Long tailed boat

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I forgot to mention -

before I booked for tomorrow at TAT I went on a long tailed boat trip up the river and canals of Bangkok.

This city is known as the Venice of the East and it desrves that name because of the many canals that ae still useful in travelling across Bangkok.

I felt as though I was re-enacting a film that I'd seen at junior school - the houses on stilts alongside the canals are so picturesque. I saw families bathing in the the canal near their houses.

One buddhist temple protects fish and they flourish in that place and are fed by pilgrims. I wonder if the fish actully know they are safe there, or if they are saved by chance alone.

I was supposed to see "the floating market" but that turned out to consist of one boat manned by a Miss Buttercup impersonator. I bought a buddha for 200 bahts and a coke for me and for the boatman.

It was a way to put my feet up for an hour and I did get to see the many Wats (temples) that line the river - together with a few mosques. I was especially interested in Wat Arun which is one of the oldest temples in Bangkok (actually not in Bangkok proper according to the purists but in the older city that predates the capital). I got off near Wat Pho and visited the temple. It was amazingly beautiful - in my opinion more so than the temple of the emerald Buddha. Unfortuntaely I was told that the the famous reclining buddha could not be seen today as it was a buddhist day of rest.

I suppose that makes sense, a reclining buddha does need his sleep . .

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