DIY Ayutthaya Historical Park
How to
go to Ayutthaya:
I
wanted to do this DIY rather than join a group.
According
to Tripadvisor, the best way to DIY Ayutthaya is by riding a minivan.
Alternative options are taking the bus and train. We went with the minivan –
read: parang FX. I found this blog as a guide in DIY-ing our Ayutthaya day.
We
navigated our way from Sala Daeng to Victory Monument station. By reading the
exit maps, we located Fashion Mall Shopping Center. In front of the mall are these minivans that will take us to Ayutthaya.
Someone collected BHT 60 when we got in. A couple of minutes later, some locals
and some fellow tourists arrived. The presence of the tourists calmed me, we
were riding the correct minivan.
When
we arrived, there was this energetic small lady selling her Ayutthaya Temple Tour
services. She whips out a laminated board with a map of the place and the
temples that we are visiting.
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| Ayutthaya map |
She was amusing, so we said yes. We got the tour
for BHT 700 for 4 hours – we haggled it down from BHT 800, saying it was the
lean season anyway. We will just add for each additional hour.
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| Our pink tuktuk |
As for
the temple names, I cannot recall all of them. So just refer to this blog for
their names. Hehehehe. I already have temple overload from Angkor Wat. This post won't be very helpful naming those temples. And the temples in Ayutthaya temples have longer names too.
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| Emphasize the yellow para naman maiba |
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| Up there |
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| We are enlightened |
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| The Wushu and Yoga pose |
There were lots of monks visiting the temples. Pilgrimage tours, perhaps?
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| Lots of gold inside |
By this day, we were now wearing clothes that we bought during the trip. My dress was from Cambodia, while Sarah's malong pants were from Patpong's night markets.
Some other temples charge a minimum fee to enter - from BHT 20 to BHT 50. We didn't go inside all of them. We did some "see-pose-shoot-and-run" combo.
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| See? No payong pose! |
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| I faint...fabulously |
Field trip.
Just when we though we'd kinda seen it all before, we saw this:
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| Fantastic destruction |
Ayutthaya Historical Park reminds me a lot of Angkor Wat. I guess we packed a lot of temples in this Indochina trip. Or maybe because we didn't have a private guide this time to tell us stories about these ruins? We didn't stay long after those four hours. At around 3pm, we were already heading back to Bangkok.
Our weather = perfect. Medyo mainit, pero okay na! :D
ReplyDeleteYes, dear, you faint fabulously.
Question lang. Saan ba ang dapat babaan ng mga van sa Ayutthaya? My friend was on solo travel to Ayutthaya last week. Nakarating yung van nila sa Ayutthaya at around 8am. Lahat ng sakay ng van (with tourists and locals) nagsibabaan na dun sa Ayutthaya mall something. She assumed dun na ang last stop pero parang hindi pa pala dun kc wala naman syang makitang temples. She had a hard time asking for directions kc lahat ng natanungan nya di nakakaintindi ng English. Nawala na rin daw yung ibang tourists. She was lost and scared. She crossed a street and may van dun. She asked na lang if papunta yun ng bangkok. When they said yes, sumakay nalng sya pauwi.
ReplyDeleteI can't remember a mall kung san kami bumaba. Parang terminal and market sya na area. We didn't see any temples in that area kung san kami bumaba pero nilapitan kami agad ng tuktuk lady offering her tours. She drove us near around the temples. She spoke little English too but we got by.
ReplyDeleteWhen we rode the van going back to BKK, the tuktuk lady driver brought us back to the van terminal.