I made it! Let the adventutes begin

So I arrived around 6pm in Bangkok airport (exhausted from 2 flights and enough Diazepam to sedate a small zoo!) and made my way to baggage collection. I watched with a somewhat inwardly smug expression as people heaved their heavy suit cases as I retrieved my very 'manageable' sized backpack. However my smugness soon disappeared as I entered the 'backpacker zone' and stood beside trendy travelling young whipper-snappers who seem to have all their possessions thrown into tiny rucksacks (I reason with myself that I'm on the slide down to 40 and I NEED 5 different face creams and all the other paraphernalia required for the more mature traveller!)

I decided getting a taxi into the city was the best way to proceed and so joined the longest queue I had ever seen. Thankfully it moved pretty quickly and I'm soon hauling my bags into the back of a pink taxi. I remember it being a quick journey last time I was in Bangkok but the traffic on this occasion was much worse. I struggled to stay awake as we stop started our way along the motorway (listening to some Thai rap group on the radio).

After almost an hour and a half I dragged myself and my bags to the guesthouse I had booked for 2 nights. The welcome was very warm (as was the temperature of the room!) and I flopped down on the bed until I gathered the energy to go in search of food. I found what appeared to be a popular spot down a small alley way. The set up is very typical of Thai street food restaurants; plastic chairs and tables haphazardly balanced on the pavement and the serviettes consisting of giant rolls of toilet paper strung from the plastic roof (does the job). The food arrived quickly and was tasty and I sat listening to the wide range of languages spoken around me and soaked up the buzz of the area. I didn't stay long as I was at risk of falling asleep on my plate of left over pad Thai and so I meandered my way back to my room.