Have to say I was pleased to be in Bangkok this time around, I have been once before, and last time I didn't wander far afield enough to appreciate the place properly. If you asked me now, I would say that it is one of my favourite cities in South East Asia. Even Banglamphu, (home to Khao San Road) has some really nice spots if you wander just ten or fiveteen minutes into the surrounding streets. I tried to keep myself busy so I headed down to Lumpini Park, and found ProBike (just outside the park on Sarasin Road) where I had some new brakes fitted. This was a relief, the original brakes were ancient DiaCompe single pivots, and the spring had been warped during the plane transfer. I was worried about it coming loose the whole way from Krabi. Luckily everywhere between Krabi and Bangkok was relatively flat so it wasn't that much of a problem.

It was as usual gloriously sunny, so I had a good look around most of Lumpini Park, with its basking water dragons, contemporary sculpture and colourful orchid displays. Orchids really thrive in Thailand, most places in the South would have a few growing in old coconut shells hanging from the awnings, or simply wrapped in coconut husk nailed to a tree. The display here was something else though.

I also went out to Chatuchak Park for the weekend markets, but unlike last time when I was at the end of my trip I couldn't really buy much. I grabbed a few things to give to my hosts in Japan and tried to get out of there before the traffic got really bad. (By the way Erin, if your reading this, the picture of the t-shirt is here soley for your amusement. I would have brought it back to Australia for you but I haven't any room left in my panneir bags,and it was going at - sincerely - an outrageous 700 baht ($23 AUS). Bangkok traffic is every bit as bad as its reputation. A 5-10km journey can take 2 hours or more during peak hour, and its not unusual to sit at one of the larger intersections for thirty minutes. I think this is one of the few places in the world where people actually value their monorail, if only it went further. Banglamphu, the backpacker district is isolated by around 5km from both the subway and the sky train so the only option is to take to the roads. Riding a bike was definately faster, but dangerous in many places and I wouldn't reccomend it.

I can't speak highly enough of the food in Banglamphu either. I returned to my favourite place from the last visit, the Joy Luck Club, only to find that Wanida (the wonderful chef, and cooking teacher) had handed the place over to her two sisters who looked almost identical. They prepared a fried fish with spicy mango salad and thai red curry. It was great, and I was suprised to find upon paying the bill that one of the sisters was studying biology by correspondace at the computer.

By a strange twist of fate I also ran into the tandem bikers from Germany for the third time. They were eating at the restaurant outside my guesthouse so we had a final farwell beer as they were flying back to Berlin at seven in the morning. I plan on taking the train to Ayutthaya tomorrow to continue riding north.