Bangkok

Diane and I made it to our hotel around 6 last night (Bangkok is an hour behind Singapore). We had some dinner at the hotel Chinese restaurant, while it was not spectacular, it was good and filling. We decided we wanted to go to the night market. We paid 100 Baht for a taxi ride to the market. The market was a bit like a big Lucky Plaza of Singapore. Around midnight or so, we'd had enough and decided to get a taxi back to the hotel. We got into one, and the guy said 200 Baht. We promptly got out of the cab! Several cabbies soon surrounded us telling us "You ride with me". We ended up back in the first cab and paid 120 Baht.

Today we took a tour of the Grand Palace and the temple of the Emerald Buddha...
After the Grand Palace (the former residence of the beloved and revered King) tour, we took a river and canal tour in a long boat. The water on the river was choppy and I was terrified I was going to fall into the river. Really! The tour was interesting, but the guy taking us on the tour rarely slowed down enough for us to get good pictures. I did manage to get this picture of these boys swimming in the canal. They were cute.


Our tour guide then took us to the Royal Lapidary, a government-sponsored jewelry factory/store. Fun!!!

Once we got back to the hotel, we both needed a rest. The heat can really wear a body out.

We walked around Siam Square looking for a good place to eat. All of these years, I've thought it was pronounced SI-am, when in fact it is, Cee-yam, duh. Oh well, live and learn. We saw the Hard Rock Cafe, but they were closed! Maybe it'll be open tomorrow? We ended up at a pizza place that was really good. After dinner, we walked around some more in the malls, but neither of us found anything that we could not live without.

We went to the 7-Eleven across the street from the hotel to buy a few more Heineken's and 4 bottles of water for the evening.

I think tomorrow, we're going to check out Chinatown. We've heard that there's a silver factory over that way...hmmm.... ;D