THAILAND: Free Visa on Arrival till April 2020 |Visa Documentation| Tourist 4G SIM | Episode 1

Flight Ticket:

Booking flight ticket from India to Thailand price depends on when we book it. Booking in advance could be economical. We booked the ticket in Feb,19 and travelling schedule was of May,19.
Recommend, if you are not short of time, reach Kolkata and book a flight from there it will be in juts INR 7500 t0 8000 with return.
We booked from Delhi via Kolkata, it costed us 18000. I had to do it because my sister wanted to carry lots of clothes, so we wanted an option with 25 kg weight limit also, she was having a tight schedule, so we suppose to save time.

Hotel Booking:
These days I prefer to use Booking.com App. We booked a Hostel named “Rest Inn” with private room for 3 of us. 450 INR per person per night. After that, we booked a hotel in Pattaya in INR 1200 on triple sharing basis.
We also experimented with another hostel at an isolated city known as “Hua Hin” and paid only 500 Bath for each again having a private room with AC.
BTW, All the accommodation was AC.

How to get Currency converted:
1. Basis on the information shared by a youtuber, I left a request on a website and they contacted me for the currency conversion. It was the economical option, until my brother visited Paul Merchants office in the neighborhood.
2. Below is the rate difference:
a. Online they were charging 15 paise on each bath, SO total was 1 Bath = 2.18 (That day currency rate) + 15 Paisa = 2.33 INR
b. At Paul Merchant I paid for 1 bath = 2.18 + .7 paisa = 2.25 INR
Basis on this experience of mine, I suggest Paul Merchants, they are almost in all the cities and all the neighborhood.

Only thing is, online I was getting an option of home delivery and here I had to visit this place with my passport and PAN card.
VISA Process:
We carried printouts of below mentioned documents –
1. Passport
2. Print out of Flight Return Ticket
3. Print out of Hotel Booking for first destination
4. 10,000 Bath
Time Taken in VISA Process:
Because whole flight came and stood up at the Visa Counter, so it was crowded and had a long ques. It took us 2 to 3 hours to complete the process.

Mobile SIM Cards:
To access the google map, book cab and to see the metro route, we required internet access. For that only option was to buy a SIM Card.
I made up my mind to buy AIS Sim card, as I saw on a YouTube channel. When I reached there and being from the telecom sector, I realized that AIS is like BSNL in India. Customer un-friendly plans.
1. AIS - 299 bath, 50 Bhat Talk time, 1 Mbps speed on a 4G SIM with unlimited Data Access.
2. True Choice SIM – 299 bath – 100 Bath Talk time, 8 days validity 3 GB Data
3. Data Tech – 299 Bath, 35 Bath Talk time, 8 days validity with 8.5 GB Data.
I bought Data win and was happy.
It has good network and service in major cities of Thailand, not sure about interiors.

This way we became ready to stem inside the city Bangkok.