Ayutthaya & Sukhothai - Ancient Ruins in Thailand

When we got back from Myanmar, we spent 2 nights in Bangkok, washing clothes, updating our blog, and we even went to the movies. We had about ten days free before starting our week of volunteering in Chiang Mai, so we decided to visit two old capitals of the Siam Kingdom. A two hours train ride took us to Ayutthaya, where we found a nice and cozy guesthouse to spend one night. Because of the extreme heat, we decided to rent a scooter to visit some of the ruins of the old city.

Ayutthaya was the second capital of the Siam Kingdom, after Sukkhotai. In 1767 it was destroyed by the Burmese army, and the ruins are now preserved in the Ayutthaya Historical Park, an UNESCO World Heritage Site.

One of the maintained Buddhas in Ayutthaya

The reclining Buddha used in a scene of the old game Street Fighters

The famous head of Buddha in a tree

When the sun set we didn't feel to comfortable about riding around in the dark, so we made our last stop to the local street market where we had some yummy chicken wings and refreshing fruit shakes. 

The next day we took a bus to Sukhothai, the capital of the first Kingdom of Siam about 800 years ago. One of its rulers, King Ramkhamhaeng the Great, created the Thai alphabet. The city is divided into Old Sukhothai and New Sukhothai. We stayed in New Sukhothai because there was supposed to be a street market there, but comparing to others cities the market didn't have so many culinary options. We had dinner there the first night and for the next 3 days Tachi didn't feel well, so we didn't do much those days. When she felt better, we took a local bus to visit the Sukhothai Historical Park, also an UNESCO World Heritage Site, in Old Sukhothai. We biked around the park, which was really beautiful and well mantained, surrounded by lotus flowers ponds. It was a cloudy day, and perfect to bike around. 

Lotus flowers in Sukhothai Historical Park

A great day for biking around, visiting the ruins

Buddhas placed at the roots of a tree

 The next day we took a bus to Chiang Mai, it was a 6 hours drive. We decided to stay at the same place we stayed the last time where we had good internet :) We also spent the weekend there so we could visit the regular night market and the Sunday night market, where we always had good food, including Tachi's so wanted fresh popcorn. 

Tachi enjoying her fresh popcorn

Chiang Mai

The day after the BSB concert we took a night bus from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, the second largest city in Thailand. It was about 10 hours ride and when we arrived in the city we had to look for a place to stay. We found a very nice room just outside the old city. After some rest we went out to explore the numerous temples inside the old city, which is surrounded by ruins and a moat. When we stopped to eat, we met a very kind woman who invited us to follow her to her home. She took us on the back of her scooter, and showed us her pets and gave us some tips about the city before we continued our walk.

Ruins of the wall around the Old City

The next day we had our first cooking class. We got picked up at our hotel and went to a local market to learn about some of the typical ingredients in Thai food. Also we got to try bamboo worms, crunchy and salty, yummy! After that we went to the home where we would have our class. There we had to choose 7 different dishes we would learn to cook. We chose different from each other, of course, so that we got to taste more different foods. It was a very fun experience and it was amazing when we tried the food we made. We actually couldn't believe that we were able to cook such good food! And it was a looooot of food. At some point we were so full that we had to ask to take the food back home. Our dinner and dessert that night would be our own take away! 

Masterchefs

The next day we went to the Elephant Nature Park office to book our visit, and in the afternoon we took a songthaew to the Wat Doi Suthep. Doi means mountain, so this was a temple up in the mountain from where we could have a great view of Chiang Mai. Unfortunately it was a bit cloudy :( Coming back from the mountain we wanted to make a short visit to the night market in the old city. We arrived just when it was about to start, and everybody froze on the street while the national anthem was played over the loudspeakers. The market was huuuuge, and we ended up spending more than 3 hours there, including an amazing massage!

The whole city froze for the national anthem

On Monday morning we got picked up at our hotel for a day trip to some places outside of Chiang Mai. The first stop was at a hot spring, where Tachi boiled quail eggs in the hot spring for our breakfast. We also had a stop at Wat Rong Khun, also known as The White Temple, in Chiang Rai. This was a weird, but beautiful temple. We couldn't go inside because there were people working on it due to a earthquake last year, but it was interesting seeing it from outside. It had so many white and mirrored details. 

One of the weird things you can find at the White Temple

The next stop was the Golden Triangle, which is where the Ruak and Mekong River meet at the triple border between Thailand, Laos and Myanmar.
At this place we had an option to take a boat across the river over to Laos, but we preferred to go to the Opium Museum. We learned a lot about the area which is one of Asia's main opium producer, second largest after Afghanistan.
After lunch we headed to Mae Sai, the northernmost point in Thailand, at the border to Myanmar.

