I love doing city tours when I get somewhere new, it gives me a good sense and feel for the city. Rob, however is a more explore on your own sort of dude, but I was able to convince him that a night time tuk tuk tour of Bangkok would be cool. Probably because the tour is pretty different from your typical city tour.
The tour company, Expique, aims to provide unique experiences of Bangkok. Getting you a little off the beaten path and experiencing the typical monuments in a new light.
Today I’ll be reviewing Expique’s Tuk Tuk Night Tour of Bangkok.
SIGHTS SEEN
- Night market: We got to try a variety of Thai street food and snacks. This was fun because I’d seen tons of street food vendors but was always hesitant to try anything because I wasn’t sure what anything was. One of my favorites were these little fried rice cakes with sugar drizzled on them, I’m kind of obsessed with them now.
- Temples: Seeing temples at night is actually pretty awesome, there aren’t any other tourists around and it’s very quiet and peaceful. You go to the famous Wat Pho, which had a completely different vibe at night than it does during the day, it probably has something to do with the stupas being lit up, and while you can’t go inside to see the reclining Buddha, walking around outside is still cool.
- Giant swing: A little way from Wat Pho you’ll stop for a view of the Grand Palace, city hall, and the giant swing. You’ll get a bit a history here, but I felt this stop was a little long and while the history is interesting, views aren’t super exciting for the amount of time spent there.
- Pad Thai restaurant: For dinner you stop at one of Bangkok’s favorite pad Thai restaurants. The line goes out the door and down the block, but you get to go straight in which is awesome. All they serve is pad Thai so there’s not too much in the way of options other than vegetarian or not, but the noodles are delicious.
- Flower market: This was the coolest and my favorite stop, mostly because I would have never know about, or seen the night time flower market otherwise. We walked through warehouses filled with all types of colorful flowers. Some were being sold wholesale while others were being made into intricate arrangements for offerings and temples.
- Chinatown: The final stop is in Chinatown, which I didn’t even know existed in Bangkok. We got dessert of mango sticky rice from a little hole in the wall shop. If you’ve never had mango sticky rice it’s delicious and definitely should give it a try!
TOUR GUIDE & DRIVERS
- Our guide was wonderful, she was friendly, chipper, and super knowledgable about her home city. She also spoke fairly good English and had a few little poster aids to help along with any language barriers.
- The tuk tuk drivers were awesome and friendly. At the end of the night our tuk tuk driver drove us back to our apartment on the complete opposite side of town which was really nice of him since he really didn’t have to, we could have taken a cab. But it’s those moments when someone does go the extra miles that always stand out to me.
PRICE
- The price of the tour was 1950 Baht which is about $55 a person. For the experience you get and all the food I think it’s a super reasonable price, you could spend $55 on just dinner back in the States. One thing to note that at the end of the night if you take the tuk tuk back to your hotel you’ll pay for that separately, and work out the price with the driver.
OVERALL EXPERIENCE
- Overall the experience was a lot of fun, and we got to see a side of Bangkok that we probably never would have known about. It really was a unique tour and I’d highly recommend it if you are looking for a good way to explore Bangkok.
Love the night shots, it’s stunning! I’ve heard the tuk tuk is awesome! Love having you on #FlyAwayFriday!
Omg how fun are riding tuk tuks in Thailand?? I loved them and did something similar to this in Chiang Mai!! It was so much fun!! Can’t wait to see what you share on FlyAwayFriday tomorrow!!