Bangkok

Bangkok hits every sense at once, and that is exactly the point — the world’s most-visited city wears its chaos with a smile. Golden temples rise beside glass towers; tuk-tuks weave past noodle carts; river ferries and new monorail lines glide over gridlocked streets. Start at the water: the Grand Palace and the emerald-tiled Wat Arun over the Chao Phraya, the longtail boats threading the old canals. Then eat — Bangkok may be the best street-food city on earth, where a plastic stool at a Michelin-listed stall like Jay Fai serves the meal of the trip for a handful of baht. Wander the fifteen thousand stalls of Chatuchak market by day; let the rooftop bars and neon lanes take over by night. Vast new districts like One Bangkok now share the skyline with century-old shophouses. Chaotic, warm, devout and deliciously alive, Bangkok can overwhelm in the first hour and enchant by the end of the first day. Few cities give back so much, so fast.

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