Handstand at the northernmost point of Thailand

Our last day in Chiang Mai was spent at the Elephant Nature Park, the main reason we planned visiting the city. This was a suggestion from Caroline, a very close friend of David's family. The Elephant Nature Park is a rescue and rehabilitation center, very different from the other places nearby where they offer riding the elephants that are actually forced and hurt to do that. We got to see how they took care of injured and handicapped elephants who had been taken out of their captivity. After visiting this place we decided to sign up for one week volunteering here :) 

Feeding the elephants

Since David was running out of time on his visa exempt, we had made our plans to visit Myanmar for a couple of weeks and then return to do our volunteering. So early the next morning we jumped on the bus heading for Mae Sot, where we would cross the border to Myanmar by foot.

Sa wat dee, Thailand!

Wow! What a difference! First of all the communication is much more of a challenge here, hardly anyone speaks English. To find our way from the airport to our hostel we used simple words and pointing on maps. We caught a train from the airport to downtown Bangkok, about 1 hour, for only 5 Thai Baht, which equals about 15 cents (USD). Several times during the train ride people tried to throw water in the windows. From April 13th - 15th is a big celebration of Songkran in Thailand, also known as the water festival. This is why we left India before our visa ran out, so we could join the Thais in celebrating their New Year. From the train station we could just jump on the metro taking us nearby our hostel. In the street where our hostel was everyone was playing around, soaking each other with their water guns and buckets. Of course as we were arriving they wanted us to be washed as well. Luckily we managed to keep our backpacks dry, but not clean, and we arrived happy to the hostel.

Songkran welcoming in Bangkok

We were planning to go right back out to participate in the Songkran celebration, but Tachi was having more problems with her sore throat so we decided to take it easy and regain energy for a big Songkran celebration the next day. Unfortunately Tachi didn't get much better, and it wouldn't be good for her throat to get soaked by cold and warm water and enter or exit air-conditioned buildings all the time. Tachi decided to stay in and insisted that David went to celebrate and enjoy the last day of Songkran, and bring back some of the experience to share. David walked down Silom Road among thousands of Thais and other tourists!

Silom Road during Songkran

The next day when Tachi was feeling better we started our sightseeing in Bangkok. There are so many temples and other things to see and do. We started the morning with a soup in the streets for breakfast and headed for the Grand Palace. From the end of the MRT we walked through parts of Chinatown to get to the taxi boat which would take us all the way to the palace. To enter the Grand Palace you must cover your legs and shoulders. We were prepared for this, but it was an extremely hot experience. The details and colors of the Thai temples are amazing! We must have used about 3 hours sweating and looking around the huge area.

Grand Palace

After cooling off in the shade with some nice Pad Thai and fried rice we got back on the taxi boat, back to see Wat Pho, the reclining Buddha. The reclining Buddha is 15m tall and 43m long, an impressive view! Wat Pho is one of the biggest Wats (Temples) in Bangkok and they say that we could see 400 images of Buddha in different postures there. We did not count them all because we also wanted to try out the famous Thai massage they offer before closing time. The temple is considered the birthplace of traditional Thai massage. First we tried half an hour of body massage, but when we finished this we decided to do another half an hour of foot massage. It was so good after a long day of walking around in the heat!
On our way back we stopped for some dinner in Chinatown. It was incredible watching them make our food with high flames in the middle of the street, and it tasted so good!

The huge reclining Buddha in Wat Pho

Included in the ticket to the Grand Palace was another museum, a bit further north. We decided to stop by here on our way to the famous street market in Chatuchak. The museum seemed to be an old mansion where the royal family spent vacations. It was a quick walk-through, especially trying to avoid loud Chinese tours! We got onto the skytrain heading for the largest market in Thailand. At the tourist police office we got a map and description of the different areas of the market. It was pretty big! We felt like we walked through most of the market seeing everything from clothing, antiques, foods to pets. It was a lot of walking in the heat again, so for David's Birthday the next day we woke up late :) We took a nice and relaxed walk in Lumphini Park, enjoying some green parts of the capitol with the lowest amount of vegetation in the world.

Loving the green part of Bangkok, Lumphini Park

Tachi had made a reservation for a fancy dinner at the rooftop restaurant at Sofitel Park Society, and we went over there to confirm the reservation and question about the dress code. Obviously David had to wear pants, which he does not have, so we ended up going shopping.
We had a delicious dinner with a great view over Bangkok!

