We wanted to include a picture of Thailand so that you can get a good idea of where we have been and where we are going but for some reason there is has been errors with this for the last few days, we will update the other posts with photos soon.
Cant believe its already been a week since we've left and what a week we've had, each day has been action packed!
Yesterday we left you with getting into Sukhothai at 4:30am, half asleep and absolutely exhausted. A guy approached us as we got off the bus to get a tuk tuk, trying to rip us off so I said that we would just wait for the bus so he reduced his price!The tuk tuks here are different with the passengers in front and the motorcycle behind. This we took to the old city of Sukhothai for 12 kilometers.
To give you some background, Sukhothai was the official capital of Thailand between the 12-1300s with we estimate over 50 temples and shrines adorned with sculptures and statues of Buddhas.
The old city is divided into 5 areas, central being the biggest, then north, south,east and west.
Having only gotten to sleep at 5am we could only cover the central area yesterday on foot which is covered with different Wats or temple ruins.
We woke up in a hard bed and a walled area for the bathroom with sink, toilet and shower. The shower is right next to the toilet so basically the whole of the bathroom gets soaked everytime we have a shower but we are most certainly not complaining, its a hot shower and we now know how to use the toilets in the more remote areas.
Today we went to the museum after breakfast but unfortunately it started to rain and we were stopped from exploring the other areas until later in the day when we rented bikes. We headed to the Northern part of the old city which is completely surrounded by a moat which is easily 50 metres wide.Afterwards we saw another Wat in Northwestern part where we saw the strangest thing yet. This fish was wriggling its way across the carpark over gravel and grass from and to god knows where. We were gobsmacked and watched it til it apparently stopped. After we came out it had gotten to the end of the carpark near the entrance where there was a little grassy hill to the river. He looked like he was out of stream so we helped him on his way. Bourkie tried to pick him up but he was too slippery. He was a kind of catfish with whiskers at the side of his head and he was quite big(we will add photos later!). We left content in the knowledge that we had helped a fish live another day.Next we headed onto the Western part which contains Wats on hills, by this time it was getting close to dusk so we climbed what looked like a wall 250 metres up a hill to another Wat. After this we really got concerned about the time as dusk here starts around 6 and its already dark by 6:30. We raced to a cross roads and with no recognisable places shown we took a chance, coming to the next crossroads we started to get worried but saw a sign for a Wat we recognised but it was still over 2 km away, in the end we cut through the central area and boy were we sweating by the time we got home. We reckon that we cycled around 10 km in about 2 hours with breaks to see the different Wats. We both agree that we really like Sukhothai but we are all Wated out and ready to move on. The highlights had to be the lovely Wats in the central area and the delicious local food with Thai green curries, thai omelettes, apple and coffee shakes!
But to be honest we have been very lucky with the weather, humid but nicely overcast and it only rained today and we are getting further into the cool season.
Tomorrow we get a bus to Chiang Mai which will take about 5 hours and is the second biggest city in Thailand. Here we have an action packed 3 days of trekking, elephant riding and rafting but more about that in the next few days.
Hope all's well at home and please keep us up to date with the goings on at home and thanks for your comments, keep them coming!
Love and Bubbles,
Richard and Clare