Traveling to Thailand, the “Land of Smiles”, was a great experience and one I truly enjoyed. In fact, I enjoyed it so much I plan on traveling to Thailand again real soon for a much longer time. After returning home from my trip I did a little research on the Internet about Thailand to get more acquainted with the area and tourist attractions; something I should have done before I went there on my last trip but couldn’t because of how sudden I found out I was going to Bangkok.

During my stay in Thailand, I had an uneasy feeling at times that the prices being quoted to me for merchandise, tours, taxi fares, etc… were a bit more overpriced than what they should be. In addition, when I spoke with certain locals around the tourist areas it seemed like something just wasn’t right. Well, I came across this site online about Bangkok scams and was amazed that some of the scams listed on the site almost happened to me! The name of the site, believe it or not, is Bangkok Scams, which can be accessed here http://www.bangkokscams.com. I suggest if anyone plans on traveling to Bangkok, Thailand they read up on this site beforehand. Now that I have the foresight to see what was happening during my trip I have to tell you there are many scammers around the tourist areas in Bangkok just waiting to take advantage of tourists.

Out of the Top 10 Bangkok scams listed here, I experienced three of them; and after thinking back about my trip and doing a little research, I can say some others scams were tried on me which I’ll blog about in the future.

The first scam I experienced on the list was “The Grand Palace is Closed Scam”. I took a taxi from my hotel to The Grand Palace and was dropped off right in front of the gate entrance to The Grand Palace. As soon as I stepped out of the taxi and headed toward what looked like the entrance, I was approached by a well-dressed Thai local man with an open umbrella (I guess to shade himself and anyone else he is trying to scam from the sun because it wasn’t raining that day).

The Thai man asked me politely where I was going, I pointed to the gate entrance and said “The Grand Palace”. He replied back “This is the exit to The Grand Palace, the entrance is over there” pointing to a further gate opening. He then offered to show and walk with me to the entrance. As we walked the other way he explained to me part of The Grand Palace was closed at the moment because there was some sort of funeral taking place inside for someone important who died and it would open up again at 2pm. He then pulled out a map and suggested I go visit two other temples close by and come back at 2pm when The Grand Palace opened up again.

This is when I started getting suspicious because I saw people going in and out of The Grand Palace gates. He then mentioned taking a tuk-tuk to the other two temples and it would only cost 10 baht (which is really cheap). Not any sooner when he finished his sentence a tuk-tuk pulls up on the side of the road with the driver looking very eager to have me jump inside. After some brief words and a conversation with him trying to persuade me to get into the tuk-tuk and visit the other temples, he finally pointed me to the original gate which I was walking too and said I can go and enter the Grand Palace through it. I was a little confused at first, but then realized it was some sort of a scam which he gave up on after I gave him a hard time and declined his request to jump into the tuk-tuk. I headed towards the gate entrance and to no surprise the Grand Palace was open.

In my next post I’ll be talking about a few Bangkok, Thailand taxi scams I experienced.

Here are two more pictures showing my perspective from inside the riverboat while cruising along the Chao Phraya River in Bangkok, Thailand. In the right picture you can see the Phra Pok Klao Bridge, one of the many bridges which crosses over the Chao Phraya River.

Today, I spent a good part of the day on a riverboat sightseeing along the Chao Phraya River in Bangkok, Thailand. The Chao Phraya River is actually the largest river in Thailand and runs north to south starting in the center of Thailand where two other rivers meet, the Ping and Nan river, and empties into the Gulf of Thailand. Some of the largest and most densely populated cities in Thailand are situated along the Chao Phraya River, including Ayutthaya, Nonthaburi, and Bangkok.

I waived down a taxi in the front of my hotel, jumped in and headed toward the Sathorn Pier, also known as the Central Pier, which is located near the Taksin Bridge. The taxi driver actually dropped me off at one of the smaller piers near the Sathorn Pier to catch a riverboat. The picture in this post was taken while standing on the pier, and shows the riverboat I road on while sightseeing along the Chao Phraya River. There were many popular historical landmarks which could be seen while traveling along the Chao Phraya River including a number of temples, the Grand Palace, and the Royal Thai Navy Dockyard.

If your visiting Bangkok Thailand for the first time I highly recommend that you take a riverboat cruise to experience Bangkok from a different, yet very interesting, perspective. If you have the whole day to spare, depending on what type of riverboat you take, you can tell the boat driver to stop at several of the piers so you can get off the boat and visit the popular landmarks along the Chao Phraya River.

After getting through the visa check line I headed straight to the money exchange counter where I exchanged my US dollars to Thai baht with an exchange rate of $1 dollar for 32.82 baht. After exchanging my money I headed toward the meeting place in the airport where I had arranged for a friend of mine who was in Thailand to meet me so we could catch a cab to my hotel. The meeting area was quite a distance from the luggage carosel so I got a little lost since it was my first time in Bangkok’s airport. On the way to the meeting place I stopped by a local wireless carrier kiosk where I purchased a local SIM card for 150 baht, which is really cheap; 150 baht comes out to about $4.50 USD. The SIM card came with 100 free minutes which would be more than enough during my stay in Thailand. I swapped SIM cards at the kiosk just to make sure it would work with my phone; it worked just fine so I headed to meet my friend.

Picture of SIM Card

Once at the meeting place it didn’t take to long to find my friend. We jumped in a taxi and headed for my hotel. The drive from the airport to downtown Bangkok on Sukhumvit 11 took about 30 minutes through the express way. It was exciting to see Bangkok for the first time, and my first impression of Thailand is a positive one. I think I’ll really enjoy my trip here!

It’s confirmed!  I’m heading for Thailand on October 4th for a four day vacation in the beautiful and exotic city of Bangkok!  I’ve never been to Thailand and I’m excited to get a chance to visit there for the first time.  I’ve heard all the wonderful stories from friends who have visited Thailand on a regular basis and I’ll make sure to take lots of pictures of the temples and palaces for all my readers.  At 4am on October 4th I’ll be jumping on Philippine Airlines for a 2 hour stop over in the Philippines, then heading to Thailand for a wonderful experience.