Originally Posted by
surram
1) For a lady traveling alone request you to share some ideas to spend the whole day. She is not planning to stay at a hotel as it is only day time.
2) The half day tours that I researched all start from hotels...but since she is not staying in any of them...can she still join the tour?
7) If she wants to go to the Grand Palace herself - can she take the train to Phaya Thai and will there be taxis available from there that take her to Grand Palace? Do you even recommend touring the palace on your own?
Originally Posted by
glennaa11
Taxis are always around. I would NOT take a tuk tuk unless my life depended on it. And even then I'm not so sure. :-)
Originally Posted by
BKKROP
...so if she likes shopping a couple of hours in Centralworld, Paragon, Platinum will delight her, or the girls love a new one call Terminal21
taxis are scarce around the rail, but the street is full of them. A car and driver guide, plus all the expenses of a day in Bangkok should set you back $200, a massage will cost $80 in a hotel, only $20 in a mall, so exchange enough into Baht
Guess a lot depends on how experienced she is and how much money she wants to spend.
I'm a budget kind of guy, so dropping $200 on one day sightseeing takes my breath away
At any rate, if she's traveled in Asia before, and wants to do the budget thing, it's easy enough to take the airport train to Phaya Thai, transfer to BTS and go to the river to take the boat to the Grand Palace.
On my first trip to SE Asia I took the half day tour of Grand Palace from the hotel, but with transfers to the bus that actually took us to the Palace and a stop at a "Gem" store on the way back we wasted a whole lot of time
Faster and more interesting the other way @:-)
Taxis will get stuck in traffic much the same way as buses, though perhpas not so much in the morning. They are always around, though you may have to walk a few meters to get to a main road. (I've flaged them down at 3 a.m. to go to the airport without a problem. Also, I normaly try to flag down a moving one, not one parked unless it's at train station).
Not a shopping kind of guy, but the places mentioned above are nice. Terminal 21 is brand new and right on BTS and subway line, so easy to get to.
As you might guess I'm a big fan of BTS.
Oh, and as glennaa11 says,
STAY AWAY from the Tuk Tuks, they are looking to rip you off
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