Junk the jetlag and never travel without this essential – it’s the best homeopathic remedy for the affliction – it’s simply Jet-Candy. Anything you travel hours and hours by plane, to see and experience can now be as smooth as going from Tuesday to Wednesday back home! Touring with no jet-lag is the key to get to know any capital city, so here we go – here’s Bangkok. For over 200 years, Bangkok has been the capital of Thailand – noisy, glamorous, glitzy, full of life, and seriously exciting with its temples, palaces, wats, markets and stupas. It has more charm in just one of its small klongs than many a city has in its entirety. It also has some of the most opulent hotels on the planet… but most particularly the Mandarin Oriental.
The iconic Oriental opens out onto the river Chao Phrya (the river of kings) and has won more awards for its service and chic than any other hotel on earth. The writer’s wing approached through the gardens is where everybody from Joseph Conrad through to Noel Coward and Barbara Cartland, have stayed and now the suites are named after them. As for the rest of the hotel… that is where everybody who is anybody from royalty to rock stars and rogues, fashionistas and designers have made their homes. And why not!
The hotel terrace is the best place in town to enjoy an ice cold Margarita Cocktail while soak-ing up the buzz of this capital city, and watch the world go by overlooking the action on the Chao Phrya. This has to be one of the greatest waterways of the world. A true working river alive with tug boats and cargo barges carrying everything from terracotta pots to steel girders, waterbuses and taxis carrying locals as well as tourists going to see the Royal Palace, the Emerald Buddha or the Temple of Dawn. Interspersed through this melee are the low, lean, elegant long tail boats – the traditional mode of transport – swift and sleek, hire one to take you from one riverbank to another, or to take a little tour of the klongs.
The klongs (small canals) are the river’s veins, small arteries which can give you an insight onto how both the rich and poor live as you skim past mansions with glorious gardens, or tiny wooden huts where entire families live. What all of them have in common though, is a little shrine where each day they light lamps, make offerings of marigold or jasmine, leave scraps of rice and fruit – for Buddhism runs through the soul of Thailand as much as the Chao Phraya runs through the soul of Bangkok.
But after each outing – whether to a market or a mall, a tailor for a shantung three-piece suit, or a temple, aficionados return to the Oriental’s zen space to relax, repair and enjoy its riches. If you want to shop, it actually has some serious luxury boutiques offering everything from designer fashion, to lavish jewellery and one of the best tailors in the city works around the clock for you. One of the hotel’s great charms is it’s celebration of Thai culture which can be enjoyed at its best across the river – the Oriental has its very own fleet of private barges to take you there – to its very own Thai restaurant where dinner is accompanied, each evening, by a display of traditional dance and music.
HOW TO TURN A RADISH INTO A ROSE…
The cultural centre offers lectures, talks and exhibitions alongside its award winning cookery school where among other things you can learn the intricacies of vegetable carving or how turn a radish into a rose. And then there is the Spa… it’s a real WOW… chic, cool and oh-so-contemporary housed in a reconstructed antique teak villa and offering treatments and therapies based on centuries-old healing techniques. A must, is of course a traditional Thai massage, which was born and developed in the temples and is now practised throughout the world. A treatment where the therapist works to release blocked energies in the joints and pressure points of the body by stretching and stroking, and sometimes walking on you! A host of other treatments for face and body are also on offer, including a Moroccan rhassoul – great – and a number of Ayurvedic therapies.
Each treatment room has its own steam room and shower, in case you forgot your swim-wear… while others have their own vitality pools. All places you are sure to will overstay in! Don’t miss a treatment at the Oriental Spa it is as essential for your travel routine as your passport and Jet-Candy.
