Caught a Thai airways flight up to Bangkok and enjoyed their service. It was back to how airlines used to be years ago. I got a hot towel, packet of peanuts and a drink within half an hour of being on the plane. Shortly after that they served dinner. It came on a full sized tray and I had an entree, a very satisfying and tasty main course, dessert and a roll with biscuits and cheese all served with wine, drinks and coffee. It put Qantas to shame. Their meals have deteriorated so much in recent years both in quality and quantity. Their last offering on my last flight was a take-it-or-leave-it spag bol which took precisely 4 mouthfuls to consume. No entree, no dessert only a chocolate. Later Qantas serves an ice cream but Thai did that as well. Qantas really needs to improve the quality of its flying experience.
I landed at the new airport in Bangkok, which I haven’t visited before. It was chaotic with long queues for immigration. I suppose I’m spoilt in Perth where, at most, there may be 20 people ahead of you in the queue with 3 or 4 booths open. In Bangkok there were 20+ booths each with 50+ people lined up. Getting out of the terminal was a case of running the gauntlet of the hotel and taxi touts and trying to look for your name or hotel amongst the many signs being held up. Predictably I couldn’t find my name at the designated meeting spot so walked back against the flow of human traffic asking various touts where my hotel meet-and-greet person was. Fortunately found her near a different door and had to wait while she summoned the transport from the hotel.
I only had a few hours lay over in Bangkok but didn’t want to sleep at the airport or any of the airport hotels at $250 a night or more. I found another hotel only 10 mins from the airport that gave me free transfers, breakfast and a room with private facilities all for $35. As I lay down to sleep for a few hours I realised why it was so cheap, as the first aircraft rumbled overhead. The hotel was directly on the flight path without any sound proofing! After the first couple of planes I was oblivious to the noise so it wasn’t as bad as I feared at first.
I slept intermittently. You can never go deeply asleep when you know you have to be up early to get a flight. The alarm went off at 6am, I had a good breakfast and was delivered safely to the airport to brave the chaos again. Having officially entered Thailand I had to pay the 700 baht departure tax, which was a bit of a nuisance seeing as I’d only been in the country for 9 hours. I wandered all through the airport on the way to my gate and after another well fed flight found myself in Kathmandu.
Everything went down a notch again and the chaos was worse, the terminal tattier and everything less efficient. I managed to get my visa okay and they were quite surprised that I was only staying for less than a day. I ignored the Customs Declaration, which said I could only bring 1 camera into the country and I had 2. These things never really mean much in third world countries and I would give myself a heap of trouble if I declared both cameras. Predictably I sailed through and they didn’t even look at my duly filled in form.
In the chaos outside the terminal there was no one obvious to meet me. Finally, having deterred half the taxi drivers in Kathmandu I spotted a man waving a small inconspicuous sign saying ‘World’ but no reference to ‘expeditions’ on the other side of the road. Talk about hunt for your reception committee! I was told to wait in the sun whilst the hotel vehicle was summoned. I wished I had my hat as it was HOT! I had anticipated that Nepal would be chilly at this time of the year and had come cold weather equipped. After my recent experiences in the UK and Melbourne I was not going to be caught short of a jumper here. Instead it looks like I’ll be living in my sole pair of lightweight pants and 3 t-shirts with my thermal underwear, hat and gloves packed away in my suitcase! I didn’t bring my walking sandals so it’s going to be my boots and sweaty socks for 2 weeks!
I am staying at the Radisson, a 5* hotel supposedly but the rating has been done by the Nepalis. I suppose it is good quality to them but seriously on the world stage it is more like 3*. I tried to have a sleep but the bed and pillow are rock hard – oh dear! I’ve only been here 2 hours and already there have been 2 power blackouts – welcome to a third world country! I could walk into Thamel for dinner but I’m not that hungry so will get a snack at the hotel and an early night. It takes 18 mins to walk into Thamel but an hour to drive because of the traffic. All the roads are really narrow and the traffic chaotic. “There are no road rules here,” our driver announced on the way in from the airport. I’ll brave the city when I return from Bhutan.
No comments:
Post a Comment