Today we didn't have anything planned until the evening where we were taking a Dinner Cruise down the river. However we hadn't seen the "real" Reclining Buddha and we had found out that it was right down the river from us. We had been right next door to it the day we went to the Grand Palace. After breakfast we went and talked to the Concierge. He said that he could arrange a private tour for us on a long boat where we would see an Orchid Farm, Fish Farm, Canal tour, and Floating Markets. He would then drop us off at Wat Pho (Reclining Buddha) and w would find our own way back.
We went up to our rooms for a bit to decide what we wanted to do. We finally went downstairs and told the Concierge we were ready. He walked us to the pier which was right around the corner from our hotel and told them what we wanted to do. They said it would be 2 hours and would cost 2200 Baht for the 4 of us. That was about $75 for the 4 of us.
We walked through a ferry to get onto the long boat. We had to step down some to get on it but we all managed to get on ok. He took us all through the canals. I had no idea that people lived this way. It was really pretty interesting. We then stopped at an Orchid Farm where he told us to get off. Once we got off they told us it cost 20 Baht each to walk through This was less than $1 but we didn't realize that we were going to have to pay anything else after paying our 2000 Baht. They had lots of pretty orchids but you can only look so much.
The next place he took us was the floating market. We weren't even sure what it was. First of all I fell getting out of the boat and landed on my knee that I had replaced so that smarted some and also swelled up some. Once off, I found someone that spoke English and asked them what we were looking at and they said it was a very small floating market. When we got there we were told that we had 2 minutes. I am not sure why he even told us to get off. We could have seen just as much riding past it but I guess we had to get off and walk through part of it to really get a feeling for what it was all about.
The next place was the Fish Farm. All we did here was buy a loaf of bread from some woman and broke it up and fed the fish. They were all over the place and pretty big. After we did that it was time to go see Wat Pho but not before some women rowing their boats next to us to sell us souvenirs. We all bought something from them.
When we got to the pier to get off to see Wat Pho, I wasn't sure I was going to be able to get off. It was a huge step up with the boat bobbing up and down in the water. I finally crawled out of the boat but the ground was so hot it burned my hands trying to stand up. To top it all off, the boat had already left and the woman there told us we had to pay 20 Baht each to land there. Talk about being mad! He was supposed to have let us off at the public pier. After paying our money we went straight to Wat Pho. There were lots of temples of there and I would have like to look at all of them but it was so hot after being out on the boat for 2 hours and the temperate had to be at least 100.
It cost 100 Baht per person (approx $3) to see it. We all wanted to get change but the girl wouldn't do it. I had put 500 Baht on the counter and she told me I was paying for everybody and my friends were paying me back. We argued with her but she wasn't budging. We found the Reclining Buddha easily. It was HUGE but it was so crowded. They did have free ice water after we finished looking at it. Good thing because I had already drank 2 bottles of water and needed some more.
We decided that because it was so hot we weren't going to look at anything else so now we had to figure out where the pier was that we needed to catch a ferry. We walked the wrong way first but after asking several people we finally got turned around and finally found it. We were once again dripping wet from the heat. They were selling soft drinks there so I got one because I had already drunk the bottle of water I had received at the temple.
We had been told to get the Orange Flag ferry ad ride it to Pier N1 so we did just that. When we got off we were at the Oriental. We could see our hotel but couldn't figure out how to get there. We walked and walked and walked -- sometimes winding up on dead end streets. We knew our hotel was there but just to find it. We finally got on track and I kept thinking it was right around the corner. I felt like I as having a heatstroke but I kept going. We passed several men dressed in suits along the way talking on walkie talkies. We finally found our hotel. It wasn't the wing we were staying in but we could at least get in the cool and walk through the building to get to our wing. As we neared, I saw a parade of cars leaving the hotel. I think they were being led by a Police escort. There were even more men on walkie talkies. We made our way into the lobby and plopped our wet bodies on the first seats we found. Someone immediately came over and brought us cold towels and offered us water. I know they probably thought we were street people. We continued to sit there. We were convinced that somebody important was still coming and we wanted to sit there and see who it was. After all, we would be the first people they would see when they walked in the door.
I looked up and there was a man in a business suit looking over our way. I figured he was the equivalent to Secret Service or something. He then started walking towards us. I said well i guess this man is going to come tell us to leave. It was quite the opposite. He wanted to know if there was anything he could get for us. We told him we were just cooling off and would be leaving soon. We asked him what all the walkie talkie men were doing and he said that they had just said goodbye to some Dignitaries but that we were important to them also. Now wasn't that nice!
We had cooled off enough to make our way downstairs to the buffet. It was good again. I think the best thing for me was the little hamburger that I had them to make for me. After eating we went back to our rooms to rest up for the evening. We were going on a Dinner Cruise on the river.
We decided to go downstairs a little early and get something to drink at Happy Hour. We hadn't been there long until they came and picked us up for our Dinner. We had a short ride to the pier where we got on our boat. They had assigned us seats which was good so we didn't have to fight for a table. We were at Table 1 on the upper deck. We had really good views but it was not air conditioned. Thankfully as the sun went down it cooled down a little, plus there was a breeze.
The food was just ok or less than ok but the entertainment was excellent. We passed by several of these boats on the river but non of them looked like they were having as good a time as those on our boat. It lasted about 2 hours and then they took us back to our hotel.
Mary P and I have a 6:00 am flight out in the morning so we had to get back and get packed up. It was around 11:00 pm before we got to bed and we had a 2:00 am wake up call the next morning. Oh well, we can sleep on the plane.
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