We're going to be renting a car for a couple of days!

It was 8:30am before we finally made our way out of the room for breakfast. We've got a kettle and tea and coffee in the room so we were just relaxing. Anyhow, the little restaurant area is right outside our room, so we figured we'd go for breakfast because we'd seen breakfast items on the menu. We went out there, and there was nobody around, with a "closed" sign on the door. (Turns out they stopped serving breakfast during Covid, and never got it started again).

So, I found another place about 15 or 20 minutes walk away.

Big Ubon Breakfasts is owned my an expat from Wales, Andy, and his Thai wife Nok. Really nice people, and Andy is very well traveled, so we sat and shared a lot of travel stories. We were the only customers at the time, so invited him to come sit with us.

I didn't get a photo of breakfast, but we'll be going back there again before we leave. We each had the "Half British Breakfast", and it was fantastic. Eggs, and sausage and toast and bacon and beans and fruit and yogurt. Really good! And at 150 baht ($4.30 USD, $5.75 CAD), each, very good value!

And then, they gave us each a Big Ubon Breakfasts t-shirt and a piece of Christmas fruitcake as well!

With full stomachs, we walked down to a car rental place we'd seen. There are a few places we want to see from here, but they are close to the Laos border. We could hire a car with driver, rent a car, or rent a scooter. The scooter would be cheapest, but it's actually quite a drive and in the heat of the day it would be a long time on a scooter. Also, I've never been a motorcycle enthusiast. I'd much rather be driving a car.

This place wanted 1,000 baht ($28.60 USD, $38.20 CAD) for one day. Not bad, but we wanted to check out another place first. 

Back at the guest house, we met our neighbors, a couple from around Oxford, UK. They just arrived yesterday with a tandem bicycle and are going to do some cycling from here and into Laos for a couple of weeks. We sat and talked to her for an hour while he was putting the bike together.

Then we walked over to a different rental place. There, we agreed on a two day rental at 800 baht ($22.85 USD, $30.55 CAD) per day. Includes insurance, but we have to give them a 5,000 baht refundable deposit as well. So, we're going out to do some exploring over the next couple of days, while returning here to the guest house at night.

Then later in the afternoon, we walked downtown. It's about 3 kms (1.8 miles) each way. Nobody walks around here! There are very few sidewalks. Everybody drives a scooter or car. Didn't see any public transportation either, but of course there are lots of taxis around. 

Typical street in Ubon, Thailand (pop 220,000).

We found a street food market and bought a couple of salads and a mango smoothie.

Some of the other street food stalls.

This is the lady who made our mango smoothie.

Ruth bought a couple of desserts. 

She's been researching Thai desserts to see which are gluten free.

It was different. Kind of a gelatin with corn in mine, and Ruth wasn't sure what was in hers!

We went for a walk in the big park downtown.

The temples are always nicely lit up.

The Candle Sculpture was built in the year 2000 to honor the King's 72nd birthday at the time.

It's so detailed!

Another temple monument.

Walking back, we came across the Wat Maha Wanaram Temple...

There was some kind of chanting going on inside.

Fancy architecture!

Detailed carvings.

So, a good day in the very non touristy city of Ubon. Looking forward to getting out of town on our own tomorrow and doing some exploring!

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Record low deal on this 4 Quart Ninja Air Fryer.

And in Canada...

Nice price drop on the Ring Video Doorbell.