I really do believe that the best tactic for taking on the always intimidating Chatuchak Weekend Market is to break it down by category. If you have the luxury of making multiple visits to the market then this category approach is easy-peasy. If you are doing the market all in one day, it still is … read the full post

The Golden Triangle is one of those regions that has captured popular imagination: think warlords, secret armies, opium mule trains chugging through the jungle, triads, the DEA and CIA, hill tribes, remote villages and above all the chest-high pink and white poppies that are the source of opium and its derivatives, morphine and heroin. Through … read the full post

Motorcycle cabs weave in between lanes of cars as traffic stands stopped at a light; they pull up onto the footpath for a stretch of cheeky riding when the road way is blocked and race the wrong way down one-way streets. Motorcycle taxis are the enfant terrible of Bangkok’s transport options. A local grandma will … read the full post

Or ‘welcome to the house of fin’, (fin being the Thai translation)! The House of Opium is the original of the two museums in tiny Sob Ruak (in Chiang Rai province) dedicated to the sticky resin of this one particular flower. There is also the new, flashy — and expensive — Hall of Opium, which … read the full post

Numerous venues in Bangkok are marketed as galleries, but for anyone looking to visit a proper gallery disappointment may ensue when some of these locales reveal themselves to be little more than a bar with a few framed photos. While we previously rounded up a list of galleries around the city that are worth a … read the full post

Mae Fah Luang Botanical Gardens are located in Chiang Rai’s Doi Tung district, close to the Burmese border town of Mae Sai. Now some 20 years old, the superb gardens were created in the early 1990s when the particularly troublesome Akha village of Pa Kluay was relocated by the royal-backed Doi Tung Development Project. The … read the full post

As a traveller I find myself on a neverending quest for something “real”, something that doesn’t involve being hoarded around by a leader holding an umbrella or scrambled in a sea of other lost tourists.  If that seems to be your M.O. as well, then a visit to Baan Bat will surely not disappoint. Tucked … read the full post

Ayutthaya was once one of the richest cities in the world and the capital of the Kingdom of Ayutthaya. It was sacked by the Burmese in 1767, bringing down both the city and the kingdom. It’s estimated that its population was more than 300,000 by the early 1600s, and grew to almost a million inhabitants … read the full post

While not the stuff that office escape daydreams are made of, getting medically protected while travelling is an important consideration. Travelling with a bit of stomach flu is possible, but travelling with malaria is not. If you’ve left home without arranging malaria treatment or have made a mid-journey change of destination that carries a higher-risk … read the full post

A few posts back, we talked about museums that give a history of Bangkok. Today, I’ll focus on a few homes-turned-museums that give more personal glimpses into Thai life of the past 200 years.  These four museums are all former homes, and all of them afford stellar looks into Thai architecture and design as well … read the full post