BANGKoK

We took a night bus to Bangkok, scheduled to arrive at 6:30am.. For the FIRST time ever this trip, the bus arrived early and we were dumped in Bangkok at 4:30 am. We couldn't believe it! We managed to find a room where we stayed for just one night.
That day we strolled Khosan road, the popular tourist Vegas-style strip. We met a lovely local man who informed us that it was the sacred day when they celebrated the death of Buddha. He arranged a tuk-tuk to take us to the temple that was only open on this special day of the year, where there was the lucky Buddha housed inside. When we arrived, a sweet old man showed us how to pray to the Buddha for good luck and told us how lucky we were to make it to this temple on this one special day. He was also shocked that we had even arrived there in the first place, since no tourist ever know about this lucky Buddha! We love finding the non-tourist things to do and were excited that we were able to do this. Later on that night, we ventured out to another very local area and found a massive second hand market. At first we thought it was a night market full of junk but when we actually realized that this was all old, used, one of a kind stuff, we began to really look through it and found hidden treasures! Amazing old watches and jewelry, old time shoes from 20 or 30 years back. It was a blast from the past as we came across our favorite old action figures, original gaming consoles and tamoguchis! We spent all night there looking at so many hilarious things.. We had so much fun! By midnight we decided to head back to our place, but first stopped to have a beer and a foot massage back on the famous Khosan Road. After our amazing foot massage was done we decided to pay a little more for a back rub too! After that, we were out like lights!
The next day we went to the temple where the ginormous gold reclining buddha was. The temple there were beautiful as they were decorated with beautiful tile and glass work. Afterwards we finally indulged in some long-awaited Burger King! Jeremy thought he had died and gone to heaven for a bit!
Bangkok was everything that we expected it to be and we were very happy we only planned one night there. The air was disgustingly thick and heavy from the pollution of the city. The streets were crazy and there were tourists and Thai people everywhere! We enjoyed the craziness while we were there but that evening we caught a bus to the pier, to catch a boat out to the islands in the gulf!! Islands are more our style ;)
-Ken