Jon took us to the bus station in Hua Hin, we booked ourselves on to a 12 seater air-con mini bus for 200 Baht each (Tehya was free) – with the exchange rate it cost us about £3.30 – it is very handy as they run every half hour or so. It took two and a half hours to the centre of Bangkok, we were dropped off at the Victory Monument Sky Train station and caught the train to the Taksin Station - we had booked into the Howard Square Hotel about a five minute taxi ride from the sky train.

Unfortunately we booked three nights online and paid by credit card – when we arrived the hotel seemed pleasant, it was clean and the staff friendly. We just dropped our belongings into the room and headed straight for the airport to collect Becca. The taxi was straight forward and although we had been worried about getting there on time - everything was fine. Tehya was delighted to see Becca, jumping up and down and running straight to her for the biggest cuddle ever. Later when we got back to the hotel we discovered that it is probably the noisiest one in Bangkok. A phone in the corridor kept ringing all night – and it echoed so loudly it might as well have been ringing in my head. Then at 5.30am the scrapping sounds of chairs on wooded floors started directly above us. It was so loud and constant I called reception at 6.30 – angry and wanting to know what was going on. The reply – the restaurant was directly above our rooms!! We all got up exhausted and frustrated – Gavin who had been feeling ill with flu type symptoms for the last few days at Jon’s was feeling even worse. We checked online to see if it was possible to leave and get our money back but sadly the cancellation policy said no refund and we could not afford to lose out on two rooms for two nights. I went and looked at some other rooms and although they were clean and looked nice they were not going to solve the noise issue.

We forced ourselves out of the hotel and caught the train to Siam Square where we hung out and got some lunch, found a Mac service shop for our broken laptop and enjoyed window shopping in some of the super expensive shopping malls.

That night we all slept badly again because of the noise and were really annoyed that the clothes we had sent to the hotel laundry service came back ruined – all Gavin’s t shirts and some of Tehya’s clothes had been washed together and the colours had run really badly (whites with dark green trousers – so now everything was covered with dark green stains). I made a complaint to the hotel – who were happy to refund the cost of the clothes, but also informed me that the cost would come out of the staff members wages!! I asked if they would at least not charge us the cleaning costs…?? They agreed but the cost would then be charged to the staff member responsible. It equalled about a months wages!! Although I was angry at the ruined clothes I did not feel that I could be responsible for bring that much financial misery to some other persons life!! I also felt angry with the hotel and was determined to leave as soon as possible. We decided the best option was to go and do a recon mission in another part of Bangkok before Oonagh arrived that night. The mission: to find more suitable accommodation and bus info to Ranong for our three week trip with the girls!!

{w:600;h:350} Siam Square, Shopping Centres, Bangkok)

(map of siam square, shopping centre, Bangkok, Thailand)

We wondered around Siam Square area and made several stops at tourist office’s but the information seemed conflicting and unreliable. Eventually we met a tourist guide who suggested we go to TAT office – there we would be able to find out the relevant information and buy tickets. That turned out to be a total nightmare….. what were we doing wrong!! We met a woman who refused to give us any information about Ranong, saying it was Monsoon season and that we should just go to Koh Samui. We informed her we had been there before…..it was not where we wanted to go. She was belligerent, rude and unhelpful and the best she could suggest to Ranong was a private bus that would cost us £31 each one way (and we would have to pay full costs for Tehya). It would not be private either as we would be sharing it with other tourists!! We left annoyed and more determined to find some where decent to stay.

We got a tuk tuk to the Khao San Road – one of Bangkok’s more notorious spots. We looked around for about an hour and found some terrible and very smelly accommodation and then we found Villa Cha Cha – just off the main shopping strip. It was like a oasis of peace and tranquillity….. so we booked and paid in full for the following night then left feeling happy and hungry. We ate at a small restaurant just down the road, had a few beers to celebrate and got a taxi to the airport to collect Oonagh.

Things got a little tense again as it was hard to find a taxi that wanted to go as far as the airport and then the traffic was terrible. There were protests in Bangkok so some roads had been block off and re routed effecting the traffic flow. We got to the airport with about ten minutes to spare and waited eagerly for Oonagh – it was so lovely to see her. Tehya was so excited…. jumping around and running off to meet her. It was very funny and sweet to see and I got a big lump in my throat. We all made it back to the hotel squashed into a taxi and sat up late exchanging flight stories, gifts for Tehya from grandparents and drinking beer and Thai whiskey.