Shiny

Our tour of Bangkok continues with the early morning trek out to the Grand Palace. As a heads up to anyone considering visiting the palace, make sure you have you passport with you!

Things were really heating up, and being in the morning sun took its toll. We wandered to a nearby place, Gram Cafe, to cool down with some granola and yogurt, while the hottest part of the day raged on outside.

The couple hours of AC’d refuge in the cafe paid off, giving the clouds time to roll in. We then trekked down to Wat Po, one of the larger Wats, and an interesting one, as it houses the reclining Buddha.

Taxis here can be a bit frustrating, as by law they are supposed to use the meter, but this day was not our day with taxis, this would be the first of several drivers that wanted to do a flat rate journey. Needless to say, it took some time for us to grab the taxi to our next destination, Wat Saket, or the Golden Mount. Unfortunately couldn’t get a good shot of it itself, so I have just the views from the top.

Along with curved staircases up and down from the top, there are various bells that can be rung. There were some other tourists that of course made a point ring them all.

After all of this walking, it was time for dinner, and so we headed to the place that is supposed to have the best Pad Thai in Bangkok.

This place would fit right into San Francisco. There was a line out the door at opening.

Fortunately, we had a front row view to their whole kitchen, as it’s in the front.

We made a small ordering snafu, we wanted the superb pad thai wrapped in egg, but we mksmarked it as with egg. Nonetheless it was a good pad Thai. The egg wrapped pic is courtesy of someone we were chatting with in line, who had a nine-hour layover before heading home.

And lastly, we had the best orange juice I’ve ever had.

All in all a good day, capped off with a good meal. Tuesday brings a more historical look at some older wats.