Far East trip 1994 to Sri Lanka and Thailand - Our Bangkok adventure.
Wednesday,  Up at 0545 before the early morning call - no breakfast, only a cup of tea and a banana as we had to be outside the Oriental Hotel to join the Royal Barge to journey north along the Chao Phraya river. Down to the Hotel lobby by 0645 up to the car park and zipped of at breakneck speed towards Rama 5 statue where we wait for 5 mins before tearing off again full pelt along Silom.  Brake,  Accelerate- never let anyone in - fill in the gaps-force yourself through the traffic-overtake on the left hurry, hurry overtake on a right bend, get in before the others.  Nic calls it something like  gen sing. Along New Road and a sharp turn under the Redemption College before grinding to a halt outside the Oriental Hotel- 20 minutes early What a rush!
All is peace and tranquility as we enter under the Porticos of the Oriental, the best Hotel in the world.  Colonial splendour,  stucco and plaster work inside all painted in a beautiful Ivory. Growing bamboo clusters at each corner with inside facing balconies - Terrific.  We took some photos and went through to the jetty where the Oriental Princess lay, panting to be off. {Tons of food going aboard. tarts, quiches, cakes and meats all in beautiiful silverware). We had to await the completion of the victualling, before we were allowed on board. .Eventually we were allowed on the upper deck as the lower was all set out for lunch and we had a good seat facing front, a Japanese couple shared our four seater table. English, Italian, New Zealand, American and Japanese, with a sprinkling of Chinese.  We had coffee at 0900, and a ball by ball comentary as we progressed out of town. heading north, past factories, temples, condos and native homes on stilts.  The Chao Phraya was alive with workers using the taxi boats, the cross-river ferries and the various oriental craft up and down river. Slow old barges, and speedy little long tails, and through it all, the majesty of the Oriental Princess, with her bows a copy of the Royal Barges, as she ploughs through the crowds. In order to save 20 minutes we follow a route of a canal which literally turned a bend in the river into an island , with no transport - only by water.
At 11 o clock we all went down to the lower deck, where we were allocated a table with a NZ(Adrian) and his wife, an American maths teacher, Frank and his wife, Margie and me and an Italian couple. We soon associated ourselves with Frank and Adrian plus their wives and we got on really well.A lovely meal with much to choose from the gorgeous buffet.After lunch at 12 noon we still had an hour to go and we got acquainted with our English speaking friends.  We arrived at Bang Pa-In Palace and spent 30 mins looking round this peaceful spot. surrounded by about 50 statues of Buddha.  After this, we were transferred to a coach for the return journey, and the coach parties took our place on the Oriental Princess. We continued on to the Ayudhaya Palace & ruins and we eventualy left at about 3.30 to return to Bangkok A rather uneventful journey back, past dreary concrete buildings, until we arrived back on the outskirts of Bangkok at 5 pm. Frank said it will be another 90 minutes before we negotiate the traffic to get to the OH.  Unfortunately, he was right. So ended our wonderful day out in the OP
We knew the way to the Robinson department store (There is one in Sg)and I bought a watch and M bought a wallet and we went into a MacD for an English cup of coffee and a Mac Chicken. In all only about £3.  We watched out for a number 4 bus and it started to rain. We watched out for a no 4 bus and eventualy one came along although being air con, it was quite cold inside the bus. We booked to the WTC.  After about an hour grinding through the traffic of Silom and Raja damon roads, we eventually reach the WTC and the Zen shopping complex.  It was now 8pm and we did a quick flip through these lovely shops before heading for Sumkhivit Rd and the Amari Boulevard hotel. We quite enjoyed the walk after so much sitting about but we were ready for a drink in the  bar.A beautiful Thai maiden knelt and poured my beer, which was nice and before long we noticed a couple who were trying to attract our attention. It was Janice and Andy from Phuket 007 trip,  who, like us were going back to UK on the 0215 o Thursday. We spent an hour in their company before going upstars to sart our packingand I wrote this report