Hello from Thailand!

We've officially arrived. Bangkok is as loud, busy, and hot as advertised.  One thing I didn't expect: so much street food.  There are vendors lining every street it seems, trying to sell you cooked or cold food.  Also unexpected: so many Japanese* tourists.  The Grand Palace in particular was packed with groups of them.

Jumped right into the must-sees of Bangkok yesterday, with visits to the Grand Palace, incl Wat Phra Kaew, and the nearby Wat Po (a Wat is a Buddhist temple).  Also took our first tuktuk ride and a boat ride along the main river and some of the canals.  Bangkok was originally built on canals, much like Venice.  Most have now been filled in, but many remain with houses on stilts, floating vendors/ weekend markets, and large lizards sunning themselves along the sides (no pic of the lizards since we were zipping along too quickly).

Side note: in the two years since I've last kept a vacation blog, Google has decided to end its blogger app for the iPhone or iPad, and this web interface is rather clunky.  I can't even scroll down to caption any more pics or rearrange them. Oh Apple vs Google wars... Hopefully this post appears ok on your end.

* update: apparently most of the tourist groups were Chinese, so my apologies to the Japanese for my stereotypical assumptions.   Selfie sticks and silly posed photos know no borders.

Long tail boat:

Reclining Buddha statue at Wat Po: