What I have learned spending 3 & 1/2 weeks in Thailand 📝:


  1. The rules of the road:🛵
    1. Get to wherever you want to go as fast as possible.
    2. On a scooter? Go ahead and cut off that 12 person bus.
    3. Have a 6 month old on your daughters lap behind you? No need for helmets!
    4. If you ever forget what the rules are, see #1.
    5. ** Note, i have yet to see a car accident since in Thailand. (Well i did see one truck on its side on a hill..but that is it)
  2. People live happily, with much much less. Do you need a 2-1/2 bathroom house? Many people here have one toilet, and their shower is a shower head on the wall directly in front of said toilet. And their business is right in front of that. Whether it be a restaurant, a massage parlor, or a shop.
  3. Shoes are overrated. You cannot wear them into most shops, restaurants, homes, and certainly not a temple.
  4. Thirsty? You can drink beer anywhere! Except for a temple.🍺
  5. If you find a smoothie, snack, or coffee stand that you want something from, keep walking. The next one you find will likely be cheaper. Don’t pay double.
  6. Don’t expect “budget" accommodations to have towels, soap, sheets, or even toilet paper. If you do get that with the room, you got lucky, so appreciate it. If you don’t, the local market sells one roll of toilet paper for 10 baht (.28 USD).
  7. If you need snacks, drinks, toiletries, there are Family Mart’s and 7-11’s on every street corner. But if you keep walking, you will find either a local grocery market or store that will sell what you are looking for for half the price.
  8. NEGOTIATE. Taxi drivers WILL try to rip you off and set a fixed price prior to getting in the taxi. Don’t accept it. Ask for the meter. It will be 1/3 or less of the price they are trying to get you for. If they don’t agree, just thank them and move on, there are taxis everywhere. One thing to note however, some locations and hours will be much harder to find a taxi without negotiating. Sometimes you take that into consideration and just negotiate as low as you can get them, and then graciously accept. 🚖
  9. Some cities will be far worse than others about taxis not using the meter. Phuket is notorious for that, they will only negotiate set prices. Just don’t forget to negotiate.
  10. Local buses in Bangkok are FREE. Seriously! Just look up where you want to go with wifi, and it will give you transit directions telling you which bus to take. There is no A/C but the windows are down so you get a nice breeze.
  11. People are very nice. If you go to a shop, temple, tourist attraction, chances are if that person is snacking on something, they will offer you some. They will not eat in front of someone without sharing.
  12. You cannot walk more than 2 minutes without seeing a cat or a dog. Or multiples of each. They are everywhere. 🐶🐱
  13. I’ve lived my whole life using google maps while traveling. I swear by it. Load up your hostel or where you want to go and the walking directions while you have wifi and it will track your location and you can follow where you want to go. Of course you can’t search new places without it, so you have to plan a bit in advance.
  14. Even better now, I recently learned about another app, MAPS.ME, where you can download the map for where you are going and use it offline! It is a game changer. You can search anywhere even without having wifi as long as that map has already been downloaded. It also has viewpoints, waterfalls, and other areas worth seeing that people can add to the map. Follow them, it could lead to beautiful sunsets.
  15. Lonely Planet has free guides you can download for the city you are going to. This will have a map on it, nearby attractions, places to eat and sleep, etc. They’re great, but know that they won’t have everything.
  16. You can do Thailand for very very cheap. You can also spend Western prices for nearly everything you purchase. Be adventurous. Do you need a fancy westernized hotel? Depends on what you are looking for. You can easily have a meal with a drink for less than $3 USD. You could also spend $30 on a meal. It all depends on what you want. Obviously, ordering from street vendors will be less expensive, just be aware of what you are eating and how long it has been sitting there. You won’t actually know how long it has been sitting out, but if many people are going to that vendor you know they have a higher turnover of food.
  17. Yes, that was a monkey riding on the back of a motorbike, what about it?🐒
  18. Don’t expect free wifi in your hostel to work very well. Chances are, it won’t. Don’t get frustrated- just go to the beach!
  19. In other news, you can get a local sim card for no more than $5 USD and buy a plan for unlimited data by the week or month, at a local phone store. It is very cheap and I don’t know why I didn’t do that.
  20. Whatever you do, don't look around when going to the bathroom. You will find a spider. And you probably won't like it. 🕷
  21. Thailand is very dirty. You will find trash all over the streets, in the ocean, on the beach; everywhere. It will make you sad. ☹️
  22. Expect to pay up to 30 baht ~$.85 usd to use public restrooms. Not all charge but many do.
  23. Bring toilet paper everywhere you go, most places don't have any, they use a hose that they spray themselves off with. I am a creature of habit I suppose and I prefer the toilet paper. But do note that you can't put it in the toilet, it must go in the trash can.
  24. Also, you won't find these everywhere, but they have toilets that you will have to manually flush. This means fill the bucket up with water next to the toilet and dump it into the toilet until it is fresh water. I had to google this one.
  25. Don't bother bringing a reusable water bottle here, because you will not find a drinking fountain anywhere and can't drink the tap water. You can buy water bottles everywhere.