Time to Turn East!

A Day to Explore Ayutthaya

7 February 2018

After a having breakfast in the garden at the hotel we set off to explore Ayutthaya for the day.

Most of our day was spend at the Ayutthaya Historical Park. This is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There are 4 spectacular temples of the early Ayutthaya (Wat Mahathat, Wat Ratburana, Wat Thammikarat, Wat Kudi Dao) and a Royal Palace and Royal Chapel (Wat Phra Si Sanphet).

Of course one can not explore all day without refreshment. It was decided to have smoothies for lunch and they were certainly wonderful.

The rest of the day flew by and before we knew it it was time for dinner. We decided to explore a night market which seem to suddenly appear on a street as the sun went down. It was crowded and contained many stores.

To my surprise Steve found another traveller there was was invited to share in a local food, deep fried insect! Steve reports they were crunchy, but not too bad.

8 February 2018

As the previous day was spent just exploring the local area we stayed in the same hotel as the previous night. After another lovely breakfast it was time to set off to explore the Dragon Descendents Museum. This Museum was designed to present the history of 5000-year Chinese civilization that is accepted to be one of the world’s oldest and most important civilization in the form of a dragon.

Next stop for the day was Wat Muang, the tallest statue in Thailand, the second-tallest statue in Southeast Asia, and the seventh-tallest in the world. This statue is 92m tall and 63m wide. We wandered around this area for hours.

Our final stop for the day was Bualuang Resort. Beds we harder tan normal, but it was in a quiet location in the rural lands near Ang Thong. Steve and I decided to take a wander around the area to find a restaurant for dinner. We didn’t find one open so it was decided we would drive off to find one. As luck usually has it – we found a beauty “Jacks”. The food was awesome and the owner Jack was great. He even insisted escorting back to or accomodation so we didn’t get lost.

Ang Thong 

9 February 2018

Today we are headed off to Lop Buri. Wat Chantharangsee was our first stop for the day which proved a pretty little temple. Our next stop was Wat Phranon Chakkrasi another pretty spot.

Phra Prang Sam Yot – The Monkey Temple

Benjatara Resort was our choice for a room for the night, it had views towards the local mountain range. After I did a walk round the area we decided to head 1km down the highway for a roadside dinner.

10 February 2018

From our hotel room we could see a temple in the distant mountains, so we decided to head that way. The first temple was Tham Khao Khiao – a priest camp.

From here we headed to the Buddhist temple Wat Prabat Nampu, this temple provides housing for HIV positive patients and palliative care for those in the final stages of the AIDS disease. It was humbling to see the generosity of locals as they donated ute load after ute load of food and supplies for the temple.

Si Threp Historical Park was the next stop for the day, before we visited Khao Klang Nok and Rusi Pogoda.

Last fun for the day was a walk through the local market before finding some local accomodation.