Arrival at Bangkok was painless. Immigration posed no problems and we were soon outside looking for the cheapestway to get to the city where we would hopefully find accommodation that wouldn’t cost a fortune. There was a ticket office right outside the doors for buses to take us to whichever area in Bangkok we chose. We decided to head to the famous Khaosan Rd, it cost only 150 Baht each and after being dropped off less than an hour later we found good, cheap accomodation at “7 Holder”. Basic and clean it has since been our first choice on a couple of occasions when we have returned after jaunts to other areas, it costs 250 Baht a night, bargain. It’s situated on the road parallel to Khaosan at the burger king end of the street, only bad thing to say on it is depending on where the room is the rock bar next door can keep you up but if you don’t mind listening to GN’R and Metallica its not a problem!

We spent a couple of days in Bangkok walking the streets and getting a feel for the place, Bangkok is huge and the best way of getting around, surely has to be the river boat, don’t get conned into buying a long boat ticket, just get the local ferry, costs about 26p. This seems to stop running around 21:00 though, so best not to get stranded and have to pay a fortune for a rickshaw to get back. China town is well worth a visit, culture is everywhere, Thai and Chinese intermingled is a wicked combo and no matter how many tourists visit there I can never seeing it changing and bowing to the needs of day trippers, which has to be a good thing. The inevitable shark fin and birds nest soup is everywhere though and neither of us agreeing with the morality of it all, decided we would put off eating in the restaurants that sold that type of thing, we settled for a road-side fish curry which was superb.

After reading Internet reviews and talking with fellow travellers, we formed a shortlist of places that we thought may be suitable for a family holiday. Koh Phi Phi and Koh Chang were on the list, having a limited time to explore we decide to head to Koh Chang which was relatively easy to get to and promised plenty of entertainment to keep us occupied for a couple of weeks. KohPhi Phi, we had heard, was tourist ville and expensive as well as more difficult to get to meaning we’d have to waste another day in Bangkok before catching the 18:00 flight the following evening, this was enough to put us off and we were keen to explore the quieter eastern islands off the coast of Koh Chang.