04th
& 05th Apr, Kochi – Chennai – Bangkok:
This was the beginning of our journey to Thailand.
We flew from Kochi to Bangkok via Chennai (Madras). 05th night we
flew out of Chennai and on 06th early morning we were at Bangkok Airport.
06th
Apr, Bangkok - Chiang Mai:
After immigration clearance we waited for our next
flight to Chiang Mai, a historical town of Northern Thailand. By 06th
noon we were in our hotel. We were due for a rest. We took a nap after a refreshing shower
(it was so.... soothing) . Later in the evening we went for a stroll.
Chiang Mai was the capital of Northern Lanna kingdom
which was established in the 12th century. At 18th
Century when Burmese conquered Northern Lanna Kingdom and went on to conquer
Siam (Thai) Kingdom which was ruled from Ayutthaya (yes named after Rama’s
Capital Ayodhya). Thai army reunited south of Ayutthaya , at present day Bangkok and chased Burmese out. Thus uniting
Thailand into the present form single Thai Kingdom.
Chiang Mai’s Old town where our hotel is situated is an old forted town with
moat around the fort. Though the fort is collapsed at many areas, we can still
see the ruins around the old town. Tomorrow we are planning to explore the old
town.
Outside the northern gate area is the night food street where the carts will be
placed in the evening and the street will be turned into a big food street. So
tonight we had our dinner there.
07th
Apr, Chiang Mai:
Today we explored the old city of Chiang Mai and its
temples. I think Photos can explain more than my writings, so I am posting some
important ones.
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| These are not real Buddhist monks but on wax....looks so real |
It's on our way back we found this School, Yupparaj Wittayalai School, does that remind something to you .... yes it's the same “Yuvaraj Vidyalaya School”!!
08th
Apr, Chiang Mai:
Today we enjoyed a walk to China town, which is in
the east of the old town. Close to the China Town is the oldest & the biggest
market of Chiang Mai called Talat Warorot. Near to this market is the Talat
Tonlamyai market too, it’s an whole sale flower market. Talat means market. From there we walked to the Night market area,
but as it was early we were just able to see the vendors putting up their
stalls. The Night market starts from 1800Hrs till midnight. So we decided to
come back the next day to visit the night market area. Walked further to Pantip
Plaza, its mainly an electronic mall but they have much bigger mall with the
same name at Bangkok.
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| Does this remind something??? |
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| China Town Entrance. |
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| Flowers placed on top of the ice cubes. |
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| Chinese Temple. |
09th
Apr, Chiang Mai:
Today was our last day at Chiang Mai, so we decided
to take it easy. Had a late breakfast and by evening we set out to visit the
night market. Number of people visiting were much less than the night markets
we had seen at Phnom Penh or Siem Reap in Cambodia. Anyway, we strolled through
and by 1900Hrs it was downpour with very strong wind. We ran into a food court
and had supper, by 2100Hrs the rain & wind subsided. So we walked back to
our hotel and the night walk was much cooler than before.
10th
Apr, Chiang Mai - Lampang:
Today morning after breakfast we said bye to our
hotel, it was a good hotel at a calm location.
Hired a Songthaew to the bus station. The charge was 40 Bath per person. it’s a
min van with sides open as given in the below picture.
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| Songthaew. |
The Executive AC minibus of Green bus company, which
we wanted to take was full, so we took a
non Ac bus to Lampang. It was something like Government Buses with open window,
though the seats were cushioned still a bit hard to sit on. Bus went to Lampang via Lamphun. Ride
took us about 2.5 hour . We reached
Lampang by 1330Hrs. Our resort was of Lanna (Northern Thai) style wooden house, we
had a colonial suite a spacious room with a day room and a bed room with wooden
floors. The resort is close to river Mae Wang.
By 1630Hrs we walked to the town on the other side
of the river and had a look at the big Lanna Style house called Baan Sao Nak,
it was once owned by “kun-yung” equivalent to a “Lady” in England. This house was built in 1895 and it stands on a 116 square teak pillars.
Structure itself is worth seeing.
