Living up to its reputation?

As a naive Kiwi, I couldn’t even think of Bangkok without a certain stereotype popping into mind. But maybe that’s been biased through tales passed on by travelling backpackers, my passing interest in the seedy underbelly and New Zealand’s connection through the likes of Mr Asia.

Even so, Bangkok certainly has a reputation to uphold of being the fast, fun, steamy, dirty, x-rated, slightly dangerous boiling pot of Southeast Asia – but on my first visit here, would any of this still even ring true?

Mind. Blown.

Day 1 (a Saturday morning) started slowly after a late arrival the night before and a solid 24hrs worth of economy travel. Waking up in our ‘Basement’ hotel room (In an alley off Silom Road), we were however both eager to shake off the jet lag with an exploratory wander before the morning’s planned activity – a snake farm.

We certainly didn’t need to stroll far either before our eyes were wide wide open and we were wide awake!

Some of the walk to the snake farm…

A slow start and a racing heart

Heading off on a ‘planned’ 9-month trip, we planned to start slowly, easing into the workload that life on the bikes would inevitably bring. As much as cycle touring leads to phenomenal adventures, the opportunity to run into all types of life and unbelievably amazing unexpected moments – it’s also a hard, rough, tough, dirty way of existing for a while. After securing a 60-day Thai visa, our plan was to take the first few weeks slowly, with limited time on the bike and maximum time to recover/explore the new world we were in.

Down to business

While the snake farm was both interesting and informative, we couldn’t help but feel for the snakes by the end of it. One thing was clear – they didn’t want to be there. Needing to be poked and prodded into striking for the crowd of mostly children, who unbeknown to us at this point were out in droves around the city celebrating National Children’s Day.

After being let down by an online order that never arrived before we departed, our top priority in Bangkok was finding Rach a rear pannier rack before we could hit the road. Another wander, this time through Lumphini Park, took us to our first bikeshop of three for the afternoon (a fancy Trek dealer) – before blasting across town to Decathlon in a loud Tuk Tuk with grins etched across our faces. No ideal rack was found – but a decision made to return to the Trek dealer tomorrow…

Day 2 – Productivity and our first ride

Waking up slightly worse for wear, the priority remained getting a pannier rack for Rach’s bike. After yesterday afternoon’s assembly session, at least our bikes were now ridable. A quick trip back through Lumphini Park to the Trek dealer, and Rach was up and running with an alloy Bontrager rack for now.

With plenty of preparing yet to do before leaving the city tomorrow morning, we dedicated the afternoon to getting the bikes and our setup in tip-top shape before heading out under lights for a 20km evening ride around some of the Old Town including The Temple of the Emerald Buddha and The Grand Palace. Nothing we could capture with the cameras however, would ever do any justice to the real-life shimmering and awe-inspiring majesty of these buildings at night!