Thailand - Messy thread!

PompeyPete

Great in't it.....think I'm being helpful by starting a useful detailed thread, and in no time it's gone off in all directions.:(

Bigadaj.....you were lucky getting through a flooded road in one piece. A lot of them conceal big holes when flooded.

We don't worry about saving a bit of time, as we always allow plenty.
Steering clear from often eventful road travel is a priority.

AlwaysHere

PompeyPete wrote: »

Great in't it.....think I'm being helpful by starting a useful detailed thread, and in no time it's gone off in all directions.:(

Bigadaj.....you were lucky getting through a flooded road in one piece. A lot of them conceal big holes when flooded.

We don't worry about saving a bit of time, as we always allow plenty.
Steering clear from often eventful road travel is a priority.

Why would you think that the weather conditions are not important information in such a thread?

bigadaj

AlwaysHere wrote: »

Yes, quite different from getting wet in the UK. Though wouldn't actually choose it as a time to travel.
So just wondered why you chose that time as opposed to say, late November.

You wouldn't appear to have much experience in travelling in Asia so it's a little difficult to explain.

We've had rain on about half the days we've been here, and heavy rain on only a couple of days. The days in the beach were sunny with a little cloud but no rain, the only significant rain has been in Bangkok.

As for timings it works for our employment, weather is turning in uk, has little practical effect in travel plans and isn't as busy or expensive as the real high season in late November for example.

If you just want sunshine and lying in the beach then that's fine but I get very bored with more than a couple of days of that.

bigadaj

PompeyPete wrote: »

Great in't it.....think I'm being helpful by starting a useful detailed thread, and in no time it's gone off in all directions.:(

Bigadaj.....you were lucky getting through a flooded road in one piece. A lot of them conceal big holes when flooded.

We don't worry about saving a bit of time, as we always allow plenty.
Steering clear from often eventful road travel is a priority.

Well that's the nature of boards and forums.

The road was a large soi in sukhumvit and it was the hotel tuk tuk, driver was very careful to be fair to him.

In terms of time then for me it's a consideration, I'm not retired like some. Depending on the conditions then I'd consider all alternatives, train generally would be high up but not to the point of doubling back on myself and wasting half a day. Flights can be useful but were restricted to central Thailand on this trip so no real opportunities, and whilst the crashes can be horrendous that are still pretty rare, even if the accident rates are far higher than Europe.

Also a little bit of relative luxury is nice, we got a private transfer in a Toyota Land Cruiser door to door from hotel in hua hin to Bangkok for just over £40. When considering that even against train, particuallry where the timings are poor as with hua hin, and the hassles of getting to and from train stations at either end then a bit of scary driving pales a little.

AlwaysHere

bigadaj wrote: »

You wouldn't appear to have much experience in travelling in Asia so it's a little difficult to explain.

We've had rain on about half the days we've been here, and heavy rain on only a couple of days. The days in the beach were sunny with a little cloud but no rain, the only significant rain has been in Bangkok.

As for timings it works for our employment, weather is turning in uk, has little practical effect in travel plans and isn't as busy or expensive as the real high season in late November for example.

If you just want sunshine and lying in the beach then that's fine but I get very bored with more than a couple of days of that.

You wouldn't appear to have much experience in travelling in Asia so it's a little difficult to explain.

What would make you jump to such a conclusion??

Of course I understand your reasoning now you have explained. But I fail to see what I wrote that would give you cause to assume that I have no experience travelling throughout Asia.

Good weather is preferable for all travel. Not keen on riding my motorbike through floods.

Weather is still good in the UK and not great in Thailand and still cheap flights available throughout November until early December for as little as £320 return, which incidentally is when the The Bridge of the River Khwae Memorial Week is held, so seemed an odd choice.
But understood.
Personally, I just prefer to leave it until the weather is better there and worse in the UK.

Back to the main topic, I've never visited any of those places.

bigadaj

We're all different, I wouldn't be keen riding a motorbike round Thailand floods or not but its personal choice.

You wouldn't want to be there on the Memorial Day, certainly if you had no personal connection, those sort of events get very busy and potentially difficult and expensive.

In terms of weather then rain or at least cloud can be a help in tropical climates. I worked in Ghana a few years ago, and noticed that whilst it is in the northern hemisphere, winters are actually hooter than summers. The reason is that there is more cloud in summer, rain can be a great help in reducing humidity and freshening things up as well.

PompeyPete

bigadaj wrote: »

We tend to be pragmatic about options, we took train up to pak Chong and then back to ayutthaya, but saved several hours by a road transfer to kanchanaburi, even if the driving standards often leave something to be desired.

Surely that's backtracking! As I said, the only reason we went back to Bangkok after Kanchanaburi was to get a flight to Hanoi.....hardly backtracking if there's no alternative.

In fact I imagine that the majority of people who visit Kanchanaburi and Hellfire Pass do it as a side-trip from Bangkok, many leave the bulk of their gear at their Bangkok hotel/guesthouse so that they aren't burdened.

As you itinerary was so well organised, why not share it from start to finish.

Hope you had a good flight home.

PompeyPete

AlwaysHere wrote: »

Why would you think that the weather conditions are not important information in such a thread?

Weather conditions are always important in SE Asia, even hot, dry, and humid weather.....the scratch-resistant coating on my cheap Asda specs melted in Vietnam a couple of years ago.

slinga

bigadaj wrote: »

It's fine, heavy showers and the road outside the hotel was flooded this morning but got through in a tuk tuk.

I've never had a problem with the so called taunt season in south east Asia, it's not exactly a hurricane.

Quite enjoy being soaked with warm rain actually, don't get that in the uk ever.

Eh.

Are you kidding?
You get soaked out here and it can make you feel freezing cold. Even if there's only a light wind blowing.

bigadaj

PompeyPete wrote: »

Surely that's backtracking! As I said, the only reason we went back to Bangkok after Kanchanaburi was to get a flight to Hanoi.....hardly backtracking if there's no alternative.

In fact I imagine that the majority of people who visit Kanchanaburi and Hellfire Pass do it as a side-trip from Bangkok, many leave the bulk of their gear at their Bangkok hotel/guesthouse so that they aren't burdened.

As you itinerary was so well organised, why not share it from start to finish.

Hope you had a good flight home.

Yes, all fine thanks.

I don't really understand your deleting the OP, it's an open forum, no one got into a massive argument and I think all threads were relevant to Thailand unlike so many other threads.

There are different itineraries that people can follow, I don't necessarily see the point in submitting a detailed blog as there is so much in the Internet anyway, but it's fine if you want to do that.

My backtracking point was going through a point you didn't want to do, so Bangkok in my example, we wanted to stop in ayutthaya and it made sense to do that between khao yai and kanchanaburi for us, whereas going back into Bangkok and then having to trek to a different station just seemed like more hassle, you could get buses in and out from Bangkok but that sort of defeats the point.