Ayutthaya

Ayutthaya is a town about an hour north of Bangkok it used to be the old capital of Siam (This is what Thailand use to be called) from 1350 to 1767. 33 different Kings ruled during the 417 years it was the capital until 1767 when the Burmese Army invaded and looted the city. They destroyed the capital by burning down the temples and removing the heads of the Buddha statues. They stole many of the treasure’s which have never been found and the remaining are now in museums in Ayutthaya. Now what remains of the historical site is protected on UNESCO’s list of world heritage sites.

Jess had a friend visiting for the weekend, who also happens to be called Jess, so the two Jessica’s and I travelled to Ayutthaya on the Saturday. We checked in to a cute hostel, where we could hire bicycles for the day to explore. After a quick bite to eat for lunch we cycled around taking in the ancient ruins. They were very peaceful despite the number of fellow tourist mingling around.

After cycling between all the temples and nearly crashing in to the elephants wondering the streets with tourist riding on them we headed back to the hostel. That evening we went on a boat trip around the Island. Ayutthaya has been made in to an Island by a river splitting and going either side of the land. It was a night so all the temples along the riverside were beautifully lit up. With just the three of us in a little thin long-tail boat with our Thai driver, it was very tranquil motoring along the murky water, with our eyes peeled for crocodiles. We got dropped off at a quite night market, which was a must see in the guide book but ended up being very small and closed early, but we ate dinner and then headed back to chill at the hostel.

Another must in the guide book was the floating market so after a lazy morning we headed there for lunch. However it turned out to not be that traditional but more of a tourist attraction of how a Thai market would be perceived. Having said that it was still fun and full interesting stalls.

We had ticked off everything on our Ayutthaya list so it was time to head back to busy Bangkok, and get stuck in traffic for hours because of the political protests going on.

 With Love from Thailand xxx