Bangkok

Good news the washing is back and it is all there, in fact, I have acquired some additional items a childs pair of underpants and two male pair of underpants! There was only one casualty - a pair of white linen trousers which came back a fetching dirty grey colour.

It is so warm here - normally you want to sit in the sun and get a tan but here you fight for a place in the shade!

We have at last done some culture,we have visited the Grand Palace - to enter the Palace you have to be modestly dressed so D took a pair of jeans to change into but they were deemed too scruffy by the wardens as they have holes in them (don't think they fully appreciated the designer holes!!!) he therefore had to borrow a pair of trousers and emerged wearing a fetching pair of XL green cheesecloth elasticated pants. The Palace complex is amazing I have never seen so much gold and ornamentation in one place but after 3 hours we were 'Palaced' out. As it was now midday we had no option but to retreat to an air conditioned room (where D changed his t-shirt again!).

This is the first place that I have had to cope with stray dogs so far (they eat them in China and Japan is too ordered and clean to have anything stray!) I am coping but it is quite hard! Fortunately they seem to be suffering from the heat too and are quite docile.

We took a 'longboat' river cruise around the waterways of Bangkok yesterday afternoon. It was actually bliss getting out of the stifling heat of the city. The water looks filthy but everyone on the river bank and at the floating market look like they are having the best time. We saw kids swimming in the canal which, given the colour of the water and the fact that we had just seen some kind of water lizard, I don't think I would have been doing.