The day pretty much carried straight on from yesterday, as I arrived at about 9am and went straight to my hostel.  I had decided to make the most of my membership to Hostelling International in Chiang Mai by staying in one of their hostels and I followed suit in Ayutthaya.  My hostel was on the edge of town a little bit, but this was more than compensated for by the fact that it was a lovely family home run by a some really friendly and welcoming people.  I only had one night in the city, so after getting rid of my bag, I got walking.  It would be best to get around on a bicycle, but having had such a bad night’s sleep I didn’t trust my hazard perception and reaction times enough.  It’s a small place though, so I wasn’t majorly inconvenienced.



Ruins at Ayutthaya




Wat Phra Si Sanphet

 In order to fully appreciate the city, I started by visiting the 'Historical Study Centre’.  This was relatively pricey, but was set out really well with enough displays to be educational, but not so many that there is an information overload.  Armed with a bit of ancient Thai history, I felt ready to hit my first temple - Wat Phra Si Sanphet, which is located within the old grand palace compound.  Its outstanding feature is the row of three tall, fairly intract, stupas that run through the middle of it.  Aside from the stupas it is difficult to imagine its former glory, as the rows of decapitated Buddhas testify.  There was a modern temple next door with a huge Buddha inside, but (and I know this sounds pretty uncultured) I didn’t take notice of its name because it wasn’t particularly interesting.  Ayutthaya is allll about the ruins.



Godzilla (golden eagle to the right for sense of scale)

 My intention was to then walk through the park in the centre of town towards my next temple.  This plan was curtailed somewhat as, strolling happily along the footpath, I watched as a MASSIVE lizard crawled out of the long grass in front of me.  When I say massive, I mean going on a metre long.  I turned back and decide to go around - it was a bit 'Singapore Day 3’ to tempt fate by walking past it.  As an as aside, when I got back to the hostel later in the evening I showed the owner my photo of it and he told me that Thais regularly catch and eat such creatures.  As to whether it would have eaten me, he declined to comment.  My detour around the park had thrown me off a bit and I therefore changed the next priority to finding somewhere to eat.  I fancied a pizza and after an extensive search I found a place that served surprisingly tasty 'crab and pineapple’ pizzas.  By this stage of my day the previous night was beginning to catch up with me, so I went back to the hostel for a quick power nap.  It wasn’t the last of my exploring for the day though, as I had booked a boat trip around the rivers surrounding the city.



Wat Chai Wattanaram, Attahuya