IMO, 9 full days is enough to get a good sample of Bangkok and Siem Reap (I'd forget the beach). It takes three full days just to see the so-called major temples at Angkor. Get a copy of Dawn Rooney's book "Angkor: A Guide to Cambodia's Wondrous Temples to get a better idea of how much time you will want there. I spent a week and would have enjoyed even more time.

I love Bangkok. Indeed, my first visit there was a full nine days just in Bangkok, and I've been back more than two dozen times since then. I never run out of things to do and see. My must-do/see list for a first time visitor includes the Grand Palace/Temple of the Emerald Buddha, Wat Po, Wat Arun (all in the same area), Wat Tramit in CHinatown, plus some less-visited wats, The Teak Palace, Jim Thompson House, Erawan Shrine. In you like house museums, I'd add the Suan Pakkard palace. If you are especially interested in SE Asia Arts, I'd add a half day at the private Prasart Museum outside of Bangkok. In addition, you must try lots of wonderful Thai food, get massages, and shop. You can do all of this on your own. Indeed, the Jim Thompson House provides a guided tour, and at the Prasart (must have advance reservation) you'll get a docent assigned to you for a private tour. At the Grand Palace, there are official guides available to you for a small fee.

I'm not a fan of using guides in Bangkok and I don't recommend group tours. I recommend people use public transport as much as possible (the skytrain and the water taxis) and plot out where they want to go on their own. But if you must have a guide, there are others here who will make recommendations.

Guide books are invaluable. Look at several and buy at least one for Thailand, and of course, get the Dawn Rooney book for Angkor. Fodors has an excellent Thailand guidebook, and you might want to look at the Lonely Planet.

As you read more about the palces you want to visit, come back and ask for input and feedback from us. We are glad to help.

personally i would want more time in bkk, but i guess you want some beach time too...

any chance you could eek out a few more days after travelling all that distance... you will still be tired on day 1 and 2 in bkk??

tourwithtong is a good service in bkk..google them... ratt is another good driver in bkk. if your friend has been there before you may not however need a guide within the city...just for outside, i.e. the floating market..

choose your hotels carefully to avoid disappointment... allow us to help you.. what is your budget? this is the most expensive time of the year for hotels, unfortunately..

travel books: fodors and frommers for general info..

must sees:

grand palace
wat pho
wat arun
jim thompson house
klong tour (canals of thornburi)
v-mek teak palace

outside city:
floating market
tiger temple
railroad market

Wow, thanks for the quick replies! This site is amazing. I was up to 4 am last night reading through the forums .

I recommended to my friend that we spend more time in Bangkok last night, but he says only visiting bangkok and Siem Reap after going there wouldn't be seeing enough, so wants to go to Ko Samui too (probably because it's the only place he hasn't been to). It's ultimately up to me, but I'm considering staying 4 days (29th all day to 1st all day) in Bangkok, 3 days (2nd all day to 4th all day) in Siem Reap, and 1.5 days (5th all day, 6th almost all day) in Koh Samui. I don't need three full days laying on a beach.

I already have Dawn Rooney's book in my amazon cart, as well as a few other Thailand/Bangkok travel guides. I'll get those soon.

My travel dates are pretty much set. I possibly could add some days but I'd be by myself as my friend will have to go back to work. I'm 30 and haven't had much jet lag after traveling last December to SE asia, and this March to Israel. I've been ready to go from the start. I've heard good things about tour with tong, and how she can sometimes be hard to get a hold of, haha, so I'll contact her often and early.

As far as budget, it's somewhat limited mostly from choice. I could spend $200/night at a hotel, but I don't need that level of luxury especially since I won't be spending much time at the hotel. I was looking at the list of hotels on tripadvisor.com and went down the list of rankings. There were several reasonably priced hotels in the top 30 including the above recommended "Tower Club at Lebua" (number 26). I guess my question is how close are the hotels to the skytrain and the central business district (where my friend says we should stay). I hope to reserve my hotels this week

I'm not a person who goes to clubs or drinks, so I travel mainly to see the sights instead of experience the nightlife.

I plan to travel to Brazil in Nov 2013, +/- Australia in Dec 2013 so I look forward to becoming more acquainted with this forum. Thanks for all your help!

The most important factor, IMO, is proximity to the Skytrain. A short walk to the Skytrain means you can get most places you want to go in a short time. I'd ignore the ranking on TA - they lump all kinds of hotels together so a basic guest house with shared bathrooms may rank above a 5 star property. Read the comments with caution as they are often spammers touting one property while degrading others.

I'm not fond of the LeBua. I'd opt fro a place on the river for your first trip, as it makes it very easy to get to the most-visited wats and the Grand Palace via water taxi. the Chatruim would be in your price range. If you opt not to be by the river (and LeBua sometimes says it's by the river, but it isn't), then I'd go to the CBD. Lots of choices there.

Oops - I hit post too soon. I w anted to say that the flights to/from Koh Samui are pretty expensive, as are the flights to/from Siem Reap. So take a look at Bangkok Air's Discovery Pass as it will save you money. Book that as soon as you have firm dates.

Kathie,

I've looked at the prices of one-ways and it was about $800 total for all three. It seems the Kayak.com price is very similar to the Bangkok Air's Discovery. Is am looking at this right?

The Chatrium looks nice! I was trying to make sense of the CBD but still don't completely understand it's boundaries. My friend recommended staying in the CBD, do you also have some hotel recommendations in the CBD?

can lubua for sure

look at centre point silom, any ascott property, marriott mayfair, chatrium riverside, ibis riverside, anantara riverside, marriott courtyard, westin, royal orchid sheraton---all below $200.

look at www.sawadee.com for an overview

why spend so much flt $$ for samui for 1.5 days??

angkor would be better in 4 full days quite honestly...its very expensive to fly to as well.

