This morning I was woken up relatively early, for a Sunday, as the weekend visitor was hungry. To make-up for the errant single strand of hair that she found in the condo yesterday, I thought it would be a good idea to go out and source a breakfast peace offering.  @Behan had mentioned this place when we had an earlier discussion about buying nice bread in BKK so I thought I would give it a try and combine it with a trip to Tops, which is very close by. We walked in around 10.00 and I was expecting it to be quiet, with all the tourists nursing hangovers from the night before. It would appear that this was not the case for the predominantly millennial  crowd that frequents Bartels. The place was crowded and whilst I was looking for menus, the 'affronted one' finally managed to get a table. The menu is almost exclusively sandwiches, either cold open ones, or hot grilled pastrami, beef, pork etc. All are made with Bartels signature sourdough bread. You can order at the counter or online and my spider sense told me that the former option was the best. This was proven to be correct as we both received our food before the tables to the left and right of us who had been seated before us and I could see had ordered on the app. The food is good quality and everyone seemed to enjoy their meals.  We ordered Tzatziki Salmon and plain Salmon sandwiches, along with an Americano and a chocolate smoothie. You couldn't fault the food, but my irritations were: 1. The kitchen had a lot of loud noises coming from it, with all kinds of whirring machines going off, which made conversation difficult. 2. One sandwich arrived after 10 minutes, which was fast considering how busy the place was, but the second didn't arrive until 20 minutes later. So overall a 30 minutes wait for 2 sandwiches which essentially had the same base ingredients. 3. I didn't think it was great value - the cost was THB 960 for 2 open sandwiches, a coffee and a smoothie. The majority of the customers were farangs and daft Asian influencer types, so this was probably not a big deal for them, as they are more appearances than value-driven. Let's just say I cannot see Bartels opening up a branch in Pattaya anytime soon. For these reasons I give Bartels a 7/10 and my breakfast companion gave it a more generous 7.5/10. Would I visit again? Yes, the food was good. But it will not become a go-to spot, such as the Swan on soi 4, or I'm Arroi on soi 11. In terms of farang food, No idea on soi 18 is better value. The website is www.bartelsinternational.com and the hours of opening are 0700-1800, seven days a week. There are multiple branches in BKK and Phuket, so it must be doing something right with its target demographic. Cheers SAG

Travel experience is the best indicator. People that are organized are faster. Give me a Chinese salesman over a French grandmother any day.

You get a 60 day visa online in about 5 days, extendable to 90 days for 1900 baht. Super easy.

Just be glad the Chinese and Indians are not on the list………….the worst offenders for holding up immigration lines. 

Im happy to see the Scandinavian countries included (most likely)....