A DAY OF DOING ALMOST NOTHING IN BANGKOK

First full day in Bangkok. Our view shows the Westin across the street, and adjacent to the left a Four Points Sheraton.

Recovery day. We decided to do nothing much. The Sheraton Grand Sukhamvit is nicely located at it's own BTS Skytrain station, and adjacent to a major shopping mall, Terminal 21. There are four of these in the country. This was the first, and on 10 floors has 600 shops, a Cineplex, gourmet market and 42-story Grande Centre Point hotel and residence. Note in comparison that the Ala Moana Shopping Center in Honolulu has only 350 shops, and the tallest building in the state, which is the First Hawaiian tower, has 30 floors.

So all we did today was walk to that mall and looked around. I bought nothing, and took photos of strange fruits and dishes. Even Chinatown in Honolulu doesn't have this kind of variety.

I will report on my pedometer readings on this trip. Shopping mall visit? Around 4000 steps. Then at 6PM went to The Library, which serves as an executive club, where we had Jameson whisky and gin martinis. Also, three canapés came several times. We then went to dinner.

After breakfast we decided to cancel our Red Sky rooftop dining experience because I thought it might rain. Good thing I did so, for it poured in the early evening when we were safely ensconsed back at the Orchid Cafe in our building. Note the raindrops on the window.

I've stayed at this hotel at least a dozen times, and maybe 25, and never went to this restaurant for anything but their buffet breakfast, which you saw yesterday. Good bargain, as for a total of $80 we had a choice of appetizer, salad, pasta, and main dish, plus a bottle of Cab from Chile.

I was so exhausted, I immediately went to bed and had a decent night of sleep. Today, I will continue to do nothing much, and have both breakfast and dinner at Rossini's, which is a fine Italian restaurant. Here, unlike the Orchid Cafe for their buffet breakfast with a vast assortment of selections, Rossini's is an order from the menu place. I selected eggs royale, which is like eggs benedict, but with salmon and spinach. They have a limited number of stations to augment your order. Only these: