Bangkok
Just how do two overnight flights, within 14 hours, work?
Well enough to get us via Emirates Air from JFK to Dubai, twelve-hour flight, three-hour layover in Dubai, and Dubai to Bangkok, Thailand, six-hour flight. Numerous time zone changes made the 'time' fourteen hours.
It is Viggo's first time to Bangkok and Karen's fourth, but the buzz of the city is equally exciting to both. There is a new airport, a skytrain that links much of the city, many new gleaming skyscrapers, new luxury malls, and a bit more polish. But is still has all bustling energy, as we viewed from our room in the Peninsula Hotel, overlooking the prime passage of commerce and people in Bangkok, the Chao Phraya River.
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Well enough to get us via Emirates Air from JFK to Dubai, twelve-hour flight, three-hour layover in Dubai, and Dubai to Bangkok, Thailand, six-hour flight. Numerous time zone changes made the 'time' fourteen hours.
It is Viggo's first time to Bangkok and Karen's fourth, but the buzz of the city is equally exciting to both. There is a new airport, a skytrain that links much of the city, many new gleaming skyscrapers, new luxury malls, and a bit more polish. But is still has all bustling energy, as we viewed from our room in the Peninsula Hotel, overlooking the prime passage of commerce and people in Bangkok, the Chao Phraya River.
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Eager to go, despite perhaps needing a little more recovery time from the flights, we commenced exploring Bangkok, the City of Angels, the Big Mango, Sin City Asia.
We began by taking a ferry to Wat Pho, famed as the Temple of the Reclining Buddha, the largest Buddha statue in Thailand, stunningly gorgeous, from head to toe.
Pictures do not do its radiant presence justice.
Wat Pho is also home to the largest number of Buddha images in one wat, or temple, in Thailand.
Buddhas of peace, with palms upraised, lined the corridors surrounding the wat.
All sorts of creatures protect the wats from evil forces.
Across the river from Wat Pho, Wat Arun rises. We climbed and climbed the irritatingly shallow and high steps to get halfway up Wat Arun, the Temple of the Dawn. The goal was to sign our names on a banner (something to do with good fortune in the Chinese New Year, we believe), wrapped around the edifice.
Beautifully ornate images and artwork adorned all sides and levels of the structure.
A round Buddha's belly (although not Thai style, but Chinese) proved to be too tempting for Karen to pass up, rubbing it for good fortune.
A lunch break was well deserved, after the wat's climb, and markets were teeming with buckets and baskets of fish, fresh and dried.
Tomorrow the Jim Thompson House, and perhaps sightings of Ladyboys at Patpong!
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