Ayutthaya

Our last morning in Bangkok was the most relaxed of our time there - we had a big breakfast, spent some time by the pool, and then headed over to the Hilton Garden Inn, where our journey to the historic city of Ayutthaya would begin!

It is possible to travel to Ayutthaya from Bangkok by train, but we decided to do a coach tour, as the journey is quicker by road, and the temples are somewhat far apart, so it's convenient to have transport included.

This was one of three tours that we took during our two weeks in Thailand - while we were in Khao Lak the following week, we went on tours to James Bond Island and the Surin Islands. The Ayutthaya tour, which was run by Sun Leisure World, was definitely our favourite, as well as by far the best value. For 32 USD each, it included guided visits to two temple complexes, a sunset cruise with a dance performance, and a meal at a restaurant.

The journey to Ayutthaya in the bus took about 90 minutes, but it passed fairly quickly, as our guide told some good jokes and interesting facts about Thailand. Plus, we could enjoy the landscapes between the two cities.

The first temple we visited was Wat Yai Chai Mongkhon, and it was pretty spectacular. It has a huge pagoda you can climb to the top of, which gives you fantastic views across the site.

There's also a big area outside where you can buy gifts and snacks. We bought this elephant shaped ice-cream, which was coconut flavoured, and as delicious as it was adorable!

 

The next temple we visited was Wat Maha That. This is the famous temple that's known for having a head of Buddha in a tree!

To be honest, it was cool to see the head, but there was such a big crowd around it that it wasn't possible to even get a photo of it from front on. We didn't spend much time on it, because the site is big, and there was a lot more to explore. 

Our guide explained that there are two types of pagoda in Buddhism: the Sri Lankan bell shape, like we saw at the previous temple, and the Cambodian corn shape, of which there were many examples at this temple (including one that was leaning like the Tower of Pisa!). 

I enjoyed looking around the site, but unfortunately it wasn't so much fun for Claudio, as he'd accidentally left his phone on the bus, which had then been driven off somewhere else. Luckily, it was there lying on the seat when the bus returned! Interestingly, when waiting for the bus to come back again, we had our first glimpse of Thai elephants going past in a big truck! (We would get to meet several more the following day...)

Next it was time to begin the penultimate part of the tour: the river cruise in a traditional boat. The boat was beautiful, and the cruise was very entertaining. We passed by beautiful temples, fed catfish, and enjoyed a Thai dance performance.

The highlight was passing by Wat Chaiwatthanaram, a temple that was inspired by Angkor Wat in Cambodia. It was really exciting to see, as Angkor Wat is a place that was high on my bucket list, and which we'd considered visiting as part of this honeymoon. However, I'd seen in mentioned in a few different articles about overly-crowded tourist sites, and decided to give it a miss and focus on Thailand for this trip. So it was a nice experience to see a sort of smaller version of it and take photos without the crowds, and it was also a really beautiful historic site to admire.

At the end of the cruise, the boat arrived at Krua Phirom Restaurant, where food was waiting for us. Our table was right by the river, looking out over Chedi Sri Suriyothai, a beautiful pagoda.

We were all given a glass of a Thai juice (I think it was pandan leaf juice) that was very sweet and tasty. There wasn't a large amount of food, but everything was perfectly prepared. I had the veggie options, which I found to be very simple and plain, though Claudio had the opposite issue, as he found the meat options much too spicy for his liking! Though given the relatively low cost of the tour, we felt that the meal was pretty good value overall.

The restaurant also had a big garden, which we enjoyed exploring. The place was beautifully decorated, tranquil and full of atmosphere.

Even though Ayutthaya is only an hour or so away from Bangkok, it feels a world away from the hustle and bustle of the big city. I would highly recommend visiting these wonderful, historic temples to anyone taking a holiday in Thailand. Although our two weeks had almost too many highlights to even call them highlights, this day was definitely up there, and we felt it added something special and a bit different to our time staying in Bangkok. 

After taking the coach back to the capital, passing by a beautiful golden palace on the way, it was time for us to pack up our suitcases and prepare to head for the airport early the next morning. Part 2 of our honeymoon was about to begin, and a lot more excitement was heading our way over the next few days...

Bangkok Day 3: Giant Lizards, Skyscrapers, Chinatown and More

On our second morning in Bangkok, we again woke up super early from jet lag. This time, we decided to make the most of it, and started our day with a gym session when the fitness suite opened at 6 am. That's definitely not my usual holiday routine, but we felt better for getting up and doing something rather than trying and failing to sleep. The fitness suite was on the top floor of the hotel and had great views over the city, so it was a nice way to start the morning.

After breakfast, we decided to start our sightseeing in the nearby Benchakitti Park. We had seen a lot of temples the previous day and were keen to see a different side of the city. The park is really beautifully designed and peaceful, and we loved the sky walk, which takes you over an area of wetlands.

Crossing over a bridge, we arrived in another park, Lumphini Park. This is actually a place that my sister and brother-in-law told us about. They also had a honeymoon in Thailand and recommended this park because of its large population of monitor lizards! These lizards are absolutely massive, and we had a lot of fun spotting them going in and out of the park's lake. 

You can take a pedal boat out on the lake free of charge for 20 minutes, which is a super nice experience. We had a great time looking for the lizards and also spotted a little turtle!

We also saw a few lovely cats! When we had our vaccines before travelling, we were advised not to touch cats or dogs in Thailand because of the risk of rabies, but it was still nice to admire them from a distance.

After a coffee break, we took our first tuk-tuk ride! It was really fun, and we were at our next destination in no time at all.

We'd arrived at King Power Mahanakhon, one of Bangkok's tallest skyscrapers and an interesting building architecturally. It looks a bit like a game of jenga! There's a modern mall next door, which we had a look around, and you can also pay to go up to the top of the building, but at 1000 baht per ticket, we thought it was a bit too costly.

By this point, we felt ready to see some more temples, so we decided to take the Skytrain over to Wat Paknam Phasi Charoen, where you can find the biggest Buddha statue in Bangkok, which stands at 64 metres tall. 

Unfortunately, we came at a bad moment, as the statue was covered in scaffolding! However, we still enjoyed visiting other parts of the temple complex.

We took a taxi over to a mall to pick up a quick bit of lunch and then took the Skytrain and metro over to Chinatown. To be honest, this wasn't a place I'd really thought about visiting, but Claudio wanted to see it, as it had been featured on a Chilean TV programme.

While we were in the metro, the lack of sleep really began to hit me, and I was actually falling asleep a bit while standing up. But as soon as we stepped out into the streets of Chinatown, the smell of durian accosted us and woke me up good and proper!

Bangkok's Chinatown is really different to the picturesque streets of London's Chinatown - it's noisy, choatic and crowded. In fact, it's rather like how we imagined Bangkok would be in general, though the rest of the city surprised us with how modern and attractive it is. This is the part of the city where you can find culinary delights such as scorpions and maggots on sticks! It certainly wasn't our favourite part of the Thai capital, but it was interesting to experience.

We had hoped to do some other activity in the evening, even if that was just going to the hotel pool, but as soon as we got back to the hotel, I went to sleep and pretty much slept all the way through to the following morning. After that, my jet lag was finally gone!

This was our last full day in Bangkok, as the next day we took a day trip to see the historic temples in Ayutthaya. Overall, we had a fantastic time in the city, and liked it a lot more than we expected to. It would have been nice to have spent a bit longer there, but who knows, maybe we'll have the chance to go back at some point in the future!