Friday, July 15. Bangkok, Thailand

Today we slept in a bit and stayed in our room for a bit catching up on the news of the US debt crisis while we had BBC and Fox news channels at our disposal.

We then wandered out for lunch, still in a bit of a jet-lagged state, but after a good, strong iced coffee and a full stomach we were ready to go exploring to locate the Stray Travel office where we would need to meet our tour group at 6:45am the next morning.

We hopped on the Skytrain and headed to the river (35-Baht ea.) where we caught a boat for 14 Baht up north of the main palace to Pier No 13, and from there Stray was just a short walk near the Democracy Monument. The day was hot, humid and overcast again, and so we were not surprised when a short shower broke out. Thankfully we were within the shelter of the boat at the time, though it might have been refreshing to cool off with a little bit of rain.

At the Stray office they took our emergency contact details and answered our questions about the trip. There would be wi-fi opportunities along the way -- a plus for you blog readers. They also has internet stations at the shop and so we checked our email for a bit before heading out to the MBK marketplace.

My watch had died the day before we left London, and rather than have the battery replaced I opted to grab a cheap watch in Bangkok. The problem was that most of the street venders were only selling large, Knock-off bling watches that were not necessarily practical for our trip. So we headed off to MBK near the National Stadium Skytrain stop at our Stray guide's recommendation. The problem was it was approaching rush hour making a Taxi a bit unpredictable in the traffic, so our guide recommended a local canal boat just up the street.

After walking a couple blocks we found the entrance to the canal boat stop behind the 7-Eleven as expected. The boats and docks are definitely not up to US/UK health and safety standards, but that seemed to add to the fun of it all. We hopped (literally) onto the next boat, minding a big gap of canal water below, paying just 9 Baht each to get to the stop we needed. And we were off...

The boat had a pulley system that raised a plastic tarp along each side to protect you from the sewage-smelling canal water that sprayed up as we went along.

The structures along the canal where an intermix of shacks and houses that the locals seem to live in, with a caged walkway hanging out over the edge of the water with all sorts of local commerce and bartering taking place - from ducks or chicken for dinner to clothes for sale.

It was just a short walk from the canal stop to the MBK shopping plaza. My initial plan was to look for a Swatch watch, figuring the lower end ones would come at a lesser price at such a market. Upon arriving, MBK seemed to be only just a step up from the street markets with only slightly less chaos to the process but with the added benefit of air conditioning. It soon became apparent that Swatch was not on the offering there, so we headed off across the intersection via the sky walkway to the Siam Discovery Plaza where we saw a Swatch shop advertised.

We found the Swatch shop after a little bit of wandering. It had a nice selection, but the prices were similar to UK/US MSRP prices which didn't seem worth it to me when I know I can get one on sale at the Denver outlet malls for much less. So we wandered back to the MBK plaza and I settled on a small, clear plastic watch with a hot pink band advertised for 299 Baht, which Stephen talked them down to accepting 200 Baht for it.

My £4/$6.50 watch to hand, we headed back to Sukhumvit via the Skytrain to grab dinner near our hotel and get our bags shuffled and repacked for our early departure the next morning.


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