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| Baan Soa Nak. |
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| Governor's Palace. |
11th
Apr, Lampang:
Today was a leisure day for us at Lampang, evening we spent our time in Saturday
market. This weekend market is on the Talad Gao road. Here the road will be
closed by 1700Hrs for vehicles and the carts will be placed with different items
like food, crafts, clothes etc.
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| Saturday Market. |
12th
Apr, Lampnag – Sukhothai:
Today was the beginning of Songakaran (New Year)
festival of Thailand, so the buses will be full and hence we decided to leave
early by 0800hrs. As per our plan we reached the bus station in time but
managed to get the tickets only for the 1100hrs bus. Still the bus was not in
time , it came only by 1145hrs and left by 1200hrs. The drive was really very slow,
though the roads were good and empty. So they decided to bye-pass “Old
Sukhothai” is were we should get off (our hotel is located here) and got off at New
Sukhothai bus station at around 1615Hrs. Caught a Songthaew to old Sukhothai.
Reached hotel by 1700hrs.
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| Songthaew from Bus station to Old Sukhothai. |
Being festival time we could see lots of people
throwing water around. While travelling on Songthaew, we even got splashed with
water twice.
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| Water throwing on the way. |
13th
Apr, Sukhothai:
Today we got up very early and went to see the Old
Sukhothai Historical Town as we had to be back in the hotel for 2 reasons. Travel
company has informed us to come to their office before noon so that they can
tell us if the bus tickets to Ayutthaya will be available for 15th or
not. Being Songkran all buses were fully booked. Secondly the water throwing
function of Thai new year Songkran will be “officially” starting from 13th
noon on wards, so we thought it is better to be back in the hotel prior to that.
Historical park of Sukhothai is about 2 minutes by
walk from our hotel. Sukhothai (means rising happiness) was part of Khmer
(Cambodian) empire till 1238, when two Thai rulers Pho Khun Pha Muang and Pha
Khun Bang Klang Hao decided to unite and form a new Thai Kingdom. This dynasty
lasted for about 200 Years. Most famous Thai ruler of this Dynasty was King
Ramkhamhaeng
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| Statue of Ramkhamhaeng |
and during his time Thai language and script developed. During his rule,
kingdom was greater than present day Thailand. Later in 1438 Sukhothai was absorbed
into Ayutthaya.
In the Sukhothai Historical park one can see lots of
temples with “Chedi” (Stupa Spires), some of them are similar to the Sinhalies
(Srilankan) Bell shaped Stupa construction, shows the Srilankan connection in
bringing Buddhism here in Thailand. But Wat Si Sawai dating the 12th
0r 13th Century is similar to Khmer Temples with 3 Khmer style
towers (but very smaller). In fact having seen Angkor and the majesty of Khmer
construction, temples at Sukhothai looks so smaller…..but it's worth seeing.
We were back before noon after walking for around 5 hours in the
History Park. Very soon we went to the bus ticket booking office and managed to
get the 0730Hrs bus for 15th April. Had a quick
lunch, by that time water throwing, spraying etc started.
14th
Apr, Sukhothai:
Toady morning again we went to visit few other
temples which are outside the History Park. By 1100Hrs water throwing /
fighting has started again and by 1630Hrs water fighting was stopped and a
procession of floats by different clubs started . We could see in each float a
lady dressed up like a queen. One of the floats was designed in the shape of a
Dragon where you can see the Queen
sitting on a pig and more, all in all we had a wonderful time.
15th
Apr, Sukhothai – Ayutthaya:
Don’t get confused with the name…….you heard it right…
it’s Ayutthaya. The city was the capital of the kingdom of Siam (Thailand was then Known),
named after the capital of the Kingdom of Rama. Siamese king named themselves
as Rama I, II …. Ayutthaya was their capital till Burmese attacked in 1767 and
ransacked the city completely. Thais reunited further south and chased Burmese
back and they made a new capital further south, much protected from the reach
of enemies and now it’s known as Bangkok.
Bus ride from Sukhothai to Ayutthaya was 6 Hours
and the buses were plying between Sukhothai & Bangkok , on the way they would be disembarking passengers in the highway close to Ayutthaya.
