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So easy to get to the pier from our Four Seasons on the Skytrain, and like falling off a log to step aboard the hotel’s longboat to ride for thirty minutes to reach the new Siam Hotel. Frank and I have the boat to ourselves as we take in all the recent development and activity along both sides of the river. We pass The Temple and Dawn and the sprawling Grand Palace complex, occasionally having to brush the river water from our lips when we splash through the wake of another speeding, noisy longboat.
Right from arrival at the ‘black’ pier, we know this is a special place. The hotel of only eight months is a study in ‘black and white’ by famous designer Bill Bensley, whose exotic luxury hotels have been acknowledged with so many accolades and awards. We are welcomed at the dockside while taking-in a dazzling white building on one side and two Thai-style houses on stilts on the other.
We walk towards a distant sunny lighted area at the end of a long green ‘tunnel of over-arching perfumed white frangipani’. Entering another building in black and white and art deco touches, we pass an infinity-edge black reflection pool with palms sprouting from the water towards a roof three-stories high. The suites are sumptuous with over-sized king beds, large walk in showers and designer bathtubs, and comfortable sitting areas.
Lunch in the authentic, quaint Thai house on stilts soon changed to another very art deco room because Frank had a hankering for a club sandwich instead of more fine Thai cuisine. It’s all his fault that I sat there shamelessly devouring the best club sandwich in the world – fresh fillings in home-made bread buttered and fried I’d say like a croque-monsieur. But I ate only three (or so) of the delicious French fries.