Damnoen Saduak Floating Market

Thailand is famous for its floating markets, but there are only a few remaining and they’re all about an hour outside of Bangkok. Kat and I signed up for a half-day tour through our hotel; we were picked up just before 7am on Tuesday morning. We had to pick up a few other people for the tour, and then made the hour trip to Damnoen Saduak Floating Market.

When we arrived, our tour guide told us we would be taking a “James Bond” speedboat to the floating market; apparently it’s a similar boat to a scene in a James Bond movie, but since I’ve never seen a James Bond movie I can’t say for sure. The boat reminded me of the boats we use for crew- long and skinny, seats for about 8 or 9 people, but this boat had a motor and rudder instead oars. The fifteen-minute ride over to the market was great. We went through all these different ‘streets’ and got to see what life was like living in this area. The houses are right on the water and have steps that go right into the water. There were a handful of people on their steps doing laundry in the water. 

When we got to Damnoen Saduak, I was rather surprised. I had seen all these pictures of floating markets and well, it wasn’t exactly what I had expected. We were dropped off at what turned out to be a strip of stores and were given an hour and a half to walk around in the stores. On the other side of the water/stream, there were little stores that were reachable by boat, but you had to pay 150 baht to get over there/for a 30-minute ride. Kat and I decided against the boat ride because we figured we could get anything we wanted on this side of the stream. At one point we sat down and just observed the dynamics of the floating market. Another tourist was interested in buying some fruit from a lady who had her little shop set up in her boat on the water. The shop owner maneuvered her boat closer to the land, weighed the fruit on her little scale and gave them to the customer in exchange for money. Afterwards, the shop owner proceeded to move her boat back away from the land so other boats could get through when necessary.

After the floating market, the tour us to an elephant farm where a few people rode elephants, but Kat and I just hung out. Then we went to a wood-carving studio. This studio was amazing. We were able to freely walk around the factory and store. The factor allowed us to see the carvers at work as well as the pieces they were working on. Some of the pieces were so elaborate and intricate. We also met another traveler on our trip; he was from Liverpool and was making his way around the world. He had already been to the U.S., New Zealand, Australia, Singapore, and was still looking to go to Hong Kong. It was great hearing about his travels and experiences abroad.

We were then on our way back to Bangkok; Kat and I were dropped off at a shopping center by our hotel, where we proceeded to waste time before leaving for our overnight bus to Samui. We grabbed some lunch at a food court; I got pad thai- it was delicious! We wandered around the mall, did some window-shopping and spent some time looking around a bookstore before heading back to our hotel to grab our bags and go to the train station where we were meeting the bus.

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We purchased tickets through a travel agency our first day in Bangkok for an overnight bus and boat ride to Koh Samui. We met the bus at a train station on Tuesday night; the bus was rather simple, a double decker with the first floor for VIP people, luggage and the driver while the top level was for the rest of us and just like a coach bus. The ride wasn’t too bad, took about nine hours and we stopped 2 or 3 times for a half hour each. We were dropped off somewhere around 6am and then picked up again after 8am. We were then taken to the dock and after an hour boat ride, we made it to Koh Samui. We had to bargin with the taxi drivers on a price for driving us to a hotel; even though the taxis are labeled “Taxi-Metered” they’re not. For a 2.5km ride, the cheapest taxi we got was 200 bhat, which is still less than $10USD, but expensive compared to what we were paying in Bangkok.

Upon checking in at the hotel, we were surrounded by the beautiful resort and beach. J