Originally Posted by billp

You say you tried to take the Chao Phraya Express boats all the way up the river but failed due to a timetable misunderstanding. It’s really quite easy. This is one of my favourite excursions because you get to see a whole slice of Bangkok riverine life and it only costs 16 baht flat fare.

Start at Sathorn Central Pier, which is right next to Saphan Thaksin BTS station. You should start no later than mid afternoon because it’s harder to get back late in the day. You need to take an ORANGE FLAG boat. Forget the blue flags, the tourist boat the HOHO boat etc. You can buy a ticket at the window but you don’t need to — you can pay on the boat. If you do buy ahead, insist on the ORANGE FLAG boat. The queue for that boat is on your right — sometimes you have to wait a while for the next boat to come up the river. It’s an older, smaller craft than the newfangled tourist boats.

The terminus is in Nonthaburi, the province north of Bangkok, and around the pier it has the feel of small-town Thailand. There’s a big outdoor market and a museum in an old teak house. There’s used to be a good floating restaurant near the pier, but sadly it has badly declined in quality in recent years.

If you feel like getting off the boat along the way and exploring, you can but you’ll have to pay the 16 baht again.

For getting back into town if you’d rather not take the boat, get a taxi to Yaek Tiwanon MRT station. The local taxis will NOT drive you downtown. That’s on the MRT Purple Line, which intersects with the Blue Line at Tao Poon, and that’ll bring you back to Tourist Central.