"if I am wrong in posting this ... specific questions"

Excellent first post, welcome to fodors.

If you are flying home from Koh Samui then I suggest staying another night or two on your own and just relax.

The plan was taking a one-way from Ko Samui to Bangkok (1 hr flight I think), then taking my return flight home from Bangkok. I found a Korean Air flight that leaves around midnight on Jan 7th, so I can get a full day on the 5th and most of the 6th.

I plan on going back to work on the 8th, and I'm paid basically on production so every day I miss costs me a good chunk of cash. This is why I fly around Xmas, New Years so I can get the most days for the least missed days (Dec. 22 - Jan 2 next year gives me 12 days for only 4 missed workdays! Last yr I flew the Dec 23rd - Jan 3. I would have done the same this year but my boss is going somewhere with his family over Christmas.

It seems like many are recommending 5-6 days in Bangkok and 3-4 days in Siem Reap, thereby negating Ko. I'd be fine with that buy not sure my friend will be happy, haha.

Anyone use hotel rewards card much? How far in advance do I usually have to reserve? I just started my first mini app-o-rama over the last month and am building up a lot of points to use for future travel and hotel. Need to learn so much more

The Bangkok Air Discovery Pass is much less than three one-ways. You pay a fixed amount for each international leg and a fixed amount for each domestic leg. If you opt not to go to Koh Samui, you'll just buy a a RT on Bangkok Air from Bangkok to Siem Reap. Look at the Bangkok Air Website for complete info and pricing.

Airline miles and hotel points can buy you a lot. As you've just started traveling now is the time to choose one major airline alliance you can use to accumulate miles (we always use our miles to upgrade to business class on our Asia and Europe trips). Likewise, try to concentrate your hotel stays at one our two companies. If you are using points for hotels or flights it pays to reserve as early as possible.

Kathie,

I'll look into the Discovery Pass more. I will probably use United alot as it travels everywhere and the gas surcharge is lower than many others (British Airways, Korean Air, etc). I have a chase sapphire preferred which can be transferred 1:1 to many alliances. I also got the hilton honors. I haven't gotten the starwood (sp?) because I already have an annual fee for the sapphire starting next year.

How do you upgrade to business? Do you buy Economy first then use points to upgrade? I was looking at the amount of points needed for business class to various destinations I want to visit in the next few years (around 120,000 for United). It's been like a new world with all these frequent flier miles and hotel points.

Welcome to fodors, BQatWSU. You'll get a lot of very useful information here (as you are already discovering).

I also travel to Thailand during the Christmas and New Year holidays. The weather at that time of year is the best! Very low humidity (few showers) and cooler temps.

I fly United all the time. Upgrading is not done easily! Trust me... I'm what they call a 1K (100,000 miles flown per year) and I do not always get my upgrades cleared! So I wish you good luck in that regard. Mid-week to mid-week travel is usually a little easier..... but you are travelling during peak season for Thailand.

I know that staying on the river is very often suggested for first-timers. The river is an amazing feature of Bangkok. I stayed on the river a number of times, but now much prefer to stay in the city center, as the river is too far away from the places I want to frequent.

I assume you will be seeing the top tourists sites, and many of those are along the river; but some are in the central city as well.

My own 'home away from home' for many of my 27 trips to Bangkok is now the Adelphi Suites on Sukhumvit soi 8. Great location as far as getting to the skytrain and the main shopping areas.

Have fun planning your trip! You will probably want to go back to Thailand, if you are like a lot of us here on fodors.

Carol

get a chase hyatt card that gives you 2 free nights immediately..

the sheraton amex card is a very good one too...

united has a 50,000 pts promo right now after your 1st purchase

you can redeem rewards as soon as you have enough pts...

there is no right or wrong place to stay in bkk, every places requires some transport and most tourist sites are not on the skytrain currently..

taxis are very cheap

Thanks simpsonc510 for the welcome! This is a very active and informative forum, wow! I'm looking into the different hotels recommended here. Trying to figuring out which nice hotels are in the city center is a little confusing. I think I figured it out, but I'll check here before I purchase. Staying on the river sounds fun too, and I'll probably do that my first time if my friends ok with it. He also has a coworker who's family has offered him a place to stay if he visits, so maybe free lodging is in store?

I visited Phuket last december which was great, especially the all day tour to the various islands. Our guide Tuk-Tuk was amazing and even had a great sense of humor with the english language. Everyone in our group seemed to love her and had a great time. I actually snorkled for the first time as well as swam in open waters. Most memorable part of my trip even though I don't take part in the "night-life". I wanted to go back but my friend recommended seeing Ko Samui this time which sounded fine.

rhkkmk,

I'm trying to avoid any more annual fees (have $95 with sapphire preferred). The united one is 25K after 1st purchase and an additional 25K with certain spending (way more than other cards) and having another authorized user. I've thought about getting this card later this year to use for a business class ticket to Brazil or Australia (prob Austr) next year. Thinking of purchasing in Jan FAR in advance and with the bonus and points transferred from Sapphire should have enough.

The Starwood seems to be everyones favorite, but I don't know if I should get another card with annual fee ($65 I believe). If I have Sapphire already, should I also get starwood if traveling 1-2 times a year?

Thanks for the info on hotels and taxis. Can't wait to visit SE asia again.

I LOVE Ko Samui, BUT the weather at that time of year can still be unsettled. You would get more reliable weather on the Andaman Sea side.

Maybe consider a few nights on Phi-Phi Island to renew you love for snorkelling. Kho Lak may be another option.