Sausages, Taxis and A Last Look at Bangkok

This is my last post on Bangkok. Sausages and taxis? What does one have to do with the other? Read on.

Every night the sidewalks in the Ratchadamri and Ratchaprasong area, where a lot of the malls are, turn into markets.

Clothes, food, drinks, toys and other knick knacks line the sidewalks.

Each time we walk these sidewalks I get lured by the heavenly smells of sausages being grilled. I finally succumbed and bought a couple to try.

The first sausage I tried was a delicious lemongrass pork sausage. The flavor was intense and the casing had a nice snap to it. It was cheap too at 15 baht.

The next one I tried was even cheaper at 10 baht and was simply awful. It tasted mushy and was almost all fat. I ended up spitting out most of it.

There’s really no connection with sausages and taxis except I like them both. I was amused with the fluorescent colors of taxis in Bangkok. I don’t know if there’s a meaning to the colors. Are certain colors private taxis? Are some un-metered? 

Here’s a quick recap of my trip to Bangkok. Hopefully this will help others who are planning to go to Bangkok.

1. When you arrive in Bangkok, the cheapest way for a group to get to your hotel is to take a taxi and ignore all the offers of a ride from private companies. Our cab fare including tip and toll fees amounted to 400 baht.

2. Choose a hotel that’s walking distance to shopping, restaurants and massage. We stayed at Marriott’s Courtyard Hotel.

3. Rent a van to take you to Kanchanaburi to go to the floating market, River Kwai, Tiger Temple and Elephant Village. You will save time and money hitting all these spots in one day. It just takes precise timing since the Tiger Temple closes early that’s why we missed it.

4. Get the best massage of your life at Wat Po. If you can find it the foot massage at Mr. Feet is also unforgettable.

5. I always thought of Thai food as Pad Thai and tom yum soup. I never thought that they had awesome seafood too. Here are my recommendations on where to eat in Bangkok.

Must eat restaurant in Bangkok – Baan Klam Nam (yummy seafood and great ambiance)
Favorite Pad Thai and Tom Yum fried rice – a small stall in Chatuchak market
Favorite Thai salads – Best Seafood Restaurant
Favorite  Hole in the Wall – I don’t know the name 😀
Favorite Mall Food – So many choices in Central World Mall

6. We asked the hotel to arrange a taxi to take us to the airport. We were charged 500 baht. It was a lot cheaper than the hotel van which cost more than double. And so this is how I will end my post, with a green taxi.

Final tip: Get to the airport early and make sure your hand carry is not full. There’s so much shopping in the airport. There were a lot of name brands as well as local brands.

What captivated us were all the free food samples and we ended up buying boxes and boxes of coconut cookies, dried pork snacks and some dried fruit snacks.