Bangkok Thonburi Khlongs

Forget the floating market. Forget the tourist hordes, the overpriced souvenirs, the whole money-making charade. For a real sense of how people in Bangkok used to live, in stilted shacks, old wooden townhouses and dilapidated lean-tos - and still do - try them Bangkok Thonburi Khlongs.

It begins on the Chao Phraya, the main river that bisects Bangkok in a wide arc. Unlike say London or Paris, it remains as alive as the city it flows through. A motley armada of battered ferries and sedate barges churn through its mud-brown waters, carrying commuters and cargo around the city.

Its banks are an exotic jumble; Buddhist temples, Catholic Churches and Taoist pavilions alternating with shabby warehouses, tumble-down shacks, old mansions and prestigious hotels. Overall, a pretty inspiring place.

But this is merely the beginning. Suddenly the boat veers toward the west bank - then turns a corner, and Bangkok becomes a narrow canal not more than 20 feet wide, where buildings over 10 stories high all but disappear…

Khlong Mon

This is Khlong Mon - sweet, lonely, ramshackle Khlong Mon. I see craggy wooden homes and shacks, some jutting right over the water, others festooned with washing, orchids and frangipani. We pass temples, saffron-robed monks and verdant patches of morning glory or water hyacinth. People are scrubbing clothes, floundering in boats, throwing scraps to fish - or waving at me. This is an older, simpler and altogether sweeter Bangkok.

Royal Barges National Museum

Khlong Bangkok Noi is a wider, bolder estuary with signs of small industry - more river than canal. There are less stolen glimpses of life on the water. But it does have the Royal Barges National Museum, an open warehouse containing eight fabulously gilded barges restored or built by His Majesty the King. For sheer spectacle it can't compete with the Royal Barges Ceremony in June, when a 52-strong flotilla glides solemnly down the River of Kings - how could it?

But it is a great opportunity to admire up-close their iridescent detail and the mythological creature mounted on each bow. Like that of the Narai Song Saban, decorated with a figure of Vishnu mounted on Garuda; or my favourite (and the most cherished) the Subanahongsa - a 46 metre long vessel made out of a single trunk of teak, a fabled swan rising majestically from its prow. They really are something. (Read More)

Wat Arun

As is our last stop, Wat Arun. With its panoramic terraces and steep staircases leading to an 86 metre high prang (spire), this rousing temple looks more a mix of Khmer and Aztec than Thai. It is decorated in broken Chinese porcelain - an outsider in this city of all things gilded. My guide Khun Mike explains, as we clamber like children up its foot-tall steps, this is because it was built prior to the founding of modern Bangkok, during the Ayutthaya period.

But honestly, I'm barely listening... The view, a seething mass of contradictions, is irresistible. Boats like elaborate matchsticks ply the mud-brown water. A corridor of high-end hotels winds confidently around the bends of the river. And before us, on the far bank, the peaks of the Grand Palace complex glint like the jewels in some strange, orchid-scented fairytale. I could stay here for hours... the floating market will just have to wait. (Read More)

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Bangkok Thonburi Klong Tour

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