Left the travelodge at 08.15 and took the car to the long term parking which was cheaper than a taxi to Heathrow. Checked in with Thai Air for our 11 hour flight and thought we would get the price for an upgrade so proceeded to the Thai air desk. Luckily we were able to upgrade for the bargain price of £1374 each. We decided it was too late in life to buy shares in Thai Air so decided to make do with economy. You know the flight is going to be delayed when just before leaving to taxi they put out an anouncement asking if there are any doctors on board but a after halve an hour we were on our way and nobody was taken off the plane.

We arrived in Bangkok on time at 06.00 £2748 better off but it was 07.30 before we cleared immigration. We headed for the exit to catch the transfer coach to Don Mueang Airport for our onward flight to Mandaly in Myanmar which with the Bangkok rush hour took over an hour. We flew with Air Asia who on the whole were very good but we were now starting to get tired so slept most of the way although it was only a hour and a half flight. We arrived around 13.00 and once we had cleared immigration with our do it yourself visas off the internet we were on our way. The thing about taking a while to get though immigration is you don't have to wait for your luggage and in Mandalay ours were the only bags going around the carrousel. I asked a girl in the baggage area where the best place to change money was as there was a bank in the hall but no one at it. She told me to change money in the arrivals hall (which as it turned out was the hall for everything) as that bank was a bad bank. I nodded understandingly but she was determined I understood and insisted I turn around to look at the bank and confirm that I could see it, I did confirm and she kept saying bad bank. We took her advise and changed our money in the arrival hall, we took dollars with us as we suspected sterling could be an issue and sure enough they only did dollars. We purchased a pre paid taxi ticket for 15000 Kyatt which is approx £7 which took about 45 minutes and 35 kilometres to the hotel. Good air conditioned taxis but right hand drive, driving on the left! Quite often we start off with a dire hotel and things improve or we get used to it but as it happens this was a good quality hotel so the start is fine.