Unexpected Bangkok river cruise

One of the things you can do in Bangkok is to have a full river tour and experience the famous floating markets around the city’s canal. It was around 11am when somebody from a booth right outside Wat Arun temple approached me that offers this special tour. Since I was the only 1 traveling and could not afford the 700BAHT rent for the whole boat but I patiently waited for other people to come so we could share the cost of the tour. And after about 40 minutes, a couple from Malaysia joined me and divided the tour package.

It was scorching heat near the midday and make sure you hydate yourself. Anyway, the boat came to pick us up together with my new friends from Malaysia, they’ve been around Bangkok for 4 days. The river tour runs about more than an hour depends upon us if we stop at certain point or continue. At first, I was just amazed about the number of tourist flock to have this cruise. 

Just like our very own jeepney, these boats are also colorful and some have religious symbols in the front. They also become a trademark of different companies that operates this mode of transportation. During the start of our cruise, the river is really clean, only some few dead branches are freely floating but some junks are also found near the canal walls. 

Unfortunately, about 40 minutes of cruising, we felt really bored, it was all water and no floating market. But, coming from the stilt houses near the river, we saw 2 boats with goods for us to sell. Yes, only 2 boats sprouted in the water and this is what they call a floating market. Hey, its not even a market. 

We felt very disappointed about the floating market and we just continued around the river, we were so bored already. We passed  by a floating store where you can eventually eat but we just want to end this tour. But its not easy because of the narrow cannals and we have to navigate back along the canal back to the big river. 

What a pleasant site when we saw the city from the river, we just want to get off this tour because it was just a waste of time. However, I pondered perhaps the time of our river tour was not appropriate because it was midday, people selling on their boats might have already rested because much activity in the river happens during morning when trade are ongoing.