Watted Out!

Three Headed Buddha at Wat Phanan Cheong, Ayuthaya, Thailand
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The bus ride to Ayuthaya was about a two hour trip, direct!  The place where the bus stopped was not too far from the area where I was going to stay.  I had selected one place, but wasn't able to easily find it and since I ran across my second choice, P.U. Guesthouse, I got a room there.  I ended up with a fan room that shared a bathroom, but was right next door, and it cost me 250 Baht (approx $7.82).

After showering, I headed out, but first signing up for a boat tour to see some of the wats (temples) at 4pm.  I was in need of a new shirt as the one North Face shirt that I had bought especially for the trip because it was made of special material to be quick-drying and to keep you cool had become pretty scary looking.  Unfortunately, it didn't hold up to being worn with my backpack and since I used it the most when traveling from place to place, it had lost it's nice white color and looked very shabby.  I started in the market hoping to find something cheap, but didn't have any luck.  Although, I did manage to find the sweet snack that Noi had shown us at the market back in Kanchanaburi, which was a treat!  Next stop was to the town's only department store.  Every small section of clothing had at least one or two shop assistants who were watching me intently, with one girl laughing every time I saw her.  Now, I know that I am not exactly a tiny person, but at the same time, I am not that large either and have managed to loose weight on the trip.  However, it seems that all the clothes are made for very small women.  I did manage to finally find one shirt that was passable and only paid 192 Baht (approx $6) so if I only wore it a handful of times, it would be worth it.

Dragon on top of possible Chinese Temple at Ayuthaya, Thailand
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Returning back to the guesthouse, I dropped off my purchase and then it was time to leave for the boat tour.  There seemed to be two very distinct groups.  The one group of 8 that I was in had all the European travelers and the other group of 8 were all Japanese.  My 8 piled into a very small tuk tuk that only had three wheels and I was sure with all our weight we would easily tip over.  But we made it safely to the pier just about 5 or so minutes away.

Once on the long tail boat, I ended up sharing a seat with the only other solo traveler, Tessa, a Dutch girl who had just finished university and was avoiding having to find a job.  We were taken to three wats along the river.  The first was Wat Phanan Choeng which had quite a few buildings associated to it, with one looking kind of Chinese to me because of all the ornamentation.  It also housed a 63ft high Buddha.  The second stop was to Wat Phuttaisawan which had a mixture of new and old buildings.  As we headed to our last stop, we passed a catholic church, which seemed quite out of place and the first one I had seen since getting to Asia.  The last stop was Wat Chai Wattanaram which was a ruin.  Unfortunately it was too hard to get a good picture of the entire complex because of the setting of the sun.  I ventured up some very steep steps of one of the buildings and had a magnificent view of the grounds below and the river beyond.  However, getting down was a little more daunting.

Old Temple at Wat Phuttaisawan, Ayuthaya, Thailand
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With three wats visited, we continued on with the boat ride and we were dropped off at the night market instead of the pier.  After looking around, Tessa and I decided that maybe dinner at a restaurant would be a better idea.  We had a little trouble finding our way back to the guesthouse, now in the dark.  We had decided to stop there, because I wanted to find out the name of a restaurant that was supposed to have a good view of Wat Ratburana which is lit up at night.  I was glad to have someone with me to get to Malakor because it was a good 15 minutes walk and we had a bit of trouble finding it.  Our meal was just OK and the view of the wat wasn't exactly as good as it had been made out to be.  But it was still worth getting away from the area around our guesthouse.

Lion Statue at Wat Thammikarat, Ayuthaya, Thailand
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After a very hot night, I got up early and rented a bicycle for 50 Baht (approx $1.56) so that I could check out some of the other wats located within the town.  My first stop was to one of the most photographed wats in Ayuthaya, Wat Phra Maharat.  There you have to crouch down (as you aren't supposed to stand higher than the Buddha image) to take a picture of a Buddha head that is entwined in tree roots.  It was extremely cool looking.

After that, it was a free for all.  I cycled around bumping into wats as I came across them - probably another 5 or 6 in all and that was not even close to all that Ayuthaya has to offer.  Two of the notable wats were Wat Mongkhon Baphit that has one the largest Buddha images in all of Thailand and Wat Thammikarat which has lion statues all around the base.

Buddha Head Entwined in Tree Roots at Wat Phra Maharat, Ayuthaya, Thailand
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Also on my travels I ran across quite a few people doing elephant rides and I stopped off at the elephant kraal where the elephants were kept.  After riding around for a couple of hours, it was beginning to get quite hot and honestly, I had enough of wats for awhile.  I headed back to the guesthouse where I saw Tessa as she was making her way out to Bangkok for a flight down to Kuala Lumpur.  Having seen enough of Ayuthaya, I chilled out for the rest of the afternoon and had an early night as I was going to have to be up around 4:30am to head to Bangkok and then onwards to my next destination.