Bangkok Blogger's Blooming Adventures

Hello everyone and how are you? Thank you so much for the lovely comments on my last post. I'm pleased I managed to give you a giggle!

So I did chuckle to find this bed in our next hotel. Wot no towel art insight? Where are the love swans? Loved the funky backdrop though. Can you work out where we are?

Yes, I have just done a quick dash to Singapore. Mr Wren was there for work and boy could I do with some help with the friendly staff at Apple, Orchard Road. All these blogging adventures and I have a massive I need Help list. 

I signed myself up for 10 classes in three days, luckily we stay really close to the Apple store. 

Hope you like the smudgy writing on the Today at Apple!

My camera is my iPhone and I always feel it is important to keep up my learning to produce the best photos I can. The 'Today at Apple' lessons enable me to keep going when all around me have many cameras. On one trip recently, one blogger even used a drone. I'm still proudly a click and go, girl! 

I also enjoy Apple's Studio Hour where I can take my current projects and yell out when I get stuck. This week I was working on a photo presentation on my recent Bloggers winners trip to two Women's groups here in Bangkok.

This photo below came from my Apple Studio lesson, although I was told to move on when presenting it,  as it made someone feel sick! Haha. Some you win, some you lose!

Would you like to see some of the photos from my classes?

This is a fisheye lens as used in my Photo Skills class: Lenses, Tripods and more for iPhone.  Have you used one of these before? It just clips on the back of your phone. Do you like the circular look, or does it make you go cross-eyed?

Using a fish-eye lens 

This was fun a Photo Lab on 'disrupting the portrait' and are mostly of the Apple Instructor. I was quite pleased with some of the portraits I took but I won't publish them here without permission. At the end of the workshop, all the best photos are put on the massive screen in the store. Which is a bit of an eek moment, when you see a more than a life-size picture of yourself!

For most of these, we are using the technique of full-length photography from below or shooting upwards. What it does is elongate the portrait.

I know it obviously works really well, as I had a friend contact me after my photo (bottom right) was on my Instagram, asking after my health as I appeared to have lost weight. So I am happy to share this technique and now am in the process of ensuring that Mr Wren and friends only takes photos of me using this technique!

Try it and let me know if you like the results!

Photos from my #TodayatApple Photo Lab class

I also did a class on Video Skills: Recording Techniques with iPhone:

Whilst we were in Singapore we took of an opportunity of visiting the newly reopened Raffles Hotel. I mean this Little Wandering Wren can hardly go to Singapore and just sit in the Apple Store, can she?!

Well, it appears we are not alone as we had to queue to get in! I can tell you 15 minutes in a hot and humid queue for the Long Bar and I was gasping for a Singapore Sling. I can't wait to write this visit over on my travel blog (www.littlewanderingwren.com) as it was a lot of fun. They have kept a lot of the original features, such as on every table is a huge bag of peanuts, and you're expected to throw the husks on the floor.

The Singapore Sling has been enjoyed since 1915!

They tell us in keeping with the relaxed plantation atmosphere, guests are invited to brush peanut shells off the tables and bar-top onto the floor; quite  possibly the only place in Singapore where "littering is encouraged"

It is still very atmospheric with all the punkah wallah fans gently wafting the breeze overhead and the noise of the cocktail machine. Yes, they can hardly keep up with all the cocktails on order and so have a special machine which can make 18 cocktails at one go. I only ordered one I promise.

The hand-cranked green cocktail shaker has been made especially for Singapore Slings.

But I did eat several hundred peanuts. All that throwing the shells onto the floor it encourages you to run amuck eating peanuts with gay abandon.  Hmm, I definitely need to use that slimming photography trick this week!

What was nice about posting our Raffles visit onto my Instagram & Facebook pages, was how the mention of a Singapore Sling brought back happy memories for some of you. Anyone else got any Singapore Sling memories? Do share them here.

For those of you wondering about the stylish tote bags in the photos, they are a gift from my Bangkok friend, Maxine. Max is an architect by trade who has recently taken her pen and ink creations onto a fashion accessories.  

You can see more at Blackwhiteandmax. Each design has a unique story to tell and a travel twist.  My black bag is called Just another Saturday night, perfect for a Raffles adventure and my white bag is called Under the Banyan tree. 

I have literally always have one or other of these gorgeous bags with me these days. You can find more designs and pictures people have sent in, here at BlackwhiteandMax Instagram.

Nan Province wanderings

I hardly had time to blink before I was back home and off on my next adventure. Since my winning bloggers trip, I've been invited on other opportunities to get out and about seeing Thailand. Last weekend I joined a trip to Nan Province in Thailand's North.

The weekend was a product test for a new booklet which is about to be launched called 'Me, Myself and Thailand'. It's been written for solo women travellers in Thailand, and this final product test included with a group of Bloggers and Travel Agents.

Solo female travel group - Nan Province, Thailand

I will write more on this in future weeks, but it was the most beautiful lush green and stunning part of the world. You can tell how much I like to escape to the countryside.

This weekend I decided needed to get away for an authentic solo experience and have just returned from an incredible weekend just getting to know the Ban Laem Community, in Suphanburi. I had the honor of being declared the first foreign visitor.

More blooming adventures - Ban Laem Community, Suphanburi, Thailand

Ban Laem is an old riverside community with a simple way of life alongside the Chin River, 100 km north of Bangkok. I stayed in a homestay with an amazing family. 20 years ago the Mother had been on exchange to Australia. She is hopeful that her 14-year daughter will get a US visa this week to go on exchange to America. Oh, the fun we both had reminiscing about Melbourne! 

So that's my happy week in Thailand. I wish you a great week, whether you are enjoying the final throws of summer, looking forward to Spring Down Under, or wondering when our rainy season will end here in Asia.

Happy Wanderings!

Linking with thanks to Fiona and all the hosts at Our World Tuesday