We started by 0730Hrs. Ticket price was
351 Thai Baht (THB) per person. Bus was very good with welcome snacks on board.
It even had a toilet same type as the
flight washroom. By 1000hrs we were stopped at a comfort station, as our ticket
had a coupon for food upon giving the coupon, food was served. 1030Hrs we
started again and by 1330 Hrs we were off at Ayutthaya. Caught a taxi to our
hotel in Ayutthaya, taxi cost was around 200 THB.
Reached our hotel and soon we checked in. As we were
tired, decided to take the evening easy so just had a walk to the close by night
market and purchased food for the night.
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| Our bus to Ayutthaya. |
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| Interior of the bus. |
16th
Apr, Ayutthaya:
Today was our day to explore the Ayutthaya
historical town. Ayutthaya, officially known as Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya, means
Royal City Sri Ayutthaya, named after the Indian city of Ayodhya the Capital city of Rama of Ramayana.
Ayutthaya is having lot of ruins of Old Royal heritage, its impossible to cover all, so we
selected the important ones. Following are the few photos.
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| One of the classic photos of Ayutthaya taken by my daughter Olivia!!! |
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| Buddhas head in the root. |
Sun was in its full strength and we were dead tired
by noon when we finished the round.
17th
Apr, Ayutthaya:
Following are few Photos:
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| Wearing Sarong to enter Palace. |
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| Chinese style Palace. |
By 1130Hr we completed the visit, caught Tuck-Tuck
back to Bang Pa In Train station. And later took train back to Ayutthaya. As we had time we
thought of visiting the floating Market
and then back to the hotel.
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| Floating Market |
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| Having food at Floating Market. |
When we reached back home Jeeda, our hostess had
kept a birthday cake and a card on my table…as today was my birthday. Very
thoughtful of her…..and that made my whole day soooooo….. special.
18th
Apr, Ayutthaya – Kanchanaburi:
Today morning after our breakfast we said bye to
Ayutthaya. We took an AC mini-van from Ayutthaya to Kanchanaburi. Van picked us
from Hotel by 0900hrs, a couple too joined us from another hotel. We reached
Kanchanaburi by 1115Hrs. Our room was not ready by then, so we had to wait at
the lobby of the Resort and by 1230Hrs we checked in.
Evening we had a walk to the Death Railway bridge
(bridge over River Kwai). Rail line from Kanchanaburi to North is known as
death railway. During Second world war, Japanese army used the Prisoners of War
(POW) to build a rail line from Kanchanburi to north, as to connect Thailand
with Burma. This helped them to carry troops and artillery equipment s to Burma
to support the Japanese army march towards India. Almost 100,000 people
including POW were killed….and thus the
railway line came to be know as the “Death Railway”. This bridge over Kawi
River was part of it.
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| Death Railway Bridge. |
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| Olivia & me on the Bridge. |
19th
Apr, Kanchanaburi:
Today morning we rested and by 1330Hrs we went to visit
the Tiger Temple, which is about 40Kms from Kanchanaburi. We hired a Tuck-Tuck and
by 1500hrs we were there, entry charge was about 600THB/person. Inside we get a chance to
touch and take photos with live Tigers of different sizes. Though we have seen
tigers, but never felt and touched any
of them and so this was the first experience in our life.
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| Olivia with Tiger. |
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| It's me !!! |
20th
Apr, Kanchanaburi:
Today after breakfast we decided to go to town for
sightseeing. Main visits were Allied War Cemetery which contains tombs of 6982
Allied soldiers, who were POW and worked as bonded labourers in the death
railway. There is plaque of Indian soldiers.
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| In memory of Indian Soldiers who fought. |
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| II World War Memorial |
Another interesting place was Burma-Thailand Death
Railway Museum. In the Museum we were able to see in detail the death railway
construction and suffering of the people during the construction & war.
