Thailand and Cambodia: What We Learned

So it's been a few months since we returned from our whirlwind Southeast Asia trip. In that time, Lacey and I have spent quite a bit of time talking about what we would do differently if we did our trip over again.

Disclaimer: Our trip was INCREDIBLE and I wouldn't really change anything about the trip. This is just a fun exercise for others who want to do a similar trip to what we did.

Getting to Bangkok:

Our Trip:

We bought our flights in two stages, our tickets from Chicago to Bangkok and then separate MPLS to Chicago tickets. This saved us about $300 but it was a pain in the butt on the way back. On purpose, we got seats across the aisle from each other to hopefully give us more leg room. 

What we would do differently:

Ideally, it wouldn't be winter and we would drive to Chicago and park our car to save the money. If it was winter, we would do everything we could to get tickets from MPLS to Bangkok instead of the Chicago situation. We would also sit next to each other on the plane.

Bangkok:

Our Trip:

We stayed in Bangkok 2 different times in 2 different areas. The first stretch, we were in the Khao San Road area but not right by the Road (about 5 minute walk away). The second stretch we stayed in the more modern Silom area. Our hostel in Khao San Road was great, the Silom area hostel was bad. 

Our favorite Bangkok moments were in the market areas like Khao San Road at night, the Patpong night market, and at Chatuchak Weekend Market. We also really loved Wat Pho and Grand Palace areas (worth all the tourists). Wat Arun and the boats on the river were nice too. 

What we would do differently:

We would probably just stay in the Khao San Road twice or somewhere near there. The more modern area wasn't as exciting or as authentic in our opinion. Taking a tour of the East side of the river (Thonburi) would have been cool and I would have liked to walk around the Chinatown neighborhood. Two other things we didn't do that we probably should have was have an actual sit down, nice Thai meal and go to a sky bar on the top of a skyscraper.

Krahi and Phuket Area:

Our Trip:

We splurged and stayed at a very nice resort right on Railay Beach. We spent most of the time there sick and in the room. After that, we took a ferry to Phuket island and visited an elephant sanctuary then flew to Cambodia.

What we would do differently: 

Well, we would bring lots of medicine and really take care of our bodies so we wouldn't be sick. I still feel bad that we weren't able to take an island boat tour. I wish we would have stayed at a cooler place on Phuket island and been able to see more of the island. Elephant Sanctuary was worth every penny.

Siem Reap, Cambodia:

Our Trip:

Stayed at one of the best hostels I've ever stayed in (Oneders Hostel). The motor scooter tour we did was amazing and the best memories of the trip for me. We went on lots of different temple tours including a sunrise tour at Angkor Wat which was incredible, a sunrise tour which was fine, and a tour way outside the city which stunk. It was very fun to walk around Siem Reap at night and drink and have fish eat the dead skin off our feet and see people selling bugs and fried ice cream.

What we would do differently:

We would stay 1 less day and go on fewer tours. We should have done the sunrise temple tour as our first tour to make the temples more special (we did it 3rd and it lost its luster). Going on the temple tour way outside the city was not fun. Everything else about Cambodia was fantastic and I'm sooooo glad we went.

Overall Itinerary Changes:

The main change we would make on our overall trip itinerary is bite the bullet and take another plane to visit Chiang Mai and Northern Thailand. We would cut the last day off Bangkok and 1 day off Siem Reap to make room for it. It's a lot of moving and a lot of airports but we stayed in Siem Reap 1 day too long and we didn't need the last full day in Bangkok.

That's just our ideas! Let us know if you've been to Thailand and Cambodia and what you would recommend.