The Lima Place Ayutthaya

... me realise something I had overlooked about Thailand. The real Thailand is touristy, since tourism is now as much a part of Thailand as Thai people are. Without it, Thailand would suffocate, or change completely.<br>Sure there are pockets of traditional Thailand though - I have already seen these everywhere I have been, and in a place like this the pockets are just more frequent. Logic suggests that if bus routes go somewhere, tourists do. The lady also said "But ...

... couple of push bikes and had a great time cycling round the main temple/ruins areas. It was hot but with a slight breeze and with the wind in your hair it was fine. The island that the main ruins are on is flat so great for cycling and the roads are quite wide and not too busy. In fact the Thai drivers seem very courteous and aware of unsteady "farangs" on bikes!<br><br>Off to Chiang Mai later tonight. ~13hrs on the night train.

... thing, I'm not sure how that works. At the end, they let off a bunch of fireworks at 10 in the morning. Quite a celebration.<br><br>The sword-fighting demo was scary. I had on my shiny red outfit (there's pictures I think) and suddenly we were in the middle of this giant field with the sun beating down and thousands of people around us. Just the three of us. Before we started I remember standing there barefoot in the mud holding ...

... to head to the train station to get info for moving on the next day...Bruce did it again.<br><br>He sped off thinking he knew where he was going...good one bruce...and we made it the station without the two again. Surely Orla will not get on a scooter with him again. We picked out our trains and then headed back to the gaff where the others had returned and Orla had bought a new camera...welcome back official ...

... one. We eventually decided to name him Doug and we call him Douglas when he does something bad. He is the most spoiled duck and everyone in all the houses absolutely love him. He really likes feet as well. If I just let him walk around my bedroom floor he will always lay right next to your toes and nibble at them and whenever you walk to the bathroom or across the room he will follow your feet. It is the cutest thing I have ever seen and I never knew I could love a duck so much. <br><br>

... paintings, plates, vases, figurines, etc. and you really don't give a second thought to how they're made, you just see a little label saying Made in Thailand, or Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam, etc. You don't give a thought to who spent painstaking hours of intense concentration to make these beautiful products that we, as tourists/foreigners take for granted. And all that works gets them maybe 10 or 20 baht. That's less than a dollar American. We saw people weaving baskets and ...

... a little girl for some sort of show. I recommend everyone at least touch an elephant, just to experience how insignificant an animal like this will make you feel. <br> Then we went to the Chao Sam Phraya National Museum. There was no photography allowed, but there were countless Buddha relics and artifacts found hundreds of years ago. Looking at some of the exhibits, I was trying to imagine all the people who have looked at the same thing and where it once was and all the wars ...

... who know me are laughing right now, cause it's well-known that I have no sense of direction AT ALL!!! Well, so everybody can imagine what happens... I got lost... and of course the fact that Thai people rather tell a wrong way than that they don't know the direction didn't help much... However, at least I got to see a lot of the city, so I guess I will be able to leave already tomorrow. Either directly North to Chiang Mai by night train or with a ...

... carp like fish there were a number of extremely large (around a metre long we guess) catfish who came to the surface to take tidbits thrown in by the gardner/handyman. These were very impressive and bigger substantially than those we had seen the day before in the market. However the hotel was unable to reproduce the tanks of live eels and other creatures, including a very sorrowful bucket jammed full of live frogs and held down by netting.

... of cold water for us shouting 'hey you, water ....... for you ......... no money', bless him. We were both so gobsmacked that before we could shake his hand and REALLY say thank you he'd sped off on his bike, giving us the thumbs up again. What he didn't realise was that we were sprinting the last 25 kms to get to Ayutthaya before 2pm, because that's when they stop selling beer in the shops, and because we stopped to drink ...