I'm considering to have a 3-hour river cruise in Bangkok in late morning on the day before returning to home country in the evening. We don't really like organised tours, and think we can just pop in a pier, say the one next to the Oriental Hotel and have a DIY trip with the locals. Any advice and recommendation on restaurants for lunch?

so many people recommend to stay in a hotel by the river, but nobody could give a little more information on cruise?!

I try to do a 1-2 hour canal longtail boat ride when in BKK. I book it either at Saphan Taksin bridge area, or else at the Saphan Taksin skytrain station, at the stand just before you go down the stairs to the river. It is a "private" tour in that we are the only ones in the longtail with the driver and guide speaking English.

I've also been on river dinner cruises and have enjoyed all three of them. One from Oriental (no longer using this old rice boat... I think it SANK) and one from the Shangri-La, very nice; and one booked at River City shopping mall, also very nice. The food was fine, not great, but enjoyable on all three. Favorite would probably be Shangri-La boat. But River City boat had nice Thai dance entertainment.

As far as lunch, some of my favorites are the Food Loft at Central Chitlom department store (Chitlom skytrain stop) or Greyhound Cafe, also located at Central Chitlom dept store. I also like eating outside on the terrace at the Oriental Hotel, riverside, when you can get a table.

Carol

Thanks, Carol, for your sharing.

there are two options from chao payra express....one is the tourist boat at about 300B per person for the whole day but i think it stops by 5pm OR SO...the other is the reg. chao payra express which stops some time after 6PM...so you could as carol suggests hire a long tail boat at about 400 B per hour....best place is any riverside hotel or from taskim pier...

not sure you would enjoy 4 hours however unless it included a couple of hours in the klongs as well..

just saw you wrote morning...sorry....chao payra express is ok, but not comfortable...long tail boat would be the nicest...but by yourselves

Just hire a long tail boat from Saphin Taskin pier. You should include a Khlong tour as part of the river trip. Forget the Chao Phraya Tour Boat. The regular ferry, however, is well worth the 10 Baht. If you're going to Chinatown or the Flower Market, just hop on the ferry and ride up to the correct peir (Tha).

Thank you all for the information. I will see if my travelling companion is interested. Actually both of us have been to Bangkok separately for a couple of times and visited some temples and other sight-seeing points in town. Will re-consider if this boat cruise route will give us something in additional.

A couple of thoughts...

I always stay by the river and take the Chao Praya Express boat (not the tourist boat) to visit a number of the wats. It doesn't take nearly 3 hours, but I always enjoy my time on the river.

You can always hire your own longtail as others have said.

I enjoyed the boat trip to Aythuttya. Bascially, that ends up being a whole day with the bus one way and the boat the other way.