A trunk calling to Asia
Nick Sommerlad samples Thailand’s cities, street food and elephant sanctuaries
Picture Thailand and most holidaymakers will think of islands, beaches and cocktails. With 1,430 islands, 1,956 miles of coastline and, oh, a lot of cocktails, there is plenty of that.
But my family and I joined the first wave of tourists to Thailand after its long lockdown and found there is much more to this remarkable country. The rules are changing all the time but, when we went, the “sandbox” rule meant foreign visitors had to stay seven days near their arrival point.
Most will have chosen the famous resorts of Phuket or Koh Samui. We went for Bangkok and made the most of an enforced and extended city break.
Google the best sights in Bangkok and you will find a list of Buddhist temples or “wats” and their golden stupa. Pick a couple – we particularly enjoyed the climb at Wat Saket for the sunset view over the city – and pay for a local guide who will bring the place alive for you.
If you are templed out, Bangkok’s famous floating markets will bring a change of pace. Lumphini Park, near our hotel, rewarded an early morning or evening walk, away from the midday heat with the sight of its monitor lizards, which grow up to 10ft long. It’s an easy city to explore by skytrain, metro or, most enjoyably, ferry boat. A taxi back to the hotel at the end of the day is likely to cost two or three pounds.
Don’t attempt to haggle a price and instead insist the meter goes on. We were happy to tip generously, once we knew what the real price should be.
We stayed in the Crowne Plaza Lumphini Park, which felt more like a conference hotel than a taste of the real Thailand. But the breakfast was superb and the rooms clean and quiet.
For a different and unmissable take on the city, we booked a day with Tours By Locals. Michai took us on his “Another Side of Bangkok” and opened our eyes to all the things that had passed us by.
We thought we had “done” Bangkok’s Chinatown but we had barely scratched the surface. He explained the Chinese tradition of joss paper offerings, which are burnt for dead ancestors and can take the form of money, jewels, phones and even cars.
It was Michai who got all five of us hooked on Thai street food, giving us the courage to try just about anything. But we drew the line at the glossy black fried scorpions sold at one stall.
Next was a longboat tour of canals to the west of the Chao Phraya River, and a wonderful afternoon in a part of the city best accessed by boat. Lunch was at the home of retired police officer Chin and his wife Eed, who live alongside the Bang Luang canal.
Eed laid on a truly delicious spread of rice, chicken, fish, red curry, vegetables and fruit. It was later voted a top meal of the holiday.
From Bangkok, we headed north, to cooler and higher parts. A flight to Chiang Mai takes barely an hour but we decided to take the train. It took 11 hours but gave us a chance to see all the countryside we would otherwise have missed.
Tickets, costing around £15 each, were booked online in advance.
Food was included in the price and delivered to our seats at the start of the journey.
Chiang Mai is a major city in the mountainous north of Thailand but feels more like a busy town. It’s the gateway for trekking the hills and jungles.
We stayed at the friendly Awana House hostel, which was cheap and
We spent an unforgettable afternoon watching elephants up close
clean and conveniently located on a quiet street.
The children enjoyed the shopping but mainly the food. All had become addicted to Thailand’s sweet treats – deep-fried bananas, frozen fruit smoothies, rotis cooked on the kerbside and laced with chocolate spread, and, above all, mango sticky rice. All costing around £1 each.
We took another Tours By
Locals and this time Pam was our guide. She had clearly decided we needed fattening up and another day of gastronomy began.
Pam showed us how to eat khao lam – sticky rice cooked inside hollow tubes of bamboo, and miang kham – sweet and savoury treats such as lime, ginger and dried shrimps wrapped up in a green leaf.
We visited yet more temples but Pam managed to show us another side, teaching our girls how the Thai people pray and leave an offering at the temple, using an ingenious contraption made of wires and pulleys which delivers a bamboo cup full of holy water to a shrine dozens of feet above us.
But the undoubted highlight of the trip was our visit to one of the several ethical elephant sanctuaries, where we spent an unforgettable afternoon watching these remarkable animals up close and learning about their natural habitat.
Fanclub Thailand has a useful blog to help you find the right places to visit, and which to avoid ( fanclubthailand.co.uk).
If, like us, you might have been put off visiting Thailand by its seedier side, I’d say to do your research, avoid the known areas where the sex industry openly operates, and a wonderful family holiday awaits.