At Bangkok, we disembarked and were transferred to the Millennium Hotel overlooking the Chao Phraya River. Bangkok was immensely crowded, and not just because of Chinese New Year--it teemed with traffic, shops, and pedestrians (see picture).
We had two days to look around before flying to Cambodia and Angkor Wat. On the first afternoon, we visited three Buddhist temples, including the Emerald Buddha in the Grand Palace. The palace itself is an elaborate complex filled with monumental and exotic architecture.
The next day was free time. While there was little to see on our side of the river, a boat service run by the hotel took guests across to a shopping complex that connected, in turn, to a square with taxis and tuk-tuks. The latter are open cabs attached to motorbikes. By this time we had run out of reading material, and after determining the location of Bangkok's one English bookstore, we set out via tuk-tuk to find it. It was on the fourth floor of yet another huge shopping mall in downtown Bangkok and had a nice, if somewhat limited, selection of British paperbacks. While there, we looked for gifts to bring home but finally decided on buying silks at the shopping complex across from the hotel, because most of the items for sale at this other mall were foreign-made. We flagged down another tuk-tuk and this time experienced what we subsequently found was a standard tourist rip-off. Driver claimed he did not know where our hotel was, then took us to the wrong hotel, etc. Finally got back, an hour and a half later and quite a few bhat out of pocket. The next morning we had to be up at 3:00 a.m. to catch an early morning flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia. Once there, we were immediately taken to the Bayon Temple, one of the several monuments dating from the 12th century Khmer Empire.
It was indeed a fascinating place, but on the highest level of the temple I started to feel dizzy. Luckily, I was able to make it back down slowly and carefully without asking for help. By the time we got to the hotel, I knew I had suffered a sunstroke. Spent the afternoon in a darkened hotel room and so never saw Angkor Wat, although Bayon gave me a pretty good idea of what it would have been like. The next morning I was fine, and before our flight back we were able to explore a bit of Siem Reap, which--even though it was a common tourist destination--was very impoverished compared to Bangkok.
We saw ruined and abandoned buildings that might have once been schools, evidence of the devastation under the Khmer Rouge. Of all the places we saw, Siem Reap was historically and culturally the most illustrative. At the airport, incidentally, there was a bookstore with an even better selection of paperbacks than I had found in Bangkok, as well as inexpensive silks and other gift items. One of the books I picked up there, Paolo Bacigalupi's
The Windup Girl, is my current entertainment reading. It's a dystopian science fiction novel set in a futuristic Bangkok. Because I visited the city, the surroundings it pictures, though distorted, have a real immediacy.
That was a good conclusion to our Southeast Asia trip. We flew out the next day from Bangkok and made it back home without incident. Looking back, I would say the cruise was a fine learning experience, but not a dream vacation. Ron isn't sure he wants to go on any more cruises--perhaps he's right. There are better ways to see the world.
We had two days to look around before flying to Cambodia and Angkor Wat. On the first afternoon, we visited three Buddhist temples, including the Emerald Buddha in the Grand Palace. The palace itself is an elaborate complex filled with monumental and exotic architecture. 
The next day was free time. While there was little to see on our side of the river, a boat service run by the hotel took guests across to a shopping complex that connected, in turn, to a square with taxis and tuk-tuks. The latter are open cabs attached to motorbikes. By this time we had run out of reading material, and after determining the location of Bangkok's one English bookstore, we set out via tuk-tuk to find it. It was on the fourth floor of yet another huge shopping mall in downtown Bangkok and had a nice, if somewhat limited, selection of British paperbacks. While there, we looked for gifts to bring home but finally decided on buying silks at the shopping complex across from the hotel, because most of the items for sale at this other mall were foreign-made. We flagged down another tuk-tuk and this time experienced what we subsequently found was a standard tourist rip-off. Driver claimed he did not know where our hotel was, then took us to the wrong hotel, etc. Finally got back, an hour and a half later and quite a few bhat out of pocket. The next morning we had to be up at 3:00 a.m. to catch an early morning flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia. Once there, we were immediately taken to the Bayon Temple, one of the several monuments dating from the 12th century Khmer Empire.
It was indeed a fascinating place, but on the highest level of the temple I started to feel dizzy. Luckily, I was able to make it back down slowly and carefully without asking for help. By the time we got to the hotel, I knew I had suffered a sunstroke. Spent the afternoon in a darkened hotel room and so never saw Angkor Wat, although Bayon gave me a pretty good idea of what it would have been like. The next morning I was fine, and before our flight back we were able to explore a bit of Siem Reap, which--even though it was a common tourist destination--was very impoverished compared to Bangkok. 
We saw ruined and abandoned buildings that might have once been schools, evidence of the devastation under the Khmer Rouge. Of all the places we saw, Siem Reap was historically and culturally the most illustrative. At the airport, incidentally, there was a bookstore with an even better selection of paperbacks than I had found in Bangkok, as well as inexpensive silks and other gift items. One of the books I picked up there, Paolo Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl, is my current entertainment reading. It's a dystopian science fiction novel set in a futuristic Bangkok. Because I visited the city, the surroundings it pictures, though distorted, have a real immediacy.
That was a good conclusion to our Southeast Asia trip. We flew out the next day from Bangkok and made it back home without incident. Looking back, I would say the cruise was a fine learning experience, but not a dream vacation. Ron isn't sure he wants to go on any more cruises--perhaps he's right. There are better ways to see the world.
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