Yaowarat at full volume, a jazz bar up a staircase, and the river at midnight.
The city is louder at night than by day, and somehow kinder.
Night one · Yaowarat
We landed at six, checked in near Hua Lamphong and walked into Chinatown with no reservation and no idea. Yaowarat Road after dark is a river of neon and woks: we ate grilled river prawns at a plastic table, then a bowl of guay jub from a cart with a queue of locals, then mango sticky rice because it was there. Total under six hundred baht for two. A man with a clipboard tried to sell us a tuk-tuk tour; we declined and walked to the river instead, where the ferries were still running and the Grand Palace glowed across the water.
Night two · jazz and the sky
Saxophone, up a narrow staircase on Phaya Thai Road, has been running since the eighties and still fills every night; we stood at the back with a Chang and stayed for two sets. Then, because everyone told us to, one rooftop: Octave on top of the Marriott in Sukhumvit, where a cocktail costs a Yaowarat dinner and the view is worth exactly one. The BTS was still running when we came down. It stops around midnight, and taxis after that should be on the meter or not at all.
Night three · Khao San, but not really
Khao San Road is what you think it is, and it is fun for an hour. The better night was one street over on Rambuttri, quieter, with live bands in the open-air bars and pad kra pao from a cart at two in the morning. We finished at a bar in the old town run by a man who plays vinyl and serves one kind of whisky, which was somehow perfect.
Night four · the river
The last night we took the Chao Phraya Express down to Asiatique for the market and the ferris wheel, then walked to Wat Arun to see it lit from the pier. A long-tail boat driver offered a ride through the khlongs for a thousand baht; we took it, and it was the best money of the trip, the wooden houses lit in the dark and a temple bell somewhere. Bangkok at night is a place you wander, not one you book.
- Nightlife
- Street food
- Bars
- Live music
- Thailand
5 stories on Travlyo
Written by the traveller with Travlyo's help. The Bangkok guide ·