Change of Plans!

Celadon is the Restaurant at Sukhothai

Ferris was supposed to join us for our trip to Burma, Sri Lanka and India. Unfortunately at the last moment she came down with the flu and her doctor said she couldn’t travel so it would just be Cathy and I heading to Southeast Asia.

We showed up at Singapore Air 2 hrs early to check in. Our flight was to Singapore then on to Burma. We gave them our passports and they said we had a small problem. We got our Burma Visa in Oct and it was good for 90 days and expires on Jan 4th. Our flight arrives on Jan 5th. They wouldn't let us board with an invalid visa.

We said ok, let us fly to Singapore on this flight and we would straighten it out in Singapore. They said no it is illegal to fly into Singapore without a ticket exiting Singapore. We had no exit ticket because we weren't returning from Burma via Singapore but via Bangkok. There is always a way around travel problems but after spending an hour and half with Singapore Air, it was clear we weren’t going to be allowed on to the plane. So we couldn't go.

We never got angry and Singapore Air was helpful, but there was nothing they could do. In Singapore you can be arrested for spitting on the ground. Think of what the penalty would be for violating imigration rules! We took a taxi back home.

We decided the best course of action was to simply skip the Burma Leg of the trip and continue on to Sri Lanka, arriving there on the scheduled day of: January 13^th. This is the lead up to Chinese New Years and it is VERY difficult to get flights to SE Asia. I spent 5 hours on the phone finally getting us two business class tickets to Bangkok via Inchon South Korea.

We decided to travel to Bangkok a few days early and stay at the The Sukhothai Bangkok, a luxury hotel with fantastic food. We have previously eaten at the Hotel. There is also a new Textile Museum we plan to visit. We are disappointed about Burma, but will catch the country in a future trip.