River of kings

 

The Chao Phraya, Thailand's River of Kings, is a pulsing, jostling, wachine machine of a river, milky-tea coloured and crowded with craft. Lumbering half-sunk barges play tug of war with straining tug boats. Flamboyantly painted long-tail boats race around spraying water and noise, while passenger ferries of every size, shape and seaworthiness compete for pier space. Squeezing in, barely stopping, they disgorge and ingest passengers in a flash.

 It is a high energy, sight a second blast.

Riverside, high-rise and five star hotels sit alongside collapsing timber houses, exotic gilded wats and palaces. 

On our first afternoon, we took the hotels charming timber launch for the short cork-in-a-bath bob to Sathorn Central and boarded a tourist boat...less crowded than the ferries and a bargain at 40 baht. The boat poked along upriver for half an hour before depositing us at pier 7, where we waited a steamy 20 minutes before reboarding for the trip home.