Back in our Happy Place Once Again

Oh, what can I say – other than we are back in our happy place! Goodbye to the horrid Home Exchange, and hello to the lovely Dusit Princess (Srinakarin) Hotel, where we will be residing for the next 3 nights.

This may end up being a long post, but only because I want to condense our activities over a few days into one post, which will hopefully help me to catch up on my days and postings. Yes I am still way behind (but I’m blaming that on the kids!).

We left the Home Exchange apartment first thing on the 10th January and hopped a Grab taxi over to the Dusit Princess Hotel. We stayed there last year for one night, and we really liked it and wished we’d had more time to explore the area. By booking for 3 nights in advance, we got a good deal, and it included breakfast which is always a bonus. We were hoping that we could leave our bags until the check-in time, and we would just head over to the nearby mall, but we were actually able to check straight into our room right away, which was fantastic. We were like two kids in a candy shop – and it felt GREAT to be back in a nice, clean and spotless accommodation. After quickly sorting out our items, we headed over to the nearby Seacon Square mall.

Seacon Square Mall

Seacon Square is an absolutely massive shopping mall, which we discovered last year after spending SIX hours walking around it. We had planned to go to the nearby Train Night Market that time, but we were so exhausted after the mall that we had to pass. This time we were definitely going to go to the night market!

Now, as it was a Saturday, we had forgotten that lots of Thais go out to the malls at weekends. I’m sure it’s a family thing, as you see groups of all age groups out and about. Well, it was a weekend, and some events were being hosted specifically for children, so the place was really, really busy with families!

The main event attraction was ‘The Horse’ as 2026 is the year of the horse, so a cool way to start the year, I guess.

However, we managed fine, and after getting a late lunch, we did our best to avoid the really busy parts of the mall (i.e. where the kids’ events were). As we had already been to this mall before, we knew we didn’t need to cover the whole mall again this time, and we didn’t want to exhaust ourselves as we really wanted to go to the train market in the evening. After a reasonable amount of time in the mall, we walked back to the hotel to have a rest before heading to the evening market.

Now R, our navigator extraordinaire, thought we could take a shortcut to the market. Spoiler alert – he didn’t, and we ended up on a convoluted route going around the back of the Seacon Square parking lot before eventually arriving back outside at the front near the BTS station (Suan Luang Rama 9), which is on the yellow line. No harm done, we got some more steps done!

The Train Market

The Srinagarindra Night Train Market, or Rot Fai Market, is HUGE! As it’s a bit away from central Bangkok, there are not that many tourists here, but it is fairly easy to get to via the Yellow BTS line. It operates Thursday to Sunday, typically from 5:00 PM to 1:00 AM

There are lots of restaurants, food stalls and sellers of clothes, jewellery, etc. There are a number of shops too. The best bit about the market (apart from the size of it) is the vibe. The reason I say this is that it is really cool and has a sort of old, American vintage feel about it. There is an old plane, an old gas station and many old American cars dotted around the market, which gives it a sort of wild west museum feel, but one that is very relaxed and chilled. Once again, I cannot help but think how my old dad would have loved this place with all the old cars, the garage,s and I can easily picture him trying to chat to the old locals with bits of car in his hands!

You can get an idea of the market from here:

After a few hours of wandering around and getting some food, we headed back to the hotel for a shower and a good night’s sleep. Sadly, the shower didn’t seem to work very well as the water was cold, but as it was quite late at night, we decided a quick (cold) shower before bed was fine, and we could sort it out in the morning if it was still an issue.

In the morning, we discovered the water was still cold, so we reported this to Reception on our way to have breakfast, and they were going to send housekeeping to check it out. The buffet breakfast was fabulous. It had a great selection and something to suit everyone, so we filled up ahead of our second day of exploring the area. There was a problem with the water in our room, so we were advised that they could put us into another room if we wanted, and we said yes, so we were transferred to a new room where the water was lovely and hot!

Paradise Park Mall

After breakfast, we made our way through the Seacon Square mall, over the BTS walkway and into the nearby Paradise Park mall.

Paradise Park has 5 floors, with lots of retail shops, covering fashion, IT gadgets, food, banking, home décor and wellness. We actually liked this mall as it was quieter than the massive Seacon Square one. That said, I think it probably lost some of its shops and customers to the larger Seacon Square. We had a very pleasant stroll around the mall and then had some lunch in the food court area. Afterwards, we headed back to the hotel to rest before our second visit to the Train Night market in the evening.

Day 47 & 48 : 10 & 11 January 2026

We loved walking around and taking in all the sights and smells. Depending on the time you are here, the food area can be very busy. There is a lot of seafood and sushi-type offerings, but we are a little wary of these given the heat (and not knowing how long they have been there). Although, as I have said to R numerous times already, it would not be good business if a vendor’s customers got sick from their food! I’m sure the food would be fine, but we tend to stick with what we are comfortable with, which is usually things that are cooked in front of us, or are deep fried!!

Bangkok, Thailand