March 31, Bangkok

Tuesday, March 31, Day 56 - Bangkok to Dubai

We both sleep in and are up packing at 9AM when we enjoy an exchange of text message with one of our Grandsons.....it is so nice to hear from the grandchildren especially half a world away...modern technology is wonderful!

This will be a long day as our plane does not leave for Dubai until after 9PM tonight. Fortunately we can keep the room until we are ready to leave which mays for a nice day. Ee were not looking forward to cooling our heels in the lobby for a couple of hours.

After breakfast, Dick arranges with the hotel for a taxi to take us to the Jim Thompson Store, not realizing it is not the same as the Jim Thompson House and Museum. Thompson was an American expatriate who moved to Thailand after WWII and was instrumental in revitalizing the Thai silk weaving industry. A foundation, run in his name, still produces fine silk products and operates his mostly traditional Thai style house as a museum.

After seeing the store and buying a few items (4,650 Baht), we take the taxi, who has agreed to wait and take us from point to point for 300 Baht ($10US) and hour (we ultimately pay him 1,000 Baht), to the house and museum and pay 300 Baht for admission. There is a demonstration of boiling the cocoons for the silken threads and of the spinning. Then we suffer through a tour of the hot, humid and still house. Thompson had collected some very nice Asian art but for us it was hard to appreciate while melting and running down into our shoes!

Of course, we also buy more silk items here and then call our tame taxi to take us back to the hotel.

For the rest of the afternoon, we finalize our packing and simply wait for time to pass. At 5PM we check out, board our Mercedez Benz and head for the airport. Right off the bat we hit dead stopped traffic and Dick’s blood pressure goes up but the 16 mile trip ultimately only take about 50 minutes.

We check into our Air Emirates flight to Dubai and on to the Seychelles and pick up a wheelchair and pusher for Carolyn. He takes us to the Emirates lounge where we wait until he comes back for us at 8:20PM and we walk right onto our 9:05PM flight. Dick makes the wheelchair guy’s day by giving him all our remaining Baht, estimated to be about 200 Baht in small bills.

We are flying business class on an Airbus A380 and each have a little private space with a lay flat seat/bed. Jack has his own little spot by the window and with the provided eye mask on he enjoys the ride. The service is good but Dick thinks the seat is way too narrow,but Carolyn thinks it is fine. They serve a dinner meal by courses and it seems to take forever. We do manage to sleep for a good bit of the flight though. There is a three hour time change between Bangkok and Dubai so we take off at 6PM Dubai time and arrive in Dubai just before 1AM.