Day 1 - Travelling by Mercedes in Bangkok

The drive down to Auckland was largely uneventful, so we arrived at Auckland International Airport just before the Thai check in counters opened. We queued up with hopes of getting to choose our seats, but when we got to the counter we discovered that the seats had already been allocated as the flight was full. We got some nice seats though, a window seat and aisle seat so we didn't have to worry about annoying other people when we needed to get up to use the bathroom (or vice vera, other people annoying us).

After a lovely final lunch with our families, we said our goodbyes and disappeared through the departure gates. The wait for customs and security was the shortest I've ever experienced it, and we were through in less than 10 minutes. We waved goodbye to our parents for the last time before venturing into the land of duty free to pick up our newly purchased Kiwi t-shirts, mementos for the journey to remind us of home.

Boarding of the plane was a little bit delayed, and consequently we departed slightly later than planned. There was about a 50/50 split between Thai and other passengers, and we noticed a couple walking onto first class with their wedding dress & suit in tow - they must be getting married on the beach in Thailand!

The flight to Bangkok was just over 12 hours, and it felt like a long time. We first checked our watch four hours into the flight, as we were flying over inland Northern Queensland (which looked very desolate). It always feels strange to have been flying for 4 hours and only be one third of the way through the flight. The TV screen in the back of the seats in front of us kept us entertained for a while, but there's only so much you can watch before you get sick of it, so the final few hours seemed to drag on. However, by the time the bright lights of Bangkok started to appear out of our window we were getting quite excited.

We were one of the final people off the plane, as we sat in the back section, and we exited into the most futuristic looking terminal building (Suvarnabhumi Airport only opened last year). The scale of the terminal building is immense. We must have walked at least 2 kilometres to the immigration lines, where we had to wait for quite some time in order to get our passports stamped.

After a simple immigration procedure, we grabbed our bags (some of the last on the carousel), some cash from the ATM, and met the man who was waiting for us from our nearby guesthouse (the Sanawan Palace). We followed him to his fancy late model Mercedes (the guesthouse business is obviously working well for him) and drove along an impressive system of highways to the small neighbourhood where would stay the night. The change in scenery we experienced turning off the highway into the local neighbourhood was awesome. We left the new age, futuristic Bangkok of the highway, and immediately transitioned to the traditional Bangkok which I was expecting: motorbikes with multiple passengers, street stalls, markets and a bustle which I was not used to at 1am.

After we paid our bill, we walked up to our air-conditioned room where we collapsed onto the bed exhausted. The first day of our big adventure was over, we were in Asia, we were excited, but very tired. Needless to say, we slept soundly.