Thailand Tuttle Travel Pack. Jim Algie

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      5 Chatuchak Weekend Market

      Behemoth of a bazaar for serial shoppers

      The Chatuchak Weekend Market in Bangkok is a world unto itself. Covering the area of a village, but with the transient population of a small city, “JJ” (as Thais call it as it is pronounced “Jatujak”) offers everything from secondhand clothes to first-class artworks, and old-fashioned hilltribe regalia to new school furniture, besides a laundry list of other items, like exotic pets for the politically suspect, PVC handbags decorated with dried flowers, household decorations and Vietnam War-era memorabilia.

      Navigating this sweltering maze of 15,000 vendors can overload and short-circuit both your senses and patience. For a personal compass, the handiest tool is the Nancy Chandler Map of Bangkok with a large section on the world’s most gigantic weekend market. At the head offices near the back of the market, free maps are available. They are okay to get your bearings but don’t provide a lot of information about which goods are where.

      Better still are the billboards located around the market, mapping out the many lanes and sign posting the sections. Using the huge clock tower in the middle of Chatuchak as a signpost also helps to stave off disorientation.

      The majority of the market is dedicated to clothes and footwear. The stalls for new clothes are found in Section 10 and in the even-numbered sections that follow it all the way up to 20. Whether it’s knock-off designer jeans or the latest trainers, affordable T-shirts or tropical-hued beach-wear, this area is well suited to all your clothing needs.

      Chatuchak is renowned for its motley collection of arts and handicrafts, ranging from the ridiculous (baseball caps made out of beer cans) to the sublime (Thai silk). In particular, Sections 24 and 26 are laden with the full spectrum of wood carvings, bronzeware, lacquerware, purses woven from vines, and the local ceramics known as benjarong for the combination of five colors that enrich these miniature tea sets, bowls and vases.

      Perhaps the penultimate rule in this jungle of consumerism is to make your purchase then and there, because you might not find your way back to that little shop again.

      Opening Times Weekends 8 am–6 pm

      Address Kamphaeng Phet 3 Road

      Getting There Take skytrain to Mor Chit Station or subway to Kamphaengphet Station

      Admission Fee Free

      6 High Tea at the Oriental Hotel

      It’s every moneyed traveler’s cup of tea

      To fully revel in Bangkok’s old world charm, the Mandarin Oriental serves high tea in the Author’s Lounge, full of period furniture and gingerbread fretwork, with all the delectable trimmings like fresh strawberries and scones.

      The long list of celebrity guests, such as Nicholas Cage, Mick Jagger and Sir Peter Ustinov, are proof of its ascendancy into the stratosphere of hotels which, given its humble origins, makes it seem all the more remarkable.

      Back in the 19th century, the hotel provided lodgings and a bar for seamen at a time when Bangkok had no other such facilities and only one decent thoroughfare (the nearby New Road), where gas street lamps were finally installed in 1866. Less than two decades later, Joseph Conrad, still a sailor and not yet the author of famous works like Heart of Darkness, hung out at the bar.

      In subsequent decades, the hotel’s poetic décor and riverside setting shanghaied the imaginations and livers of other celebrity writers of the likes of Somerset Maugham and Noel Coward, who have suites named after them in the Author’s Wing—the oldest part of the hotel—where high tea is served with crisp linen amidst white rattan furniture and a library of classics.

      Before the end of the 19th century, the Oriental had become the first luxury hotel in the country. Opulence still reigns at the hotel, and many visitors stop by for a glimpse, a cup of tea or a meal at one of the seven superb restaurants, such as the seafood specialist Lord Jim’s (named after Conrad’s novel).

      Across the river at the hotel’s Sala Rim Naam, guests can savor classical Thai dances and performances, while gorging themselves on a set menu of local staples, or get a spa treatment at the Oriental Ayurvedic Penthouse. For a double shot of jazz with a chaser of blues, the hotel’s legendary Bamboo Bar is just the place for thirsty ears.

      Opening Times Daily noon–6 pm

      Address 48 Oriental Avenue

      Getting There Catch skytrain to Saphan Taksin Station and five-minute taxi ride from there

      Contact +66 (0)2 659 9000; [email protected]

      7 Phang-nga Bay, Phuket

      The ninth wonder of the water world

      Take a survey of any 10 wayfarers cruising around the coasts of Krabi and Phuket on what their favorite day-trip is and the smart money is on sea canoeing in Phang-nga Bay. One of the world’s most incredibly natural marvels, the bay is studded with some 40 sheer limestone karsts that rise vertically out of the sea for hundreds of meters. It’s like a tropical seascape envisioned by Salvador Dali.

      Nature’s exclamation marks, the limestone cliffs are pocked with sea caves, collapsed cave systems open to the sky and surrounded by limestone walls, that are only accessible during daylight’s low tide. The local “paddle guides” have to navigate their rubber canoes through chinks in the cliffs so narrow that both navigator and daytripper have to lie flat on their backs.

      Miraculously, the caves open into lagoons with water that looks like melted-down emeralds surrounded by ramparts of limestone. Equally as photogenic are the looks of awe on the faces of the other visitors as they catch their first glimpses of these Jurassic flashbacks.

      Monitor lizards, monkeys, sea eagles and black kingfishers СКАЧАТЬ