the old capital of ayuttaya; the first of many days temple viewing

broken buddha head
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Ayutthaya was Thailands capital up until the middle of the 18th Century when the Burmese came down and sacked it, forcing the Thai royalty to create a new city in Bangkok.

We had a cycle around town looking at some of the many buddhist Wats and royal buildings.  The main attraction for us was the everything was a bit overgrown and crumbly as the Burmese hadn't been shy when it came to knocking things down and cutting the heads off the buddhas and setting fire to the temples.

A purple rocket ship

a wat in ayuttaya. i can;t believe i have forgotten the name already. it was only yesterday!
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Lots of photo taking took place, but we learnt more about the interesting history of the place whilst we were in Bangkok and from our guide book than we did whilst we were here.

It is worth mentioning here that we have found throughout Thailand that ice creams and lollies are REALLY CHEAP.  Just pop into any one of the 18 7-11s you might find on any high street and you can pick up a Cornetto for 40p, or even better one of the local specialities for around 15p, these include:

Pirate Faces Lemonade flavour lollies with embedded bits of sweetcorn Coconut flavour lolly with some kind of tasty purple jelly inside An Asian take on the Feast A purple rocket ship with yellow jelly interior

buddhas, beheaded by the burmese when they sacked the city in 1770s
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Amazing.