For years, the Flower Market at Pak Khlong Talad (literally 'the market at the mouth of the canal') was my secret Bangkok surprise. To friends and visitors I took there, I would introduce it as the Midnight Flower Market — and indeed between midnight and 4 am is its busiest time, when fresh blooms arrive by river from distant provinces. The truth is, there's nothing secret about Bangkok's famous flower market. These days, busloads of Japanese and Chinese tourist are downloaded on Pak Chet Road and throng around the place, cameras everywhere.

Till not so long ago, the flower market existed along the pavements of Pak Chet Road, clogging up pedestrian traffic and slowing down everything else. In 2016, the government, in its campaign to liberate Bangkok's sidewalks, cleared the flower market, and for a while there was nothing there. But now they're all back in a giant covered market with over 3,000 stalls. You can find it by walking down Pak Chet Road and taking the first lane right.

The best hours to go are still in the evening, when it's cooler. The later you get there, the greater the chances that the busloads will have left for dinner or gone off to sleep, and you will be able to wallow in this paradise of fresh flowers — jasmines, chrysanthemum, gerbera, orchids, lilies, roses and birds of paradise from nearby provinces like Nakhon Pathom. Some evening I have even seen tulips, fresh from northern Thailand provinces like Chiang Rai and Loei.

Though the market bustles all day, the cooler hours of night are when the the flowers arrive, many of them swaddled in damp rolls of newspaper to keep them fresh. The flowers arrive between midnight and 4 am — choose these hours if you want a truly unique experience.

Expect to see fields of orchids of every color, shape and rarity — Thailand is the world's largest exporter of orchids. You can buy armloads of the cheapest sorts — the deep magenta ones — at eye-poppingly low prices, or carefully potted and wrapped rare breeds.

Let yourself be riveted by the intricate craftsmanship of vendors who thread jasmine buds together into gorgeous shapes as votive offerings, the ancient Thai art of phuang malai. Some roll up chrysanthemums and other buds within banana and pandan leaves to create flower cones called baisri, believed to represent Mt Meru, the centre of the universe in Hinduism.

Some people have called it Bangkok's Covent Garden but it would make more sense to call Covent Garden the Pak Khlong Talad of the west. Bangkok's floral paradise simply dwarfs other markets.