Bangkok Day 3: Fine Dining @ Vertigo Restaurant and Moon Bar

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Good Tuesday morning, chewy chewy friends! I had a really shiok weekend staycation with misterchewy and I can’t wait to share it in words and photos with all of you! But first, here’s another photo-heavy blog post that places more emphasis on the highlight of our third day in Bangkok! Before we get to that part, let me tell you that misterchewy and I woke up super duper early so that we can go shopping! Why don’t we get this kind of enthusiasm back home? LOL. Again, breakfast at the hotel!

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We chose to walk about 20 minutes to Platinum Mall. Good thing I tied up my hair in the morning because I knew that it was gonna be hot. The funny thing is, we reached the shopping mall early at around 10.30am but most of the shops were not opened for business yet! So we sat there and wait. Sorry no pics of us shopping because we were too busy keeping a lookout for nice clothes etc. Don’t bother to haggle with the store owners because they will automatically give you a discount if you buy 2 pieces or a wholesale price for 3 pieces and above.

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Took a tuk tuk to Chatuchak Weekend Market! Yeah tuk tuk FTW~ πŸ˜› Hungry us decided to eat lunch first before shopping around! There wasn’t any menu, just the banner on top and everything was in Thai. We tried conversing in very simple English. “Chicken, beef or pork?” Luckily the young one understood and replied, “This pork. This beef.” “Ok two bowls. No beef.”

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Photo taken by misterchewy while I was busy Instagramming and subsequently posting on Facebook πŸ˜› We only found out later that these are the famous Bangkok boat noodles. Took a sip of the savory, hearty broth and the rest was history! The boat noodles were really slurpilicious goooood! We enjoyed the broth thoroughly; it was well-flavored for a good amount of spring onions, sweet basil and probably a dash of pork blood had been added.

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Felt really satisfied after finishing our delicious bowls of boat noodles and it was time for us to see if there was anything worth buying at Chatuchak market!

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We managed to get some souvenirs for colleagues and friends. I bought a handful of Singha, Chang and Leo beer magnets for myself! Really cute! Took a tuk tuk (yes again) back to our hotel and showered plus nua-ed a bit before our long awaited dinner! πŸ˜€

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Ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you that I had actually made email reservations to dine at Vertigo Restaurant and Moon Bar around 2.5 months before the trip. Kiasu much? Kiasu better than be disappointed right? As the popular saying goes, “Book early to avoid disappointment!” πŸ˜›

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Since most things in Bangkok are cheap, I decided to splurge a little more on fine dining while we were there. Also, prior to this, we were actually comtemplating a staycation for our first year wedding anniversary cum misterchewy’s birthday. Decided not to go with the staycation in the end and chose this short getaway instead. So this dinner is also part of the belated celebration πŸ˜› Our dinner cost around the same as our airfare, even more than our hotel stay!

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Located on the 61st floor of Banyan Tree Hotel, Vertigo and Moon Bar is an alfresco fine dining restaurant that offers a breathtaking view of Bangkok both in the day and at night. There are two sittings for dinner and I chose the first round which is the sunset period, from 6pm to 8pm. Second seating is from 8.30pm to 10.30pm. Moon Bar closes at 1am so if you want to chill out after dinner, you know you are better off staying put in your seat.

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Allow me to backtrack a little.. We didn’t take a tuk tuk to Banyan Tree la. Cab fare from our hotel costs 200 baht only. Considering the distance, we probably had to pay 150 baht if we were to travel by tuk tuk. Anyway, we can’t afford to mess up our hair. LOL. We reached about 30 minutes early and had pre-dinner drinks!

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Please be warned that there will be quite a number of photos because I was trying to capture the various views during sunset πŸ˜€

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A very friendly waitress offered to help us take some photos! πŸ™‚

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From this point, the sky started turning purplish!

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I love this scene the most! How I wish time would just stop.

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The both of us chose the 5 course set menu (3100 baht) which was around SGD300 for two after GST. Yes, this was our most expensive meal in Bangkok πŸ˜‰

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We were later asked if we could change tables so that they could accomodate a large group. Didn’t want to make things difficult for them and we agreed. They gave us two complimentary glasses of Prosecco but too bad I’m not a fan. Hehe.

