Ayutthaya/last day in Bangkok

On Sunday I took the train up to Ayuttaya, an old capital of Thailand that was sacked by the Burmese in 1787 and that is now a World Heritage Site. The train trip was about 1 1/2 hours, all of which I had to stand for, in a non-air conditioned car (although in fairness, the air conditioned cars had windows of such poor quality that you could hardly see anything out of them-this was not a problem in my car as the windows were all opened wide). Ayutthaya is about 55 miles north of Bangkok but the train ticket each way was only about 50-60 cents. The city is effectively an island (it was built at the delta between two rivers, with a canal at the northen part of the city between them).

Arriving there, I rented a bicycle and had to take a ferry to get to the main part of the city. The ferry is the boat on the right side of the following photo:

There are ruins scattered throughout the city. the first one I visited was Wat Phra Mahathat.

And then Wat Ratchaburana (I'm having to look in my guide book to remember these names-and don't even ask me to pronounce them).

And Wat Phra Sri Sanphet. The three towers are chedi.....each one contains the remains (after cremation) of an important person, in this case a king and two princes (the princes apparently killed each other in a duel for the throne).

Next to Wat Phra Sri Sanphet is a bronze Buddha that was damaged during the Burmese seige, but survived to be restored and enclosed in a new building (the old building, when burned by the Burmese, collapsed and destroyed the head and arm of the Buddha). The people you see in the foreground of the photo were leaving some sort of prayer service.

Not all temples were destroyed. I visited one of them, Wat Na Phra Men. It was used by the Burmese as a base for attacking the city (Wat Na Phra Men is located north of the city, across the canal). The King of Burma was mortally wounded at this location when a cannon exploded here during the bombardment of the Thai Royal Palace.

The Buddha inside the Wat:

I then rode out to a temple about 1 mile outside the city. This Wat, Wat Phu Khao Thong, has a rather large chedi that affords a view of the surrounding countryside.

Here's what Central Thailand looks like from the chedi....lots of rice fields. There were very few people at this location, but plenty of cows and chickens (as well as the usual stray cats and dogs) roaming about the grounds.

On the way to Wat Phu Khao Thong, I passed a monument guarded by large rooster statues....

...some of them were rather sparkly.

At the top of the monument, before some sort of shrine, were hundreds of smaller roosters.

And down the road, a whole army of them.

Afterwards, I learned that the monument was for King Naresuan. Naresuan liberated Thailand from Burmese control in about 1690; the details of his death are legendary (depending on whom you ask, he either died in battle or died from smallpox). He was raised in Burma, in the Royal Court, after being taken as a hostage. In one of his most famous exploits, he killed the Crown Prince of Burma in one-on-one combat atop elephants. That's a pretty cool thing for a King to do...hand-to-hand combat riding on an elephant. The roosters are left by people as thanks to the spirit of Naresuan for answering a request for help.

Another temple in Ayutthaya, Wat Chai Wattanaram.

On the way back to the center of the city, I couldn't find the ferry crossing I needed to get back over the river. A woman saw that I appeared to be lost, and directed me to the proper place to catch the ferry; another woman actually got on her scooter and had me follow her to make sure I could find the landing. Thai people can be very helpful and friendly, although Bangkok taxi and tuk-tuk drivers are an exception (acutally, they appear to be very friendly, but will try to scam you if they can. Today I took the river ferry to avoid dealing with these people).

I returned my bicycle to the guest house I rented it from (total rental charge = about US$1.50) and had a beer before heading over to the train station. Unfortunately, the next train was sold out and I ended up having to wait for 2 more hours for the next one. I went back to the guest house and had some food (green curry chicken) and another beer. The guy who ran the place (his mother apparently is the owner) let me choose the music, either the Eagles or the Beatles (I chose the latter). He then gave me one of those blacksmith puzzles, where you have to remove a ring or looped piece of iron from a larger loop/shape. The reward if I solved it: another point for the US, as tallied on a board on the wall that listed the number of people who had solved the puzzle by country as well as by sex. But I didn't get around to solving it; I ended up talking to a US expat that had lived in Thailand for 10 years. Interestingly, he had attended school at Eastern New Mexico State. Later, I wondered if the fact he hadn't been back to the US in 10myears was due to some sort of legal issue. Here's the view from the seating area of the guest house:


I made it back to the station in plenty of time to make the next rain, but still had to stand in line for a ticket.

Here's a view across the street from the Ayutthaya Station: note all the food carts.

And everyone waiting for the train. What you can't see in the picture is all the rats that were scurrying around the tracks, underneath everyone's feet.

I made it back to Bangkok at about 9 p.m. For some reason, the express train I took (with limited stops) took longer to go betwen the cities than the ordinary train. I had to stand for an hour, but then got a chance to sit down for the rest of the trip. It was cool being able to ride a train and stick your head out the window. When I helped a guy get a large bag from the luggage rack above me, my hand got covered in some strange liquid. A girl next to me started laughing; apparently the liquid had been dipping beside her for the entire trip

Today I visited some of the sights back here in Bangkok. Here's Wat Arun, the Temple of the Dawn. It's decorated with bits of pottery that had been used as ballast in Chinese Junks visiting Thailand.

Note the steep ascent up the tower. In America, you probably wouldn't be allowed to make the climb.

Next was Wat Traimit, home of a 5.5 ton Buddha made out of pure gold. It was discovered a few decades ago when a crane dropped what was thought to be a stucco Buddha. It's thought that it had been covered in stucco to hide it's true value from the Burmese, but was forgotten about over the years. I'll leave the calculation of the value of the gold to you.



And then Wat Pho, home of the 150 ft. long reclimomg Buddha (he's attaining Nirvana at this point).



These four chedi at Wat Pho house the remains of Kings Rama I-IV.

A detail of one of the chedi:

And the final stop of the day, at Wat Phra Kaew, home of the Emerald Buddha (it's actually made out of jade), the most revered Buddha around. You can't wear shorts or skimpy clothes when visiting this image. Here's the entrance: note the glitz.

No photography inside the hall, so I had to take a shot of the Buddha from outside. Sorry for the bad picture quality, but it's the best I could do with my camera (the Budda was both in the distance and under low-light conditions)

Some more photos of Wat Phra Kaew: Liberace would've loved the place.

I didn't get to see the Royal Palace because of the funeral of the King's sister, but otherwise had a pretty full day putzing around. Tomorrow it's back to Singapore.