Chatuchak

After the conclusion of the Bangkok Christmas Classic baseball tournament, we had some additional time to explore the city of Bangkok as a family. By far my absolute favorite part of our entire trip to Thailand was the discovery of the roadside markets. These markets seemed to pop up everywhere, with vendors selling all types of things from specialty treats to custom or vintage clothing to knockoff brand name items. Everything at the Thai markets is incredibly cheap, so cheap that sometimes you can't believe what you're paying.

One of our baseball friends had visited Bangkok before and told us about a market called Chatuchak, the largest outdoor market in Asia with over 35 acres and 200,000 visitors each weekend. We managed to squeeze in a short-lived visit after our final baseball game, and it turned out to be my very favorite activity of the entire trip to Bangkok! Chatuchak actually reminded me a lot of the First Monday Trade Days back home in Canton, TX, which is maybe why I enjoyed it so much. We were only able to stay for a few hours, but we explored stall after stall of every item you could think of.

The pictures can't do it justice. Chatuchak was MASSIVE. It would've been easy to get lost in the maze of stalls and long narrow hallways in some parts of the market. My favorite stops were the fun local treats like pork on a stick (Connor's favorite) and the fresh coconut ice cream served inside a coconut shell. The kids also loved the fresh squeezed orange juice and the fruit popsicles made in these tiny steel cylinders inside a barrel.

I also loved the shop with tons of $4 Under Armour (knockoff) shorts, which turned out to be the deal of the day for Connor. Jeff and I told the kids that they could pick out something fun from the market, and they ended up settling on wrist watches in their favorite color, which they were both super excited to wear.

 

 

Jeff and I wanted to make sure we could find some sort of item to take home that would remind us of our trip to Thailand. In one of the interior stalls, we found some fun metal décor pieces and really liked the elephant ones because the elephant is the national animal of Thailand. When I started to negotiate with the Thai vendor, I noticed that his English was very good. He told me that he had lived in Virginia for a few years! We picked out the perfect metal elephant to take home, and it will always remind us of our visit to the super cool Chatuchak market in Bangkok, Thailand.