So anyways. On Thursday morning, we slept in until about 9:30 a.m. and grabbed breakfast. Checked out of our bungalow and got a taxi to the pier. Waited at the pier for about 10 minutes before catching another long-tail motor boat back to Krabi Town. Hopped in a taxi to take us down the bus station where we would *hopefully* drop our packs and wander around a bit for the 8 hours or so we were prepared to have before our bus headed out. Instead, we had a bit of an almost disastrous experience with that as the taxi took a meandering route, stopping to drop off propane tanks and finally dropped us off NOT at our bus station. Instead, it took us to some tourist information center who called our bus station which said, "oh, we can send a taxi over to pick you up at 4 (It was 11:30 or so at the time). We had decided pretty unanimously that we didn't want to do anything strenous and the information center told us we could leave our bags there. So we did just that and found a coffee shop/restaurant that served the following: REAL milkshakes, ice cream sundaes, spaghetti, thai food, iced (and hot) coffees, club sandwiches and GRILLED CHEESE, with bacon. Can you guess what I ordered? It was delicious. Grilled cheese, and a chocolate sundae. Ain't nothing better. We had about 4 hours to kill but were pretty tired and Bekah was feeling pretty sunburnt at that point, so we didn't want to walk around too much. So what did we do? Only our favorite activity of the trip: Uno. For like 2 and a half hours. The other hour and a half were spent napping or eating, mostly eating. Our taxi finally came and then stopped to pick up some 8 or so other people from various hostels in Krabi.
Got to the bus station still a full hour early. at this point, we started to throw around a bit. Threw for quite some time, but I was getting really hot, so I relaxed in the shade for the last fifteen minutes until the bus arrived, a full 30 minutes late. We departed roughly an hour behind schedule and hoped on the bus. 2 hours to the same place we went before. Then 11 more hours to Bangkok. We got into Bangkok around 5 a.m. There were very few cars on the road, and it was exceptionally dark. We wandered around for a bit (we didn't exactly have anywhere to go, unfortunately. We decided, hey, we should go to the national park. That's probably a good place to relax and maybe catch some z's before the sunbreaks. So we head over there, pausing for mobile toilet buses and photo ops with Korean language signs. As we approach the park we discover that it is a place for rest, if you are a stray animal, trash, a tourist bus, or homeless. There was virtually no grass and the whole area was simply depressing to walk through.
However, we passed the "park" and hit the wall that surrounds the National Palace and watched the sunrise over the palace. We then went for a walk to see what our breakfast options to discover no restaurants open till 8 a.m. and it was only 7. So we walked around the city for some time. we stumbled upon a port area market, where they were selling tons of fruits, drinks and other things. Also, We saw dozens of Buddhist monks walking through the area and watched as numerous buddhist followers purchased foods and offered them to the various monks walking around, bowing at their feet and giving them flowers. It was beautiful. Absolutely beautiful.
Then, while walking, we saw this stunning walled in area with beautiful statues, and such. It looked a lot like a wat, but we couldn't find any religious markings. Then we discovered it was an elementary school. We walked inside and just enjoyed how beautiful everything was. The intricate painting of the moldings and undersides of roofs, the colorful spirals of tile leaping up buildings. It was stunning. And to think, a group of 5-9 years olds call this place their school. It was amazing. Positively amazing.
Then, hungry as can be, we headed back to this thai restaurant near the entrance to the palace, and we grabbed some thai food for breakfast and took our time relaxing in a/c and peace. Then we headed out across the street into the national palace area. I was wearing a knee length skirt and bekah and adam, shorts, and we were all turned away, instructed to change into pants. Luckily, our packs were with us and we were able to just throw on the one pair of pants we brought with us to Thailand. We entered the area, and saw a small guard changing march and then discovered that tickets to see the grand palace were 350 baht. That is only 10 dollars, but we were running a bit low on cash (I have about 1000 baht left for three and a half days, and 350 baht was a lot) Plus our packs were heavy and it was incredibly crowded. I'd have liked to have gone, but it just didn't work out for us. Instead, Bekah and I headed outside, bought some ADORABLE matching sundresses (complete with elephants on them) and then hopped in a taxi to head to our hostel.
Our hostel, Suk 11, was AMAZING. It wasn't the cheapest hostel in bangkok, those are on khao san road and run you as like as 4 dollars/night, but my single room (oh my gosh, a whole room, bathroom, shower all to myself!) was 500 baht, which comes to about 13 bucks per night. Not too bad. Also, Suk 11 probably has the best ambience I've ever seen in a hostel. It was SPECTACULAR. I loved staying there. Plus our rooms had a/c. A double was 900/night, and they had triples as well. If you are ever going to bangkok and are looking to stay away from, crowded, dirty, noisy khao san road, I'd highly recommend Suk 11, on Sukhumvit Soi 11.
Got into our hostel, and basically passed out. Mind you, we had taken an 11-hour bus ride through the night to get to Bangkok and arrive at 5 a.m. and had been up for pretty much the whole thing. I slept, and then woke up and got some subway, for the first time 6 full months. Came back, showered, napped more, and then got ready for the tournament registration party.
En route, we stopped at this fantastic, albeit slightly pricier restaurant and ordered sandwiches, my first real sandwich (excluding pb) in 6 months. Mine had fried egg, delicious cheese, and ham, on foccacia bread. Oh. My. God. Delicous. It was probably the most satisfying meal we'd eaten because it was huge and we were really really hungry. Plus, sandwiches are tough to come by in Korea.
Then headed to restaurant for registration. Checked in and in line met this guy named Sam who happened to have traded jersey with adam at college nationals the previous may. What a small world. He lives in Northern Thailand, working for a non-profit, installing renewable energy on the burmese-thai border. He went to Stanford and looked freakishly like TJ McCourt. He was super cool and ended up kind of hanging out with us for the whole weekend. Had a beer, chatted it up, and then headed back home around 11 to get some sleep.
That's it for now... Tournament weekend coming soooooon!
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