July 21 - Train to Phitsanulok

We’ve taken planes, cars, taxis, rapid transit, taxi boats, bamboo rafts, tuk tuks, and even an elephant. Today we added train and pickup taxi.

Our day started with oversleeping for the first time. Fortunately, we had done the vast majority of packing the previous evening, so we were able to make up for lost time pretty quickly and get back on schedule after eating breakfast in the hotel.

We had been told by the Tourisma person the first night that we should have the bellman get us a cab at 7 which would give us enough time to get to the train station before boarding. Next up in our set of misunderstandings, or misleadings, was that the cabbies were still sleeping at that time (We got that from the bellman who laid his head over his hands, as if sleeping. There was less English in Chiang Mai than the other places we’ve been.) The bellman was able to find us a private car for 200 baht, and we felt that we didn’t have much choice.

So we arrived at the train station and found that all was in order, and we were an hour plus early for the train. Again, there was very little English in the station, so when an Australian bloke struck up a conversation, we had a pleasant diversion. He was accompanying a Thai woman back to Australia after about 4 weeks in northern Thailand, and was glad to have some English conversation for a change, even if he found our accent to be a bit funny.

The train was a little late, but it was very pleasant, with a great view of the mountains and valleys on the way to Phitsanulok. The trip took a bit more than 6 hours, but we got fed a couple of times, the car was air conditioned, and we had more room than the plane.

When we arrived at Phitsanulok, we were supposed to be met by one of the Compassion workers who would take us to the hotel. We didn’t know where the reservation had been made for us, so we were sort of stuck. Joyce called our Compassion contact, and she quickly gave us the name of the hotel and the contact for tomorrow. Our correspondence had clearly said that we would be met on arrival, so here was another misunderstanding/misinformation piece. There was a taxi driver nearby who had talked with me a couple of times, so he offered to take us for only 50 baht, and wouldn’t negotiate. Again, we didn’t have a lot of choices, since his English would turn out to be the best we’d hear today, other than from our Australian traveling comrade. The hotel was relatively close (probably no more than 5 to 10 minutes from the train station), and we got the view from the back of a taxi/pickup for the first time.

Once at the hotel, we apparently didn’t have a reservation, and only the manager seemed to know any English. We also apparently scared the front desk staff by speaking English. The manager was able to say enough that we understood that we were getting a deluxe room for 790 baht a night, including breakfast (less than $20 American). The hotel seemed clean and nice enough, and again, what choice did we have?

We were pretty worn out, and definitely felt like aliens, so we elected to stay in the room. It began to rain, so that seemed like a good choice. We watched a movie and slept a bit, and finally felt brave enough to venture out. A few blocks away, we saw a sign for KFC, so headed that direction. Joyce was still a bit timid after her recent bout with intestinal trouble, so something American sounding seemed like a pretty safe thing. It turned out that it was part of a large department store/mall complex. So we were able to purchase the towels we wanted for Nipaporn’s family. So with our purchases complete and supper in a sack, we headed back to the hotel for the evening.

I wanted to try and post this and some other pictures, but wasn’t able to figure out how to make a connection to an outside line, and a call to the front desk proved completely fruitless. My lack of Thai and their lack of English didn’t create any connection. Getting back to Bangkok is looking pretty appealing right now. But tomorrow is one of the day’s we’ve been anticipating, so barring any more misstatements, on with the show!