Thailand: The Lost Post

(Just found this blog entry was left out from our trip last summer.)

(Thailand was coming the wild card of this little trek to Asia. It was a country that was on our list of palaces to visit and one of the first places that popped into my head when i decided to add a second leg to the trip. Originally I was reading up about the Maldives as our first option but a lot of the sites like Lonley Planet spooked me about the small island nation in the India Ocean. Sadly its not LGBT friendly. Thailand on the other hand is the Castro of Asia almost. To prepare for this trip I read up on two location that I knew we wanted to visit, Phi Phi Island Phuket. I spoke with a few friends who had travelled to Thailand and to both places. The strong consensus was Phi Phi was perfect to travel with the kids but Phuket was very questionable with its crime and red light district scene. 

With Phuket out, that really only left Bangkok. We opted to take a car from Kyoto to Osaka and skip the train on this leg of the trip. While reading up on the JR Rail system, one piece of advice that came up again again, was the line between Osaka and Kyoto experienced delays. With a 10am flight we opted to play it safe instead. Fair warning, hiring a car or van in Japan can get a little pricey. As I mentioned before the rail system is more affordable. A car from Narita-Shi airport to Tokyo was well over $400 and the same was true for drive from Kyoto to Osaka. Thailand on the other hand, we are are talking dimes on the dollar. 

We flew via Thai Airways and the flight wet pretty smoothly. The only negative feedback I would give the flight was the food was pretty simple and A/C was horrible.We landed in Bangkok in the late afternoon and took a car from the airport directly to our hotel. The car only cost $140. When searching out the hotels for Bangkok, some of the feedback and online was to not stay in the middle of downtown area.