Current location...
Latitude: 13 degrees 3.3' N
Longitude: 100 degrees 54.2' E
We arrived at 8:00 this morning to the cleanest and most orderly port we have seen so far! The port at Laem Chabang is not even 20 years old, and since it is so far from Bangkok it has much clearer air than many of the ports we have experienced. John and I watched a container ship being simultaneously unloaded and loaded today -- something we have been unable to view until now. It was fascinating.
We did not have the usual diplomatic briefing today since it was Sunday and the port is so far from the US Embassy. Immigration did arrive and it was about 11:00am when the ship cleared and we were allowed to disembark. The people who had trips today went off first, for the two hour bus ride to the airport and flights to Phuket in the south and Luang Prabang in Laos. Since John and I didn't have anything scheduled we had a slow morning and left the ship around 1:00pm. We got a cab and went to a mall not far from the port. There was not much there, and what was there was very western, so not much of note to share, except that we did give in to our urge to visit the first Starbucks we have seen since leaving the Bahamas!
We are planning a trip tomorrow to Pattaya http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattaya which is about 30 km south of the port, leaving around 10:00am. I'm not sure why there are no ferries from here to Bangkok, but it seems to me that would be a much more sensible way to travel than the crowded roads. There is a skytrain in Bangkok that should make travel within the city easier, but you have to get there first. Some of our briefings from people who have lived in Bangkok indicated that vehicle travel is faster than in India with less horn, and the only rule seems to be that any empty space must be filled. The jury is still out on whether we will try to make that trip.
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