Phetchaburi to NE Thailand

Oct 18 & 19

 We came to BKK after turning in the rental car in Hua Hin which
is about 45 minutes south of where we live. From there we caught a mini bus (van) to BKK and unfortunately it was the slow bus, making frequent stops which made a 2.5-3 hr trip into a 4 hr trip. We spent the night at Leslie’s and got up at 4:45 to catch a plane to Khon Kaen ( an hour trip) in NE Thailand where we met our friend Surapong. After checking into our room, Surapong took us nearby to a daily fresh market that has small booths set up for serving food. We ate a typical Thai breakfast there. He had a noodle soup while we had kao mon gai (chicken with rice).

We walked around town then went on a search for some Thai silk. Years ago when Ron was working here there were vendors who would hang around in front of the hotels and sell precut lengths of silk to tourists. I was hoping to do that again. The beauty of having a local friend was Surapong knew exactly where they had moved to and walked us there. I would have never found them on my own. I got some beautiful silk in teal. Since we had a short night we suggested that we return to the hotel and rest and let Surapong have some time to himself.



We were meeting that night for dinner at his house. We rested until lunch time. We took a taxi to the

Central Market which is a huge shopping complex that was new to us. It has been a few years since we were last here. We found a place to eat up stairs and did a little shopping for gifts to take to Surapong’s two young girls, ages 7 and 4 years old. We found the NY Times in a bookstore so returned to the hotel to escape the heat and read the paper. We got a foot massage nearby and caught up on email until time for dinner.

Surapong picked us up at 6:00 and we joined him, his family and another couple for a great meal of barbequed meats, mushrooms, soup, shrimp cakes and fruit.  The other couple were Thai had lived in Boston while attending school there. The woman was a radiologist and her husband was a computer software designer. We had a great time with four kids running around, good food and excellent company.

On Sunday we decided to just relax. We started with a visit around the corner to Starbucks (good coffee is so hard to find in Asia) after breakfast at the hotel. We visited the gift shop at the Pullman which is a high end hotel nearby but didn’t see anything we had to have. It was hot after walking around looking for a gift shop that we couldn’t find so we ducked into another hotel and enjoyed a cold lime juice. We tried to connect with the vice mayor whom Ron had worked with in 2003-05 but he wasn’t available. We returned to the market and ate a simple Thai lunch there: duck with rice. We relaxed in the room again to escape the heat.

For dinner we decided to be brave and try Italian. Frankly we went in with low expectations and were pleasantly surprised. The salad was huge, fresh and delicious. The pastas were good as well. We couldn’t finish as the portions were large.

On Monday we went to Starbucks first then ate breakfast at the hotel. We checked out and took a taxi to the mini vans where we caught one to Udon Thani near the Laos border. While waiting for our van I heard this honking sound like you hear with clowns. A woman and man came around the corner pushing a cart with a live charcoal fire and various foods. Think ‘food truck’ except this was a cart. Many people came out of offices to get some hot breakfast. So ingenious. Talk about fresh food! Along the way to Udon Thani we saw lots of agriculture: rice, sugar cane, tree farms and other crops I couldn’t identify. 

The trip took longer than we had anticipated but we arrived aroundUS so his English is excellent. He is retired now and enjoys redecorating his home every six months or so. He entertained us at lunch with photos on his laptop. We walked from the bus station to a large new shopping mall where we had multiple choices of Thai eateries. Each of us got our food at a different stall but we all ate together. 

11:30 and were met by Chong. Chong is Nattawan’s first husband. Nattawan owns the house where we stay in Phetchaburi. Like Nattawan, Chong was educated and worked for many years in the

It was fun to catch up with Chong before we caught our 2:00 bus to Vientiane, the capital Laos.