Thailand By Land ( 21 Nov - 9-12 2009)

Hallo again! Now Jemimah being back in the water we decided to do a bit of land travel before X mas. Missing out on cheap flight to Vietnam we decided to travel to Northern Thailand by land. Jenny and Peter( Tiaki) kindly drove us to Kuah ferry terminal. They needed to stop at the local hardware shop for something so we accompanied them, only to find the perfect Christmas present for the admiral. The HONDA Generator she always wanted so badly. We paid a deposit and promised to pick it up in 4 weeks. A taxi to the ferry terminal would have been so much cheaper!!!!!
The ferry from Langkawi to Tammalang Pier in Thailand takes only 90 minutes. So with the 1 hour difference in local time we arrived after half an hour in Thailand including going through immigration and customs. A short drive by tuk tuk took us to the bus terminal in Satun and from there a 14 hour bus trip overnight to Bangkok. This long distance bus was very comfortable, lots of legroom (very important for the admiral). I settled down with a good book to read for a few hours before bedtime. But by 6.30 the lights inside the bus went all off. Well, maybe we should try to sleep earlier. Arrival in Bangkok was scheduled at 4 am. But shortly after the lights went off, the music came on. Loud Thai rock music till almost midnight. Is this the way Thais travel?

Elephants and Scorpions

Arriving at the Southern Bus terminal in Bangkok we followed the signs to the “BUS TO PAK CHONG” and within 15 minutes were on our way again. The trip to Pak Chong took 3 hours .This government bus was a bit tatty but the aircon worked well. I was shivering all the way despite wearing my warm winter jacket. Arriving in Pak Chong, we found a market stall were we had a coffee. The coffee came with complementary tea. Do you drink the tea before or after coffee? We drank the tea to be polite (we only drink tea when we got the flu and then with sugar and rum). While enjoying our coffee we witnessed some monks receiving their free food donation from the local market stalls and in return blessing the market stall. It looked very ceremonial.

Finally we rang the guesthouse and they kindly picked us up from the bus stop near the market. Greenleaf Guesthouse http://www.greenleaftour.com/ is located 5 km outside Pak Chong. Accommodation is spotless but basic, cold showers only and no furniture other than a bed. We paid only $ 7 Dollars the night. The attached restaurant served delicious food by friendly staff, the best we had so far in Thailand. Tours can be booked at the guesthouse and we organised an afternoon cave tour for the same afternoon and the big tour into Khao Yai National Park the next day.
The cave tour took us first to a waterfall were we could have had a nice swim if we had our togs. We forgot them of course. One of the guides found a little snake, a very soft viper and handed it to us for a cuddle. Before my turn a fellow traveller was bitten by the snake and I gave the handling a miss. Back in the “pickup” we drove past fields of rice and vegetables and arrived at the bat cave next to a temple. The monks here were wearing yellow beanies. Our guide managed to find some creatures again, this time a big spider- scorpion. After the initial fright and goosebumps I managed to have a close look. Some travellers even toughed it and put it on their arms and face. Too much for my liking. Later on, we watched millions of tiny bats departing the cave. It looked like smoke pouring out of a volcano and the sound was like thousands of humming bees. Later at night back at the guesthouse we enjoyed a nice hot soup to warm up. It was too cold for a beer. We asked for a second blanket and gave the cold shower a miss.
The tour trough Khao Yai NP was excellent. We sat on open Utes (with a cover for shade), saw lush rainforests, lots of birds including the giant hornbill, white handed gibbons, macaques, and deer. An even larger scorpion, waterfalls and wild elephant evidence, like the mud on the trees at about 2,5 meter height and the trampled down vegetation and of course elephant poo. But we missed out on seeing wild elephants. Maybe next time. Later in the afternoon we were driven up to the top of one mountain to 1400 meter from where we could see hundreds of kilometres over this vast NP as far as the mountains of Cambodia. Thanks to Allison and Geoff (SY Saraoni) for their recommendation to visit this NP.

Monday 23.11.2009

Ruins and lots of Dogs

A very interesting 3 hour train trip took us to the ancient royal capital of Ayuthaya. Our third class wagon looked about 100 years old with wooden benches. Unfortunately there was only standing room for us in the aisles, which were merely the width of by bottom. That was ok until the hawker ladies came through the train with large baskets full of cocked food. We squeezed into any gaps we could find. At some point I asked the lady what she was selling. She answered” Chicken” in English. I looked at it and shook my head. The pieces looked small and dark. But one man sitting beside us bought some. I watched him eat and discovered that they were chicken all right. The size of freshly hatched chicks. Later I was told they were actually younger than that. They get them out of the shell just before hatching and grill them.