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Amuse Bouche

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Roasted Tomato and Tangerine Soup

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Lobster Spring Roll with Spicy Mango Dip, served with mesclun salad

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Seared Bay Scallops, Sweet Potato Puree, Green Asparagus, Coconut, Chili, Lime

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Duck Confit, Sauteed Onion Potato, Braised Red Cabbage, Orange Jus

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This dinner place was solely planned by yours truly and I’m glad misterchewy enjoyed the dinner and ambience as much as I did! Besides, I picked up the tab for this one because he paid for my airfare, accomodation and expenses for the trip. Why does this sound so familiar? πŸ˜›

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Cabbed back to our hotel!

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A little souvenir from Vertigo and Moon Bar for us to bring home! They went round taking photos of all guests and developed the photos for each table, which I thought was a really nice gesture. Our dinner at Vertigo will definitely serve as sweet memories in the many years to come! πŸ™‚

Vertigo and Moon Bar
21/100 South Sathon Road
Sathon, Bangkok 10120, Thailand
Banyan Tree Bangkok, 61st level
Tel: +66 2 679 1200

Opening Hours:
Daily
Vertigo Restaurant: 6pm – 11pm
Moon Bar: 5pm – 1am

Bangkok Day 2: Damnoen Saduak Floating Market, The Grand Palace, The Fabulous Bar & Dessert Cafe and Khao San Night Market

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Hello chewy chewy friends! Very good right? I didn’t make you all wait long long for my second BKK post! πŸ˜› If you have not read our BKK Day 1 post, it’s here! Soooo.. We were quite disciplined and woke up early enough to settle for breakfast at the hotel. Looking to save money of your accommodation? There are great deals on the Expedia hotels page.

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The buffet breakfast spread was alright, nothing to shout about. While we were seated, we looked around and noticed that there were quite a number of Singaporean youngsters like us. Hoho.

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I didn’t really think much about the food. Can’t believe misterchewy went for a second helping! Hahaha.

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Our plan after breakfast was just to visit one tourist attraction which is The Grand Palace. The moment our cab driver knew we were tourists who were interested in more than just eating and shopping, he offered to ferry us around and take us to Damnoen Saduak Floating Market and Temple of the Reclining Buddha in addition to The Grand Palace for just 1000baht (SGD40) excluding ticket admission charges. We felt that it was quite a good deal considering that at least we would have something to keep ourselves occupied with for about 5 hours.

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Little did we know that Damnoen Saduak Floating Market is located damn far away from our starting point, about 100km southwest of Bangkok. It took us more than 2 hours to get there! If I were a kid, I would be like, “Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?!?!” Hahaha you get the drift. And to our horror, the admission cost us 1500baht per person, which means we paid a freaking SGD120 for the two of us to sit on the wooden boat for two hours!

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The only consolation was probably that we had the boat (I’m so inclined to call it ‘sampan’) all to ourselves and it was sheltered. But then again, it made taking photos kinda difficult.

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Some people call this the James Bond Floating Market, since some scenes from the The Man with the Golden Gun was shot there and subsequently released in 1974. Another 2008 crime thriller film, Bangkok Dangerous, starring Nicholas Cage, was also filmed there.

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And trust me, it was a nightmare whenever the boatman stopped the boat in front of these merchants because their prices are marked up really high and they would try to sell you every single thing that they could. What’s even funnier is that we didn’t express interest in those things that they were selling in the first place and they kept asking us to name our price. Like wth?! In the end we bought some cutesy elephant pouches for my colleagues there and then just to shut them up. LOL.

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We also spotted a few of them selling fruits, drinks, noodles and other snacks but the boatman didn’t even slow down πŸ™

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Part of the boat ride included stopping by the souvenir shop for about 10 minutes. I was actually quite reluctant to get off the boat because I was so afraid that I would slip and fall into the water.

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Nothing worth buying here!

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We were like O_O when we saw these! I mean, what are these doing here?! LOLOLOL.

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Hahaha. Told misterchewy to pose for a photo and he did! And the shades on the statue didn’t belong to us :S

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This, on the other hand, looked pretty cool. I could have bought something here but the boatman didn’t stop.

