Week 3- Bangkok- Day 1

So today was arrived into Bangkok airport at about 8am including the hour and a half time difference between India and Asia. The second flight from Mumbai to Bangkok was fine and we had a spare seat so we managed to spread out a little bit and got a few Zzz's in!

We got a cab from the airport to our hostel but we were a bit worried because we thought we might get completely ripped off as we didn't have a clue about the currency yet! Our cab driver was a little bonkers and appeared to be swigging medicine the whole way there while repeatedly saying 'Sunesa' and laughing.. Our hostel was called 'Suneta'. Once we got to Khao San road our cab driver literally didn't have a clue where he was going so booted us out the cab. By this point we were very tired and disorientated, we hadn't even really registered the fact we were in Bangkok! We then realised we had arrived in Bangkok just as their New Year was starting- Songkran festival. This is a water festival which is all about washing away the bad luck for the new year. The festival goes on for 3 days and you literally cannot step outside your hostel without being completely and utterly drenched. It's one massive water fight! So after a lot of confusing conversations with many Thai people who didn't know where Suneta hostel was we finally got approached by man (we clearly looked very lost and dying from carrying our rucksacks in the heat) who found it on his phone and sent us in the right direction.

The hostel is amazing and the people staying here are really cool. We couldn't check in until 2pm so we put our stuff in the luggage room, sneaked a bit of free breakfast and sat talking to other people staying here. Yet again it was really good talking to people who have been in Oz and New Zealand and we have been given loads of advice! One of the girls Hetta has been living out there for about year so we have been speaking to her loads. She was heading out to do a few tourist attractions so we decided to power on through and headed straight out with her!

We got a map from the hostel and was ready to walk to the temple then we got approached by a guy with a tuk tuk who said he will take us to all the places for 5 baht each so we decided we may as well do that. We jumped in, let's say I feel a lot safer in these tuk tuks than the ones in India. Our Tuk tuk driver called himself John he only had about 5 teeth so understanding him was a little difficult. We then went to see the standing Buddha (Wat Intharawihan) which was pretty cool. We then went to see the Palace and the sleeping Buddha but we weren't appropriately dressed (shorts and strappy tops) so we decided we will go back to it another time. We then went on a boat ride down the river for a hour and we saw some floating villages and restaurants. We was told it was the floating markets but we think that was a little white lie! It was really interesting to see the houses down the canal, they were more like little shacks!

After that we headed back to the hostel, me and B then decided to get something to eat. We headed towards Khao San road and little did we know the festival had just kicked off so we got drenched! It was amazing sitting there eating lunch and watching the festival go by. After lunch we made a quick dash back to the hostel because Charlotte had her camera in her bag and she was worried about the water!

We chilled out in our dorm for a bit and managed to FaceTime home which was nice, we were absolutely EXHAUSTED though. We really needed to stay awake until bedtime but we were both struggling particularly Charlotte! We decided to head out for a quick dinner so we could come back, have a shower and hit the sacks for the night. We ended up going out for dinner with two other girls from our hostel which was nice, one was American and the other was Irish but had been travelling for 14 months! We walked a really long way round in hope of not getting wet but of course we did.. It's Songkran!!! We were so happy to get back and be in bed, we were definitely going to sleep well!