Cath – you were so right when you described Bangkok as “a little bit crazy”. Today is day 7 in Thailand and the day I fly back to the UK – I’ll be hitting the tarmac at Heathrow tomorrow (Thursday) morning and heading up to Northampton pretty soon after that. Can’t wait for a good long shower!

I’ve seen a gazillion different temples and shrines and been all around this mad city by taxi, by river boat and in the legendary tuk-tuks that seem to appear on the front covers of all the guide books, but whose drivers aren’t quite as innocent as you might like them to be. My attempt to get the bus back from the Skyrail station last night failed – leading to a 45 minute walk back along lots of long, dark and wet streets – but the Skyrail itself and the subway are a simply marvelous way of getting around, although slightly limited by their routes.

I took a break from the heat, humity and pollution of the city with a rather unplanned but truly memorable trip up to Kanchanburi provice, which is a two-to-three hour drive out of the city to the east and not far at all from the Burmese border. Aside from the compulsory trip to the World War II sights around the River Kwai or ‘Death Railway’ bridge and the Australian-sponsored museum at ‘Hellfire Pass’ a little bit further up the track towards Burma – both of which were rather poignant places to visit – much fun was had over the course of the generally well-organised three-day tour.

Highlights included eating snake meat, dancing to songs about elephants, riding on an elephant and stroking live tigers at the Buddist monastery that we visited. Photos to follow!

Today is a day of relaxing and seeing a couple more sights that are within walking distance of the hostel I’ve been staying at for the last two nights. I’m determined that there will be no more bus disasters for now, at least not until I get back into the UK 🙂