Advertisement
Published: September 9th 2012
Before I move out of Bangkok, I did want to mention that we did see several of lady men that Bangkok is so famous for. But I didn't realize half of them till E pointed them out. They look good.
We left Bangkok Friday headed to Ayutthaya, the 2nd capital of Thailand from 1350 - 1767 when the capital moved to Bangkok. Along the way we stopped at the royal summer palace, Bang Pa In. It was originally built in 1632 but was destroyed and rebuilt in the 1800's. It was certainly cooler there than Bangkok because the humidity was lower. Basically felt exactly like the weather we left in Houston, still hot and humid but not as bad as Bangkok.
The summer palace was, of course, a grand place, still a favorite of the Queen. However, the temple built as gift from the Chinese was the most opulent. The was amazing amounts of gold leaf everywhere since gold means prosperity. The furniture was made of teak, a favorite wood here even for homes, and was inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Then there was an amazing ancient royal barge figurine, about 3ft long and a foot high that was a white
carving. I assumed it was ivory but no, it was camel bone! Yep, China has lots of camels. Since pics weren't allowed I tried to find a postcard of it, but they didn't have one. Very sad because I would have loved a lasting visual of that..
When we finally reached Ayutthaya, we made sunset visit to the ruins of Chai Wattanaram Temple, built in 1360 to be a smaller version of Angkor Wat in Cambodia. The ruins are in good condition for 650 years but they are trying to maintain them with no further loss by keeping visitors at a safe distance.
Wi-fi has been hard to come by in the hotels cause they charge so much. Several places near the hotels have free wi-fi so we've become bums in local coffee shops.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.093s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 13; qc: 28; dbt: 0.0483s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Chai Wattanaram Temple
Bridget Colbert
non-member comment
Amazing pictures!
If 'E' is taking most of these pictures, he is SERIOUSLY talented...they are mesmerizing!