Temples, Buddhas, and Squished Airplanes

We started the day by getting up just before breakfast. The common room and breakfast were much busier than the day before. It was the same food but still delicious. After that, we got our stuff all packed up because we had to check out before we left for the day's adventures. Our only real plan for the day was to walk to a ferry terminal on the river and take the ferry to Wat Arun (the 3rd big tourist place in Bangkok).

Wat Arun as seen from the ferry

The walk to the ferry was overall pretty nice. We walked through a neighborhood called Banglumpoo and it has a ton of hostels mixed with regular residential housing. It was nicer than the areas we walked through yesterday. The ferry terminal was easy to find but we were kind of at a loss on which specific boat to get on. There was a family with a tour guide so we just followed them. The boat ride was pretty busy but we missed rush hour so it wasn't too bad. Seeing the city from the river was really cool.

Main Chedi of Wat Arun

Lucky for us, the water taxi took us right to Wat Arun. Just like the other big places in Bangkok, Wat Arun was built in the late 1700's/early 1800's. It has a main chedi (tower) and four smaller chedis surrounding the main one. Each smaller chedi was built to reference one of the 4 great seas around Thailand. The whole complex is beautifully adorned with recycled ceramic pieces. The pictures don't do it justice but the place is really big and really, really pretty. I loved the monkeys/demons "holding up" the chedis. In the past, you could climb the steep stairs up to an upper terrace but it was unfortunately closed.

This was definitely the hotter of our two days in Bangkok. My goodness walking around with our small backpacks felt like carrying a ton of bricks. The sun can really sap your energy so we have been drinking a lot of water. Also to beat the heat, we stopped at the same pier and shopping area as yesterday when we ate lunch and got some frreezies. They're fresh fruit and ice basically.

Monkey/Demon things holding up Wat Arun

Funeral Altar At Museum

Wat Arun was our main highlight for the day for sightseeing so we were at kind of a loss on what to do next. Because of the heat, we wanted to go somewhere with at least some AC. We also didn't want to walk across town and have to take a taxi later. So we went to the National Museum. It is one of the largest museums in Southeast Asia (which is funny because it's tinnnny compared to ones in Europe). We saw a ton of Buddha sculpture (Southeast Asians in the past preferred carving to painting I guess). The highlight of the museum for us though was the funeral procession altars. They were MASSIVE things had required 216 people to pull the cremated ashes of former kings. 

Next we were getting really hungry so we walked back to the Banglampoo area and walked  around, where we found a Vietnamese Pho restaurant. As usual when you're traveling abroad, the place that has lots of local people is usually the place to go,  so we figured we'd try it. It was delicious! Pho is beef soup stock with rice noodles and meat and cilantro and yumminess. Next, Lacey treated both of us to a Thai foot massage. After all the miles the last couple days, this was a welcome thing. I've never had a foot massage before so the guy doing it and Lacey both laughed at me a bunch.

Lacey eating Pho (pronounced "fuh")

Next, we walked back to the hostel and walked through a fun, different area of Khao San Road. We really liked all the open bars and stuff. Our stuff was at the hostel still and we packed up. We took an Uber which turned out to also be a taxi to the airport (not the main one we flew into before, this one is for domestic flights and budget airlines). He took a toll road to make it go faster then asked us to pay him for the tolls afterward. Problem is, he also charged our Uber account for the tolls too. Lacey reported it and we got some money back thankfully.

We took an Air Asia flight to Krabi which is in the south of Thailand and is a gateway to the cool islands and beaches. The seats were INSANELY close together and, of course, the guy in front of me put his seat back. I was squished. It was only a 1 hour 20 minutes flight so I survived. We met a couple sitting next to Lacey who were really nice. She teaches at an International School in Korea. We took a bus to Krabi Town itself and made it to our hostel.

I was not made for small seats

Weird bed arrangement at hostel

The hostel was okay. The bed part of the room was super closed-in which was weird. Lacey started to not feel well during the day today and it got worse on he plane and when we arrived at the hostel. We found some pad thai on a street corner because we knew we needed to eat. It ended up not being that great. There were some cars on the main road a full block from our hostel blasting music. They didn't do it very late but it was loud!

Tomorrow we are off to Railay Beach and the beautiful beaches. Let's hope we have good weather and feel better!!