On the way to breakfast we reacquainted ourselves with 'Sh*t yourself Alley' (on our previous visit, 2 days in, we got 20m down it and turned back). Its labels itself as a short cut to Khaosan Road, it turns out it is. You just have to walk down a long alley, through the back yards of homes, passed a lot dogs, up some stairs through a travel agents and through a bar. It seems so simple now.

Today's mission, explore Bangkok by using the river taxi. Its really straight forward after a 10 minute conversation at the tourist information desk.

The plan

Get to the end of the route on the tourist boat, get an idea of our surroundings and work back towards our area.

What happened.

We paid double the price of the taxi boat to be on a boat with a tour guide. He just told you the platform number and the boat followed exactly the same route as the taxi.

We discovered a lot of temples so we just picked one - the most historic one 'Wat Pho'. When we arrived we layered ourselves in trousers and long sleeves (respectable clothing) and entered. It soon became clear we were not at Wat Pho but at a marriage ceremony. The kind man on the door pointed us in the right direction. When we got to the correct place, Matt got more GoBeginner than GoPro. The building was spectacular, housing a 42m reclining Buddha.

The majority of the day was spent practising our scam avoidance techniques, ducking such lines as 'The temple is closed but I can take somewhere worthwhile' and 'The royal family are about to come down this road and I need to escort (by tuk tuk) away.

M & C xxxx