Bangkok by night from the rooftop of Sofitel Park Society

The next couple of days were also spent in Bangkok, getting our visas for Myanmar and having the camera for service. Early morning the 22nd we had our train for Kanchanaburi. We had two main goals for Kanchanaburi, learn about the construction of the Burma Railway, also known as Death Railway, during the second world war, and refresh ourselves in the waterfalls of Erawan National Park. The day we arrived was just for exploring the nearby surroundings. We got a view of the Bridge over River Kwai from distance, checked out prices to rent a scooter, but the best part of that day was visiting the night market. Every night, near the train station there is a market with second hand clothes, gadgets of every kind and lots of food :) We walked around trying a lot of new and different foods! One of Tachi's new favorite desserts after that night is the ice-cream balls covered with some kind of marshmallow thing, called Mochi Ice-cream.

Our plan for the next day was to wake up early to catch the train to the Hellfire Pass Memorial Museum, but when we woke up it was pouring from the sky. We decided it would be a bad idea going to the Hellfire Pass if it was going to rain like this, and went back to sleep. Luckily David woke up again not long after, and the weather had cleared up. Quickly we got our stuff together and went for the bus. We got some good help from Joy, who worked at the museum. She told us to get off the bus with her, showed us where to catch the bus back, and helped us prepare our walk on the Death Railway before the museum even opened. Thank you Joy!
We chose to do the whole trail which took us about 4 hours with some stops to listen to our audio guide and also admire the scenery and reflecting along the way.  This railway was built by the Prisoners of War and Southeast Asian labor workers, known as romusha, as Japan was in need of a more secure supply route between Thailand and Burma. They constructed 415 km of railway in 14 months under severe conditions. More than 12 000 POW's died during the construction, and the number of romusha who died is assumed to be as much as 90 000. It was a very emotional and educational walk along the railway where all of the cuttings and embankments were done by man power!

Hellfire Pass

Today a part of the Death Railway is still operational from Nam Tok. We got on the train to experience the ride on the historical tracks back to Kanchanaburi. The ride was quite long but we passed by very nice landscapes and we could see how impressive it was to have built this railway in the way it was. After passing the famous Bridge over the River Kwai, we got off of the train and took a short walk on the bridge before returning to our guesthouse.

Riding the train on the Death Railway

The next day David woke up earlier to rent a motorbike before we had breakfast and took the road to Erawan National Park. Tachi was a bit afraid that we would face crazy traffic but it was actually an easy ride and we could enjoy the green around us.
The Erawan Waterfalls consist of 7 different waterfalls, with green emerald or light blue refreshing ponds full of hungry fishes eating the dead skin off the visitor's feet. When the small fishes nibbled on our feet it was just tickling, but when the big ones did it, it wasn't that comfortable! At one point Tachi decided to enter the pond with her shoes.

Refreshing in the Erawan waterfalls

The next morning we visited the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery to try to watch the ANZAC day ceremony, but it had not started by the time we had to return to do our check-out. We took the bus to Ratchaburi where we were going to catch the bus to Phetchaburi, but with a lot of misunderstanding and a lot of Thais saying that bus stopped going years ago we just barely got on the train heading south. We had to stand during the 1 hour ride, and as the only tourists we got a lot of staring at us.
At the train station in Phetchaburi we got on a pick-up taxi, called songthaew, and hoped to get a room at one of the few guest houses in the area. We got a room, had dinner at the night market and relaxed for the rest of the evening.
The next morning we had a soup from the neighbor for breakfast, and started walking towards the Khao Luang Cave. We didn't get far before we realized that it would be too exhausting walking all the way in the burning heat, so we caught a songthaew. There is a temple inside the cave with many images of Buddha. Outside the cave are many hungry monkeys waiting for the tourists to give them food, and they can become quite aggressive. Just in front of us a tiny monkey jumped onto a lady, giving her a shock. Luckily we passed without any monkey attacks ;)

Khao Luang, temple inside a cave

We were hoping for a songthaew for the trip back, as our driver didn't want to wait and said there would be others to catch, but there were none, giving us no other option than walking back in the burning sun!
For our last day in Phetchaburi we were planning to walk up to the temple on the mountain, but it was under maintenance, and we were also met by a lot of angry monkeys, so we decided to just walk around the town. We had our dinner at the night market again, before heading to the train station. Our train was supposed to leave some time around 10 pm, but didn't arrive until past midnight.
Time to hit the beach!!!