21st
Apr, Kanchanaburi – Bangkok:
Today morning we departed from Kanchanaburi, our
mini bus to Bangkok was at 1000Hrs. It was a 3 Hour drive, by 1315Hrs we were
dropped off at Khao San Road and by 1330Hrs we were in our hotel. After
freshening up by 1530Hr we started exploring Bangkok. Some photos are given
below with details.
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| Buddhist Monk Novice. |
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| Victory Memorial. |
22nd
Apr, Bangkok:
Today we planned to visit “Ancient Siam”.We were told it’s a park showcasing the Ancient Architecture of Siam (Old Thailand). So even being a bit far away from the center of Bangkok, we made our way to see it. We took BTS (Bangkok Sky Train) to the last stop called Bearing. From the BTS Bearing station to Ancient Saim there is a free pick up at 1000hrs, so as we were there in time they picked us up and we reached the park by 1115Hrs. Entry fee was 700 THB /person for foreigners. The park is huge and so there was a Tram tour at 1300Hrs. We were there early so we took a golf cart ride for an hour. It was costing 300 THB /Hour. A map too was given to move around. Ancient Saim is a recreation of Old Thai architecture and temples from Sukothai, Ayutthaya etc. After enjoying the sightseeing we handed over the Golf cart and was all set for the Tram tour . We still had time so after having refreshment, we boarded the tram. It took 2 hours to cover the Park. By 1500Hrs we were back and caught a free drop service to Bearing BTS station. Got off at Ratchatewi BTS station and went for shopping.
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| Sightseeing in a Golf Cart. |
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| Tram for sightseeing. |
Now regarding the visit to “ Ancient Siam” ….. is it worth visiting. In my
opinion I think if you have seen the ancient cities like Sukhothai &
Ayutthaya then it’s not worth visiting. But if you have not seen these Heritage
cities, then you will like it and Ancient Siam will give you a good outlook of
Thai culture & Architecture.
23rd
Apr, Bangkok:
24th
Apr, Bangkok:
Today we visited Wat Pho where the reclining Buddha
statue is present, which is just opposite of Grand Palace. Then we took a ferry to China town, mainly for shopping and
I really enjoyed shopping there.
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| Wat Pho. |
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| Reclining Buddha. |
25th
Apr, Bangkok:
Today we went to an other marketing area called Chatu
Chak. It was a bit far away from our place, so took a taxi to Phaya Thai BTS
(Bangkok Sky Train) to Northern most point Mo Chit. It’s just walking distance from
the BTS station and it’s one of the best place to shop. The market is open only
on weekends (Fri, Sat & Sunday); so if you are at Bangkok on weekend then I
strongly recommend you to visit the market. Note that the market is huge, but there
are sectors marked on basis of items sold. It is better to note the sectors you
wanted to visit first and later you can cover up the other sectors as per time.
This visit can give you what you need and in short I could say that it’s worth a
visit; mainly because I made my husband’s pocket empty ……………So if you wish the
same………….then look no further, just go ahead.
26th
Apr, Bangkok – Chennai:
Today was our last day in Bangkok & in Thailand.
3 weeks trip coming to an end. Our flight was at 1903Hrs. So we checked out by
noon, had lunch and waited till 1515Hrs then took a taxi to Airport. It took
almost one hour. We completed all formalities quickly but our flight was
delayed by an hour and half. By the time we reached Chennai it was 2230Hrs.
Checked into an Airport hotel we had booked.
27th
Apr, Chennai – Kochi:
Last day of our trip, a three week long…..but like
all good things this also has to come to an end. Back home at last.
I thank Trip advisor forum for giving such
immense information while planning my trip and I am thankful to Sanjeev too from Hyderabad, India whom I
came to know through Trip advisor while digging Thailand itinerary. His information
had been so helpful to me. He & his lovely wife had even visited us at Kochi thus
forming our communication into a family friendship.
Above anything, like all our previous trips, I would
like to thank my Lord & Saviour Jesus Christ for making our trip so
enjoyable, for protecting us, providing surprising helps from unexpected
corners especially during Thai New year (Songkaran) days when getting tickets
for buses were extremely difficult.......a joyful trip indeed and time just flew by!!!!!
