The worst thing I feared last night was a continuation of disruptive sleep after discharge from the hospital. The fact that I had a good night's sleep against expectation is a major boost for my recovery, so much so that it feels like the last 6 days never happened. Still though, I must be careful not to overdo things. The first thing we need to arrange is breakfast, the short-notice release from the hospital leaving us unprepared. The options are either I take a short walk to 7-Eleven or take breakfast at the hotel, paying the extra. With a bit more foresight, I could have added breakfast to the hotel booking yesterday and saved money. Eventually we pay the extra as the difference in price between the options is not significant. Leaving it as late as we dare, we head for the dining area, but where is it? We're directed to the rear of the building along a passageway, and lo and behold, it's like stepping into another world. In contrast to the main street access to the busy road through Pak Chong, the rear overlooks the attractive Lam Takong River. Here is a delightful terraced dining area right on the tree-lined riverbank. I'm thinking whatever the breakfast looks like, it's just lovely to be here. We are offered the choice of half a dozen dishes, from American-style to traditional Thai. That's fine, and you can help yourself to unlimited toast and jam, coffee, tea, juice, and some fruit. That in itself is excellent. Such a delightful location it is that I really don't want to leave, but leave we must.
We are soon packed and ready for our return to Bangkok, but we have all day to make the two-and-a-half-hour journey. As we depart the city, there is a clear blue sky, but the temperature is still in the low 20s Celsius. I'm overcome with relief and delight as I'm now back in control of my life and quickly put together a plan for the day.
My instinctive reaction is to check out progress on major construction work on the state railway's northeastern line that runs through Pak Chong. From here the railway runs down from the plateau to Thailand's central lowlands. It's a difficult route for trains, and the construction effort to extend the railway in this area to dual-track and development of the High Speed Rail project is enormous.
We first start with a visit to Bandai Ma station, but there is little to see. We then use minor roads, even some dirt roads, to follow the railway. It's simply incredible the amount of work going on here: I even see that they've cleared a whole hilltop to support construction work that skirted the old section of line. This is where a memorial was placed in memory of King Rama V's visit during the railway's opening in the early 20th century.
I now find my way to the familiar stations of Pang Asok and Klang Dong, accepting there is little rail traffic during the day. We now head further along the Mittraphap road to almost the base of the mountains. I turn off the highway heading to a station I've never been to before. Map Krabao is the next station east of the important junction at Kaeng Khoi, which has its own maintenance yard. Here I'm rewarded with the view of a train waiting for clearance to head up to Pak Chong and beyond. This area has important cement and aggregate works. Soon the cement train departs, heading up to Pak Chong. This excursion to view the railway has managed to use up the rest of the morning, but the rest of the day is reserved too.
It's an awkward detour, but we have news of recent work on the land plot in Nakhon Nayok, where final preps are underway, allowing construction to start soon. We need to travel from the north to the south of the national park, which takes over an hour, and after stopping for lunch in Ban Na, we reach the land plot in mid-afternoon. Here, we confirm a substantial amount of rock and soil has been added to raise the ground level. It's great to see some progress after the work was halted during the rainy season. We note that we now have a water supply, and some progress has been made for an electricity supply too. This all allows us to plan ahead with much more clarity.
Satisfied with the result, we head back to Bangkok knowing we will get snarled up in evening traffic. After grabbing some provisions, we arrive back at base at around 7:00 PM. The last couple of weeks have been bonkers. It's time to take a deep breath, step back, and reset.

Source: Visit