Breakfast with Lisa & Josh #35

Breakfast with Lisa & Josh #35

Welcome back to Breakfast with Lisa & Josh!

The last few days in Bangkok were just breathtaking. It was perfectly sunny, not a cloud in the sky (despite our desperate pleading for some cooler weather), and so ALIVE. Bangkok was just coming down from New Years, and people were still around. Hope was in the air, and it was intoxicating.

It just felt like the thing the world needed. For 2021 to end. I think we all were holding our breaths (sometimes very literally), waiting for this COVID thing to run it’s course so that we could get back to a semblance of normal life. To be honest, I’m not sure how close we’ll get back to normal life, but I’m still hopeful. It’s just… it’s been so long. What was that like? Did we take it for granted? Probably.

And then, with Omicron looming, absolutely nothing changed. Some more lockdowns happened. Some places opened up. We’re still talking about masks and vaccinations every single hour of every single day.

But, somehow, it felt different this time. It felt better. It felt, well, hopeful. And that’s exactly what Bangkok felt like. A place ready to explode whenever they’re told that it’s OK to. A city ready to get back to normal life. It’ll come, hopefully sooner than later.

One of the brightest of bright spots was the ICONSIAM mall. This place is incredible. I think, more than likely, the best mall on planet earth. It’s a massive landmark located directly on the best spot on the west side of the river. It’s immaculately built - with so many incredible details it’s honestly hard to recall them all. The floating market in the basement had architecture from all around the world, flying lights, delicious super cheap food - something for everyone. The bathrooms had toilets that automatically opened, and when you sat down they were playing the Avengers movie on the ceiling for your entertainment. The mall also had incredible coffee shops, a co-working space, places to just relax and use the wifi (or upload a video), live music at all hours of the day, fine dining… I mean I could go on, but this place did actually have everything. Let me put it this way - it’s the only mall we’ve ever gone back to twice. It was that good.

Oh, and how do you get to the mall? By A FREE BOAT RIDE OF COURSE.

Ok, that’s enough about the mall. It was really amazing though.

After saying a bittersweet goodbye to our friends the One Pack Wanderers (we had been traveling with them for the past 1.5 months. It was a sad day to part ways, but had to happen :( ) - we flew out to Chiang Mai in search of cooler weather, and new experiences. Neither of us have ever been here, so we don’t really know what to expect! And, to be honest, we’ve both needed a bit of that - a bit of newness.

Looks like they found a use for all of those old WOW planes. They didn’t even repaint them, lol :)

Videos this week

FIRST CLASS SLEEPER TRAIN TO BANGKOK

We took an absolutely EPIC first class train all the way from Surat Thani to Bangkok. You’ve gotta see this thing.

WE TOOK A BOAT ACROSS BANGKOK

We also took a beautiful boat ride all the way across Bangkok, to see as many of the sights as we possibly could.

So, that’s it for this week. More videos coming soon!

See you next Sunday…ish :)

- josh (and lisa)

Oh, and if you want to learn how we afford to take all these trips after quitting our jobs last year, you’ll likely be interested in our Skillshare course on Travel Hacking and Frequent Flier Miles. It’s been really taking off lately, but we still have a few uses of this link left for those of you who want to see the class for free. It comes with a free month of Skillshare, which is more than enough to watch our class and any of the other great courses on there!

Check it out here: https://skl.sh/3wstHhf