September 17th to 19th
We left for our 7th and final continent (Asia) on Dick’s birthday, the 17th. Our route takes us to Thailand, Lao, Vietnam and Cambodia over the next six weeks.
It was a long trip, ending up being over a 42-hour transit door to door. Pittsburgh to Atlanta, Atlanta to Seoul (15 hours!) then Seoul to Bangkok (a measly 6-hour flight) with long layovers everywhere. We departed Pittsburgh early Wednesday, evening of the 17th, local time and arrived at Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi Airport on Friday early afternoon, the 19th, Bangkok time. Thursday the 18th never existed due to the time zone changes.
For this trip we went with a different company to manage our logistics – Audley Travel, a big player in the Asian tourism market. Our guide and driver (Pongtep Artkaeo, aka ‘Mr. Ed’ and Mr. Boonsong, respectively) met us after clearing immigration to take us to our hotel in Bangkok. The local Audley subsidiary is apparently unfamiliar with the name ‘Smith’, so we were greeted as the ‘Smitches’. Ed was kind enough to present me with a hand crocheted hat and Buddha amulets for both of us representing our birth day of week – green for Dick (Wednesday), red for Mary (Sunday). The birth day of week is very important in Buddhist culture.
Bangkok is a large city with over 18 million people, and the traffic is horrific, even mid-afternoon. It took over an hour for the short drive to our hotel in the middle of the city. Interestingly, Thais drive on the left side of the street even though they were never a British territory. This practice started with King Chulalongkorn the Great (now known as King Rama V) who was the first to travel to the West and brought back Thailand’s (Siam at the time) first automobile from England.
Our lodging is at the Ariyasom Villa Hotel, once a traditional Thai home with lush gardens, now converted to a twenty-four room boutique hotel on a quiet street in the middle of an busy urban area. The Villa was built by the Grandparents of the current owner in the 1940’s as a private home.
We were wiped out after the journey so we unpacked and had an early dinner at the hotel. The owner stopped by and paid us a visit during dinner, nice chap. Early to bed for us.
Mary