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This old granny looked quite cute sitting there so I hurriedly snapped a photo. Hahaha.

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Ummmmm.. No comments.

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And then, we stopped by a temple. So cool right! There’s a temple within the floating market! Yeah, had to get off the boat again.

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Fish feeding time! Fish food cost 10baht. I got tired of watching misterchewy throw the food in small quantities and told him, “Aiyo like that feed until tomorrow also cannot feed finish one leh. Just dump the entire pack la” and he did. LOL. -.-

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The rest of the boat tour was uneventful. Even the boatman knew that there was nothing interesting for us to see, and he sped up for the last 10 minutes.

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Let me tell you that our visit to The Grand Palace was pretty much a nerve wrecking one. They stop selling admission tickets at 3.30pm and when we reached at 3.25pm, there was already a queue. We were all advised to return another day. Both of us were like.. Whuttttttt.

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And so we walked back dejectedly to our cab driver who had parked his car some distance away from The Grand Palace and told him what was being said to us. He actually ran in and came out with tickets and said we could pay him afterwards! We had to loan proper attire because no shorts and sleeveless clothing were allowed. Mehhhhhh.

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I think misterchewy looked quite cute in these pants or whatever you call it. As for me, I was quite pissed with what the Thai auntie picked out for me but I couldn’t take my own sweet time to choose since we were already running out of time. The husband kept offering to help me take photos but I refused because my attire was really quite chui! Walking fashion disaster I tell you! D:

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My mood was kinda ruined because of the fugly outfit plus we didnt have much time to tour The Grand Palace. Yeah despite that, I still tried taking some photos here and there. Trust me, when I’m in a bad mood, I refuse to do anything one. LOL.

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This photo was taken by misterchewy! I can’t master this! Arghhhhh..

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TADAH! I know you guys must be wondering how AWESOME my outfit was. LOL! Towards the end of the tour, I told misterchewy, “Help me take a photo.” He thought he heard me wrong because I was quite adamant initially about having my photo being taken in this horrendous attire. “Don’t take my face la. Just take my back, I pretend I taking photos with iPhone.” Very awful combination right?! Wah lao very malu, face don’t know where to hide liao. T_T

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Our final stop was supposed to be at The Temple of Reclining Buddha but we were exhausted. More importantly, we were feeling ravenous! So we told the cab driver to take us to The Fabulous Bar & Dessert Cafe. Decided to tip him nicely too since he really went all out to help us.

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This cafe turned out to be a pretty hip and nice place to chill out at! We made ourselves comfortable while poring through the menu, which only consists of desserts and drinks.

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Basically we want everything when it comes to desserts and sweet treats! But of course we have to be realistic. Lol. We narrowed it down to just two desserts and two cocktails! πŸ˜›

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The Fabulous Signature didn’t exactly blow us away but one good thing was that the cake was not cloyingly sweet.

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The hubby has had a weakness for molten lava cakes for the longest time! Naturally, he was the one who had his eye on the Chocolate Satin, which I felt was yummier than the cake. Just imagine creamy rich chocolate oozing out from a warm cakey crust.

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My Bangkok Delight and misterchewy’s Single Lady. LOL.

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The Fabulous Bar & Dessert Cafe is quite strategically located along Khao San road, where the entire street comes alive at night.

Address: The Fabulous Bar & Dessert Cafe @ 32 Jakkapong Road. Taladyod Phranakom, Bangkok 10200.
Tel: +66 2 6291144

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Ehhhhhhhhh sexay laday ohohohohoh oppa gangnam style! See what I mean?

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Khao San Night Market is really very happening!

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We saw this auntie selling Phad Thai! There was a queue and we decided to join it. Must be delicious! We couldn’t resist the aroma too.

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Eating Phad Thai by the streets and downing Singha beer! Best! Oh and one plate costs a mere SGD2.

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I think we covered most of Khao San Night Market and took a tuk tuk back to our hotel.

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Upon seeing that there’s another night market right outside our hotel, we decided to shop around some more!

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It had been a really loooong day for us but it was fruitful, that’s for sure! Our next post will mainly feature our experience at one of Bangkok’s fine dining establishments that offers a spectacular view of the city, so look out for it! πŸ˜‰