First Day: Mall-hopping and eating phad thai in Khao San road
Our plane left the Ninoy Aquino International Airport at exactly 10:30 AM and arrived at the Suvarnabhumi Airport after three hours of travel.
My friend and I were rushing to go inside the airport so as to take our first Bangkok pictures. We were told beforehand by our travel agency agent that we have an hour after landing to meet our guide that will take us to our hotel. Scrutinizing by the Thai immigration officer was just a breeze. After getting our luggages, we went outside the lobby to look for our guide named Than. We were surprised that a lot of guides were waiting outside while waving banners and at the same time calling out names of their guests. It took us a while before we saw the banner with my surname in it.
All in all, we were 9 Filipino guests being fetched by Than. We were asked by Than if we will be joining the half-day city tour. Based from the threads that I had read, it wasn't recommended to join such tour because you will only visit two temples and that was just a waste of time. My friend had been whispering to me that he would like to join that tour but after I had explained my thoughts, he then realized that it would be best to follow our own itinerary. I then told Than that we will not be joining the group for the half-day tour.
At 3:45 PM, we were brought to our hotel, the old First Hotel along Petchburi road. Since there was a deposit of one thousand baht and we hadn't changed our money yet, I was forced to look around the area for a money changer. It took me some time to find my way back to our hotel because I was almost lost in the Pratunam market! The lady at the front desk gave our key to the room which was in the 5th floor. We immediately unpacked our things so as not to waste time.
Since it was already mid-afternoon, we decided to just go first to the malls as they were near from our hotel. Armed with a map of Bangkok, we started our walk towards Central World. It was 5:00 PM when we reached CentralWorld and took photos of ourselves infront of it.
Next stop was Siam Paragon. Ocean World is located at the basement of the mall and took the chance to get inside since it was my friend's first time to see an attraction of such kind. There were lots of large aquariums inside which were way better than those of Singapore's Underwater World in Sentosa Island. It was fun taking photos of ourselves with sharks in our background.
It took us an hour of strolling before we decided to leave Siam Ocean World. We were both hungry so we went to the food court for our dinner. It was our first time to eat Thai meals and was so excited about it. All the dishes in the food court were yummy! We also tried the Thai iced tea which was also great. Burp!
After our dinner, we continued our mall-hopping.
MBK was the last mall for the night. It was still early to go back to the hotel so we decided to visit Wat Saket Temple. We went back inside MBK and asked the lady in the information center to write Wat Saket Temple in their own language. I learned this idea from the Bangkok thread I had been reading so that it would be easy for the taxi drivers to understand. Most of the drivers in Bangkok were still not familiar with the English language so the language barrier was still evident. We took a cab and gave him the note that the lady had written for us.
It was 9:30 PM when we reached Wat Saket Temple. Unfortunately, the temple was closed already. Sometimes, information in websites are not reliable. Since there was nothing to see, we decided to walk towards Khao San road. After a few minutes of walking and pondering that we somehow were walking on a different direction, we decided to just ride a cab. We had wasted some precious minutes there.
10:00 PM. We were in Khao San road already. Wow! The night there was so busy and vibrant. Many tourists were flocking the area. There were lots of bars from left to right and establishments selling souvenirs, shirts and jeans. There were some sections where you can have your hair braided.
11:45 PM. Establishments were starting to close down and it was time to go back to the hotel as well. We rode a cab and were in the hotel after 15 minutes. The cab fare was 55 baht.
12:15 PM. We were soooooo tired. ZZZZZZZzzzzzz
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It has an internet and coffee shop called Saranyuth which can be found at the ground level. Ladies at the front desk are friendly and speak some English but don't ask further as they surely will run out of English to explain more.
The complimentary buffet breakfast is being served on the second floor. The Thai dishes are simple but tasty.
Our room is just average if aesthetics is to take into consideration. Nothing fancy. But what is great about the room is that it is very clean. During our 4-day stay, our room is always being cleaned and the bed sheets are also being changed.
Since First House is the cheapest hotel that is being marketed to Filipinos, expect to meet a lot of Filipino tourists who are checking in the hotel.
If you love shopping for clothes, Pratunam and Baiyoke are the places to be and are just a few walks from the hotel. Platinum Mall is also a walking distance.
You may need a cab though if you want to use the Skytrain.
The only problem we encountered was that the cab drivers always take us to the wrong hotel, First Hotel, even though we always show them the Town guide card. So be prepared for this.
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