Bangkok 4/86

Very beautiful and exotic...

This trip, which also included Hong Kong & Southern China and Tokyo was planned to be the last of the great trips for Mary Lou and Wayne before children. We took almost two weeks off work to see the far east. Our planning turned out to be a bit too close, as Mary Lou was six weeks pregnant when we left LA.

The Marble Temple

Bangkok was our first stop on this trip after a circuitous air route from LAX through SeaTac, Narita and KaiTac. We counted 24 hours elapsed and 21 hours in the air. These were the days before non-smoking flights and before I could upgrade from coach, so by the time we arrived in Bangkok we were tired and smoked out by our fellow passengers. We took the shuttle from the airport to the Menham Hotel which was new and very nice. Everything was cheap in Thailand, due to the US dollar's strength, e.g. a local beer from the hotel mini-bar was 25 cents US.

Refreshed for our first full day of sightseeing, we headed out for a tour of the Grand Palace. The Grand Palace is a large complex having both religious and political importance (large picture at right and four pictures below). The temperature was around 100 F and the humidity was very high. Since you can not drink the tap water, we were always seeking a soft drink during the day.

The Grand Palace

On our second day, we rode along the klongs - canals (first picture below) to the floating market (second and third pictures below). We visited the Marble Temple (large picture above left), the Temple of the Golden Buddha and the Temple of the Reclining Buddha. We took a trip on a rice barge through the rural canals and then toured the busy streets of Bangkok (fourth picture below).

Before leaving for Hong Kong the next day we shot the two views below from our hotel room.