Day 1, Arrival in Thailand

Photos by MJ Klein and Hui-chen

To check out the food we enjoyed on this day, please see this article.

We are pleased to bring you this series on our recent trip to Thailand and Laos!

We parked our car in one of those parking lots near the airport, and took a shuttle bus to the airport terminal.

Michael Cannon (L) and Michael Turton join Hui-chen and I for shopping in the duty-free terminal before departure.

Once we finally landed in Thailand, we took a rest and then got up to walk around and explore a bit.  One of the places we hit up right away, was the car rental agency.

The 2 Michaels confront a bus pulling out of a parking lot.

The car rental agency is on this street in Khonkaen, known as “Sirchant Road.”

This is the view from the passenger seat in the rental car.

Here we are with the first order of business for the day – lunch at the noodle shop.  We’re going to be showing the food we experienced in this series, in a separate series of just food photos, so don’t worry!  You won’t be missing out on any food!

Michael Cannon (L) writes an entry in his journal while Michael Turton looks on.

We then made our way to the Laos embassy, where we got our Lao visas.

After our visas were all issued and in our passports, we took a small driving tour of Khonkaen.

My GPS goes wherever I go, and it sure comes in handy for finding your way around!

Khonkaen has grown up quite a bit since I first went there in 2004.  The traffic has more than doubled.

This is the impressive city gate.

Michael Turton (L) and Michael Cannon check out the menu at The #1 Bar.  We went there for drinks in the afternoon.

Later we took a walk down to the Roma Hotel and the restaurant there.  Remember, we’ll bring you the food photos in another article.

We’ve blogged on this food street before, and the restaurant is right in this area.

We walked back over to The #1 Bar after dinner, as it becomes very interesting in the evening.

Michael Cannon played a few games of 8-ball with some of the other bar patrons.

This is the only food shot we have at this time.  You can see that we’re drinking Sang Som Royal Thai rum, with soda and Sprite, and we’re eating some snack food while we’re drinking.  I like to eat some small food when drinking.

The last shot shows some of the staff of The #1 Bar.  We called it an early night as we had plans for a full day the next day – as you will soon see in our next installment.

Thanks for reading!  Please leave us your comments and recommendations below.