The Dubai Diaries
My life as a flight attendant in the Middle East!

Bangkok, Thailand – Bang Kachao, An Island Escape in the City

I have been to Bangkok so many times over the past 6 years with Emirates, and it’s a destination I’m always happy to return to. Delicious Thai food, amazing cheap massages, and a short-ish flight makes it a popular destination for almost everyone!

However, as with every destination that you’ve been to more times than you can count, you end up getting into your routine there. (See above – Thai food and a great massage!). So when I was there recently and one of our crew suggested visiting a small island in the city for a day out, I jumped at the chance!

Bang Kachao, known as “Bangkok’s Green Lung” is the perfect escape from the busy city – a forested island with cycling trails, cafés and a nature park just waiting to be explored.

We took a taxi from our hotel to the river and jumped on a tiny boat to take us across to the island. The boat cost about 10 Baht each!

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48 Hours in Phuket

I was lucky enough to be rostered a dreamy trip to Phuket this month. Most of our layovers are 24 hours, and a few of the longer US flights are 48 hours. However, sometimes there are these lucky occasions where you manage to get a 48 hour layover for a quick and easy 6 hour flight!

And when I say easy…it really was! We had 4 passengers in business class (with a capacity of 42 on the 777) so we were practically fighting to take them their meals, just to have something to do! We flew overnight, so after dinner they went to sleep, and we kept ourselves awake with cups of tea and coffee.

Once sunrise arrived, we started our approach into Phuket, admiring the gorgeous scenery below.

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Unfortunately the 777 door windows are not quite as photogenic as those on the A380, haha! Nevertheless it was still a pretty view of the beaches and islands.

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Wat Pho & The Grand Palace, Bangkok

I’ve been to Bangkok almost 10 times since I started flying, yet somehow I’ve just never gotten round to visiting any of the temples there! Whilst I’ve visited the incredible Chatuchak Weekend Market (which is over 35 acres in size) and tried my hand at cooking some delicious Thai dishes, I decided it was probably about time I go and see what Thailand is really all about.

Since we landed early evening, a group of us headed to dinner at a lovely little restaurant just a few minutes walk from the hotel – every crew knows it and inside was another group of crew who were on their first leg of the 9-day Bangkok – Sydney – Christchurch trip. After a delicious (but very spicy!) dinner accompanied by a fresh coconut and finished with mango sticky rice of course, it was time to call it a night.

A couple of the girls from economy planned to head to the temples in the morning, so I asked if I could join. We met the next morning armed with a map and some Thai Baht, ready to explore.

A quick tuk tuk ride later we were at the Chao Phraya river, from where we would sail on down towards Wat Pho, also known as the Temple of The Reclining Buddha.

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After negotiating with the man selling the boat tickets (and I’m certain we were ripped off, but no amount of bargaining would get him to lower the price!) we had our own little boat to take us up the river.

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Cooking up a storm in Bangkok

After my two lovely holidays to Zanzibar and Jordan it was time to get back to work. I eased myself in to things with a nice Bangkok flight that I managed to swap for an Australian multi-sector trip.

I’d fly to Bangkok, stay for 24 hours, do a “shuttle” flight to Hong Kong and back, and then get another 24 hours in Bangkok!

It’s been a while since I went to Thailand, so I was looking forward to the trip. The first day was spent getting a lovely massage and some delicious street food for dinner.

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