Ayuthaya was the Siamese royal capital from 1350 to 1767. They call it the sacred city, intertwined with Thai nationalism and religion. The great empire of South East Asia, used by international merchants sailing between India and China during the era of the trade winds. Central Ayuthaya is surrounded by water on all sides, having been build where three rivers come together. A wide canal links them, encircling the town. Over 400 temples were constructed in the ancient city. The largest concentration (Ayuthaya Historical Park) now a Unesco World Heritage site. Efforts were undertaken by various kings and today by the Fine Art Department to restore the ancient temples.
We found a nice guesthouse within the “Island”. On the first day we took a tour which was offered by the guesthouse to see some of the best ruins lit up at night. The tuk tuk (a three wheeled pedicab) for this 3 hour adventure was so small that we could not sit upright and had only legroom for one bench but not for the opposite. One stop just before it got dark was the Elephant Kraal. In olden times a stockade for elephants, today a huge fence of teak logs keeps the elephants in. We saw many elephants being trained to do tricks. Some being washed, others just standing around eating and pooping. The attraction was a mother elephant that had a 2 months old baby. The youngster was running around freely and came to us when we called it but was so active it was difficult to make a photo and he or she nearly pushed us over several times. The next day we hired a motorbike and visited many of the ruins and temples. At Wat Chaiwatthanaram (say that after a few drinks 3 times in a row), one of the most imposing ancient Buddhist monasteries, I nearly had my little Kodak camera confiscated. At the exit of the temple I was approached by two temple security persons who were not very happy about me taking a photo of a Buddha. I actually made Michael stand behind that Buddha (without head) to make a photo. That is forbidden. They wanted my camera, but I kept saying that the batteries were flat and I did not make photos. I kept the finger on the lens cap, so when I switched the camera on it would go off straight away. They ask me to wait. What for? After a few minutes a women came and with spare batteries. I was very lucky because the batteries were not the right ones for my camera and they finally let me go, with my camera. I am glad we did not take our new big SLR Olympus. That one we left at the boat on purpose!

Many ruins looked similar than the ones we just seen 10 minutes ago. At night we enjoyed a good Thai curry at the night market overlooking the river. Walking through the streets we saw so many dogs lying around in front of homes and shops I was wondering if there are more dogs than people in this town. At night our sleep was interrupted by a lot of barking.

Thursday 26 Nov 2009

More Temples and Ruins

A six hour bus trip (this time first class) took us from Ayuthaya to Sukhothai, 450 km north of Bangkok. First class has the same comfortable buses as second class but a steward on board served coffee and water and during a stop we received a free meal. Sukhothai was the first capital of Siam and flourished in the 13th century and lasted 200 years. The temples and ruins of the era are considered to be the most classic of Thai styles. Sukhothai Historical Park, another World heritage site, was very impressive. The Historical Park includes remains of 21 sites and four large ponds within the old walls, with dozens of more sites within a 5 km radius. Our guesthouse called Ban Thai, situated in the new Sukhothai, was very nice. With a good atmosphere, excellent restaurant and comfortable rooms. The only downside was our mattress. Super hard. After a very uncomfortable night we upgraded from our room to the Bungalow for an extra $ 3 dollar. The mattress was still hard but there was a 200% improvement. A sawngthaew, a common name for a pick up truck with two benches in the back and used as buses, took us the 15 km to the Historical village in old Sokhothai for the cost of .80 cents per person. On arrival we hired bicycles to see the ruins and temples. It was fun! There were no cars inside the park and the landscape was very beautiful. It was a hot day, so at lunchtime we escaped into the museum. It was very good with an impressive collection of Sukhothai artefacts. Unfortunately our peaceful time inside the museum was disturbed by hundreds of young school children from Bangkok. For them we were more fascinating than the museum displays and they wanted to know where we came from. After the museum visit we had a second round of temples and ruins and went back to the guesthouse for Internet and dinner.
Our plan originally was to also visit the Historical Park of Si Satchanalai-Chaliang. Another world heritage site, similar to Sokhothai but set among the hills in a more peaceful setting. But we had seen sooooo many ruins and temples in the last week that we really did not want to see more. While in Sokhothai we discovered that our Visa given to us at Tammalang Pier/Satun was only for 15 days, because we travelled by land into Thailand. Air passengers are given 30 days. We still had 6 days left but wanted to stay around Chiang Mai more than a week. So what do we do now?