Bangkok & Krabi Adventure, 5 Nights

Into the city from Suvarnabhumi with the afternoon to settle. In the evening a walk through Yaowarat, Bangkok's Chinatown, where the food is cooked on the pavement and eaten at folding tables under the neon — a bowl of noodles here, grilled seafood there, mango and sticky rice from a cart to finish. It is the best introduction to the city and it costs almost nothing. Back to the hotel by the river.

A private longtail from the river pier into the canals on the Thonburi side, where the old city still lives on the water: stilt houses with their spirit shrines, temples at the water's edge, a floating vendor or two, the fish that boil the surface at Wat Kalayanamit when fed. Out again past Wat Arun and a climb of its central prang. Lunch by the river. The afternoon is free for the Grand Palace and Wat Pho — on request, with tickets — or the hotel pool before an early night.

The morning flight to Krabi and a drive not to the beach but to Wat Tham Suea, the Tiger Cave Temple, just outside the town. The stair to the summit is 1,260 steps, steep and in the open, to a golden Buddha at 278 m and a view over the whole of Krabi's karst country to the sea; allow an hour up in the late-afternoon light, when the heat has gone off it. Down for the drive to Ao Nang and a swim before dinner on the beachfront.

A morning in a kayak at Ao Thalane, half an hour north of Ao Nang: the mangrove channels narrow to a boat's width between the roots, open into lagoons enclosed by karst walls, and the macaques and kingfishers watch from the branches. Two to three hours on the water with a guide. Lunch on the way south to Khlong Thom for the Emerald Pool, a spring-fed pool of green water in the Khao Phra Bang Khram forest, and the hot-spring waterfall nearby where warm water runs over rock into the stream. Back for the evening.

A longtail round the headland to Railay, the peninsula the climbers made famous, for a half-day beginners' session with a qualified guide: the harness and shoes are provided, the routes on the crag behind East Railay and at Phra Nang are bolted and top-roped, and most people are ten metres up the limestone with the sea behind them within the hour. The afternoon is Phra Nang beach and its cave shrine, and the walk through to West Railay for the last of the light. Back to Ao Nang by longtail.

A free morning — a last swim at Ao Nang, or the four-island boat day for travellers with an evening flight and the energy — and the transfer to Krabi airport, about 40 minutes, for the flight home or to Bangkok. Travellers connecting through Bangkok can add a final city night on request.