07.20 And We Were On Our Way,

the taxi was a few moments early, but we were ready,

our first stop was the Embassy of the Philippines,

due to the number of times she has to leave the country to keep her visa to stay in Thailand current, her passport has nearly run out of pages, we had to go in person as the new passport requires a picture to be taken at the Embassy and finger prints taken, so in we went all finished inside of 20 minutes, the other reason that we went now is that the Embassy advises it will take at least 60 days before the passport has been returned from the Philippines, also it could take as long as 90 days, so as we have no immediate travel plans this seemed like a good time to apply,

also as we had the taxi for the day it meant we could make our way here, Jatuchak Weekend Market as it is called,

but the good news is the the live stock section is open every day, having said that some traders take Monday off and do not open,

next to the market is the JJ store, it has a multi storey car park on top of a shopping mall with a food court as well, so we left the driver with the car and made our way down to street level, the first thing we saw as we left the lift was this immaculate shop, although not allowed I took a quick picture of it, one thing that seems strange is that even in the UK many shops have a 'no photograph' sign display, frightened of one of us being the competition I suppose?

as we came down the stairs this is the first shop that we saw, it specialises in African cichlids, so we will be stopping there to buy a few later,

we took a quick walk along the aisles that separate the shops,

one thing I noticed from the last time I was here, is that there are massive amounts of really nice bog wood that can be used for tank decoration,

a view along one of the aisles, this one specialising in aquarium accessories,

but first we wanted to have a look at some of the koi carp on offer, not that we wanted to buy some, but justs a look see, as we went out of one section of the market there are a few stalls selling china ware,

and on the other side of the road almost endless shops selling koi carp,

I only took a few pictures of the koi stalls as we wanted to look around the fish market then go to some bonsai shops, in case you do not know koi from Japan are always considered to have better colours than locally bred fish, but of course they are imported so command a high price,

a closer view of some Japanese koi,

and some locally bred ones, to me the main colour here, which should be red, is more of an orange colour compared to the imported stock,

the problem here is that where ever they come from you are spoilt for choice,

then through a few more aisles, the fish market is divided in to two sections, shops like this one, where you can buy 2 or 3 fish of your choice,

or you can go here to the wholesale section where retail fish shops buy their stock from,

the difference being that fish are sold here by the bag, with typically 30, 50 or 100 fish per bag, great if like us you want to stock 150+ gallon aquariums, but not to be recommended for smaller aquariums,

the other problem is normally all of the fish in the bag are the same species/colour, luckily for us the 30 in this bag of African cichlids was mixed, the advantage of buying in bulk of course is the price, in the shops there sell for 20 baht each, buying in bulk brings the price down to just 7 baht a fish,

the wholesale market is huge, many years ago this market was only open at night time, although in a different location it was 02.00 in the morning, very little electricity mostly paraffin pressure lamps, all of the buyers and sellers carrying their own personal flash light to look at the fish, times have changed,

Diana then spotted some tiger barbs, 30 for 150 baht, bargain, so they will make the other aquarium a bit more lively,

a view form the other end of the market,

we then made or way back to some of the permanent fish stalls on our way back to the car,

past some of the aquarium plant shops on the way,

fingers aching,

we made it,

Diana looking over the market, in case you did not look at the link there are 8,000 stalls here spread over a 35 acre site, the covered area you can see here is just a small part of it,

then some fresh fruit to nibble on as we continued our walk round the shops,

we stopped off at some of the planted aquarium shops,

this one having a small vivarium, complete with a bonsai in the top left hand corner,

the aquarium has a bow in the front glass, this used to be very popular many years ago,

Diana looking at another vivarium,

this one,

again with a bonsai and a couple of figures in it,

next on to a few plant shops,

they all look so nicly done,

many years ago I started a planted tank or two, but they are not the easiest to keep,

firstly the palnts grow at such a rate you are forever cutting and replanting them, not to mention the expense, plants need wter below 75F (24 C), our so to do really well, plus of course large anmounts of heat producing lights so a chiller is needed to keep the tanks cool, sounds strange I know, but energy prices are quiet high out here, the cost of running just one tank with lights and chiller was just on £100 a month, yes a month not a quarter and I had two of them! so now for us it is just fish rather than the luxurious look of the plants,

we then popped in to a shop called All Fish, we bought a few rainbow fish there,

also in All Fish a planted aquarium,

lots of fish to choses from,

a nice set of two aquariums both 24" X 8" or so wide,

hardware also for sale like this shop selling everything you need for your hobby,

then a couple more cichlids, a bite to eat and we were on our way to the plant market, we wanted to have a look at some bonsai.