Ayutthaya Historical Park - July 13

Today’s adventure started early with a 6:30 am pick up at our hotel to join a tour group to Ayutthaya Historical Park, the ruins of the ancient capital of Siam located about an hour outside of Bangkok but difficult to get to our own.  We were happy to find a group that could get us there and back in time for our flight to Cambodia later in the day.

Ayutthaya was the second of four capitals in Thailand’s history – Bangkok being the fourth – and the remains were named a UNESCO World Heritage site in the 90s. Our guide for the day was a woman named “Donna” who spoke of herself regularly in the third person.  She was very energetic and told some interesting stories providing insight into the people and culture of Thailand, but unfortunately her English was difficult to decipher at times and the guide books proved more informative about what we were actually seeing.  One thing I found interesting is that she carried with her a bag of dog food and fed the many stray dogs we encountered throughout the day - she said she does it because she is working at the time of day that the monks go on their morning walk to collect food so she makes up for being unable to give alms to the monks by providing for the dogs.

Our first stop on the tour was the Bang Pa-In Royal Palace, aka Summer Palace,  used by Thai kings since the 1700s. Most of what stands now dates from the restoration done by Rama IV (the king of The King & I fame) and it is rarely used now except for state visits (Queen Elizabeth is the only dignitary to get to spend an overnight there.)  Many different styles of architecture make up the outer and inner Palaces.  The lookout tower was especially cool.  There is also a memorial to the 20-year old queen (wife of Rama V) who died when her boat capsized on the way to the Palace but no one could save her because touching a member of the royal family was a capital offense.

Next stop was the Wat Mahathat temple complex in the center of old Aytthaya, which is an island surrounded by three rivers.  It is thought to date from the 1370’s and stood as the city’s largest and most important temple until the Burmese attack in 1767 destroyed it.  The temple was made largely of brick and stone so it is still easy to see how impressive it once was.  A highlight of this stop was the statue of Buddha’s head embedded into the root system of a tree. The Burmese vandalized many statues of Buddha by lopping off their heads but it is not known exactly how this one ended up here.  Somehow it was left near the tree roots and the tree grew around it.  Since it is disrespectful to have humans higher than Buddha, you can only take a picture if you are kneeling down below the statue.

Next we stopped at a Buddhist temple where Donna showed us how Thai people make wishes for health, happiness, and luck using incense, lotus flowers, and gold leaf.  When we went inside an adjoining temple a monk sitting next to a Buddha statue was splashing holy water on visitors and tapping our heads with a branch. After each blessing, he put a bracelet on our wrists.  I watched several people take their turns without incident but after I was blessed by the monk, I slipped on the holy water and banged my knee quite forcefully into the wooden plank on which he sat.  It was inordinately painful immediately and has continued to swell and stiffen throughout the day.  My greatest worry is that I will not be able to get any more Thai massage because manipulating my leg is currently out of the question.

Our final stop was an outdoor large reclining Buddha, 37 meters long and 8 meters high. (Yesterday’s was 46 meters long and 15 meters high.)

Then we drove an hour to a pier to join a 2.5 hour river cruise back to Bangkok.  During the all-you-can-eat buffet lunch the rain started pouring down outside.  So, we spent the entirety of the cruise inside the dining area playing rummy and listening to a man with even worse English than Donna’s drone on unintelligibly.  It was fun to see Bangkok emerge along the banks and to get a view from the river.  After disembarking we took a taxi straight to the airport for our flight to Siem Reap.