Life as a Local in Syros, Greece

In Bangkok we chose to stay near Khoasan Road but not on it- an area known for its cheap massages and mass amounts of backpackers. We stayed at a hostel called Baan Nampetch ($21/night). They served a complimentary breakfast which was my favorite breakfast yet- it included corn flakes and toast. I sure was happy for ‘American carbs’.

Lumphini Park in the middle of downtown Thailand.

Our main objective of the day was to finish getting our immunizations at the Queen Saovabha Memorial Institute and to do some siteseeing while in the city center. Since we’ve been enjoying using public transportation (and saving money) we chose to get there by way of boat.
Bangkok also uses the river for some mass public transportation.  When you get to the station they have 2 ticket options- the blue flag boats for 40 baht ($1.15) and the orange flag boats for 15 baht (43 cents). Lucikly our hostel host had already warned us of this ‘tourist trap’ and told us there’s really no difference. It goes without saying that we took the orange flag boat. From a distance the other did not look any nicer.  

Jeanette had read about getting immunizations abroad for a fraction of the cost. We had both already had Hep A and T-Dap in the States so we went in for the remaining recommeneded few shots. We both got Typhoid ($13) and Japanese Encephalitis ($12) and I went ahead and got the flu shot ($10). All tolled a savings of $650 between the two of us on those two shots. 

After exploring the city and its many malls we made our way to the bus station for the overnight bus down to Koh Tao via Chumphon. We were a couple hours early so we decided to get another massage. This was my 4th massage in 3 days. The average price of an hour massage is $7. 

This will be the last overnight bus we take.  Neither of us got more than an hour of sleep on it. 

Now we’ve checked into our $8/night resort on the island where we will be for the next 4 days getting scuba diving certified. 

– Jason