very little other than enjoying the weather and the food. Yesterday we took a boat cruise on the nearby Ping river. That was pleasant as well.

Our plans for the next couple of days are uncertain as well. Probably go f or a tour somewhere and head back to Bangkok on Saturday. Then on to Siam Reap in Cambodia.