Continued from Thailand – Laos Travel: Day 7 – Part 6 – Welcome to Bangkok! For pre-travel, please refer here.
Just off the ferry, we set up a route search via Google Maps to get to Khao San Road on foot. At the Phra Arthit jetty, there are clear signposts that make it easy to search. The distance is only 650 meters.
Note: A search on Google Maps has two keywords namely “Khao San Road” or “Khaosan Road”.
We went through the alleys and rows of shops on Soi Rambuttri Road. At first, I did not know that the road is also popular with foreign tourists. That’s why along the way here, we came across shops selling beautiful and interesting items. For your information, if you want to shop, it is best to go on this road and avoid Khao San Road because the price is a little high. Just know that Khao San Road is a place for backpackers from all over the world to gather. Jalan Alor in Bukit Bintang (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) is similar to Khao San Road.
In fact, since getting off the ferry, we have started to feel nauseous and still feel like being tossed by the waves even though at this point we are already on land (similar to vertigo).
We continue to walk as well …
….. but finally stopped to rest here. For people like me who have problems like being over anxious, will start to feel uncomfortable because of worry and thinking all sorts of things.
Worried if nausea and vertigo will last for hours or days …
Worried about getting sick suddenly, what about my backpack? Will Tatie carry those two heavy bags?
Worried because I still haven’t found a hotel for accommodation.
Worried because suddenly the body became a little lethargic.
That is an excessive anxious mind … It will not appear if there is no trigger (in this case, the cause of the trigger is nausea and vertigo).
We rested for almost 15 minutes here to calm the brain. For your information, Khao San Road is only 50 meters away.
This is where we walk and rested for a while.
We were determined to continue our journey north of the main road. Through Agoda’s search, there are several cheap hotels on this main street namely Diamond House and Vijittada Hostel.
Diamond House is located next to a river after crossing a small bridge. I went in and asked and the cost of accommodation was expensive. The river is not clean because it smells a bit musty.
Then we went to Vijittada but only one room remained which was a bit cramped. I’m not happy with the situation in Vijittada.
One piece of advice for you, if possible do not look for a hotel or hostel on Khao San Road because the activities there are very noisy with the sounds of disco, rave, techno and so on until dawn. It’s hard to sleep at night.
This is the Vijittada Hotel I was talking about. If there is a vacancy though, look for another hotel because the receptionist service here is not as friendly as not wanting to serve customers.
Then we tried to step again to another place. From an Agoda search, there is a hotel that is somewhat tucked into the shophouse area called Ying Hostel.
This is the entrance to the hallway leading to Ying Hostel. In such a situation, we only try our luck if the hostel has room for the family. It doesn’t matter if it’s a hotel or a hostel that needs to be shared with other residents.
Arriving at Ying, I went inside. It turned out to be a hotel with a combined Spa. I asked for the info at the counter. They have a room for a family but the price is very hefty which is THB650/night. It’s out of our budget.
Since I was still convinced from the information searches in Google that there were indeed cheap hotels in Bangkok, we gradually moved out of Ying Hostel. As soon as I stepped out, suddenly a middle-aged man chased us and called out to me.
Apparently, he who is not Thai but Chinese who has been residing in Thailand for a long time offered me a room for the family which cost THB300/night! Wow, for me it was very cheap only the toilet had to be shared with other guests.
Immediately I went to Ying Hostel again and paid for 3 nights amounting to THB900, about MYR100 for 3 nights. Then he took us to an opposite shop house called Barnana Hostel and showed us the location of the room. There is indeed a dorm there but it is separate from us. Apparently, Ying and Barnana belong to them.
That’s the way the Chinese do business. If the customer does not have a budget, they will try to provide other facilities that are lower in price and most importantly the money successfully transferred from hand to hand compare to not getting anything at all.
Regarding Barnana Hostel, I will review it later.
It’s around 9.23 pm. After putting our backpacks in the room, we went out to explore Khao San Road and find halal food for dinner. To the right of the picture is a 7-Eleven that we will stop by when we return later.
It is common in Thailand to be full of Spa shops, massages, manicures, pedicures and so on.
This is Khao San Road! Finally, we arrived at the heavenly base of the world’s backpackers gathered. Khao San has two entrances which is west and east.
At this point, we entered from the west (red dot). If compared between the two, there is no difference because of the lively atmosphere for both. For those of you who want to find halal stalls such as kebabs, please head to the east entrance. Just follow the blue dots on the map above.
Full of various styles and faces of tourists as well as locals. Various creative ways are used to attract foreign tourists to stop by restaurants, spas, hotels and more here.
The total length of this Khao San Road is 400 meters. If there was more time and money to spend, of course, Tatie would go into the Henna shop.
Does anyone want to get married? This is where the place is called Kawin Guesthouse. Kawin means to get married in the Malay language.
Among the pubs that get more lively when midnight begins.
Services for backpack storage are also available here. There are also many stalls selling clothes.
More massage parlors here …
We almost reached the east end of Khao San Road. Although only 400 meters away, with my age being almost 40 years old when this adventure was done, the speaker was a bit noisy and ear-splitting with loud techno sounds on our left and right. Not because I’m unfamiliar with the noise as I used to go clubbing and disco in my 20s.
Suddenly at the end of the road, we came across a halal chicken kebab. The price of THB60 is quite expensive but due to being too hungry, we bought it. Along the way here, I did not find any halal food. We ordered up to 3 packages.
Next to it there are also sold strange foods such as insects, caterpillars, crickets, scorpions and others. Indeed, this is the scene I look forward to in Thailand. The picture I took was allowed by the seller after paying THB10.
The worms originally looked like garbage caterpillars.
I’m not sure what kind of insect.
When eaten, it is crunchy like chips. This time I didn’t buy it because I was just looking around first. Don’t think that I don’t dare to eat … later I’ll show you a video of me biting caterpillars and crickets on the second night in Bangkok. This is proof that I deserve to be a commando in the army!!
The package is ready. At that time, I did not dare to eat the scorpion because I was worried about the poison even though it had been discarded. Maybe there’s a way to eat it that I didn’t know.
We did not linger long on Khao San Road because we were very tired. Then back to Barnana Hostel at 10.20 pm. But before that we stopped at the 7-Eleven I mentioned earlier to buy mineral water and biscuits.
It looks like the alley here is already empty. For those who are interested in staying here, I enclose the GPS coordinates of “13.763591, 100.500167”. The distance between Barnana and Khao San Road is 950 meters.
Our 7th day in Thailand is over. There are 9 more days with our final destination being Vientiane, Laos. Continuing to the 8th day in the next post …. Thailand – Laos Travel: Day 8 – Part 1 – Lunch at Chakrapong Mosque and a Visit to Coin Museum.
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