I woke up in my hotel in Ayutthaya and went to grab some breakfast in the courtyard before starting out on my explorations. My hotel had a nice breakfast with toast, juice, coffee, and fruit and then a main course of your choice (either more traditional Thai fare with rice etc. or more Americanized options). I went ahead and had eggs and sausage as I figured the protein would fill me up for a busy day. 

Once I’d had my fair share of food, I took off towards the historic city. I started at Wat Ratchaburana . I bought a ticket to be able to get into all of the different archeological sites in the city and then headed into the first one I’d chosen to visit for the day. 

As with the day before, I wandered through the ruins, getting pictures and admiring everything there was to see. Wat Ratchaburana actually ended up being one of my favorite sites. One of the phrangs was actually open to go up inside. There were even some bats up in the corners of the chamber and you could admire the view of the temple from the top. 

It didn’t take too long to see everything there was to see. Temperatures were heating up so I took off to the next site I’d planned to visit as quickly as I could, stopping a couple of times along the way to see other interesting things. 

So as I mentioned in my last post, Ayutthaya is very spread out. Which is why a lot of people visiting more than one site choose to rent a bike. Unfortunately, overconfident person that I am, I looked at the distance and figured “oh I can just walk it”. 

You’d think I’d have learned my lesson the day before of realizing Thai streets are not always built for walking.

Still, I went ahead and walked down to Wat Thammikarat, another site that was open for no charge. 

Next was probably my biggest priority, heading to the site of the old palace (Wang Luang). I started by visiting Wat Mongkol Borpit. Much of Ayutthaya is in some amount of ruin, bases of buildings, crumbling phrangs, and chedis that are just exposed brick. This temple was a little more modern (1500s rather than 1300s), but it was also in a restored state and is still currently a working temple. 

When I was done seeing the inside of the temple, I decided it was time to take a little break. Temperatures were continuing to rise. I know the hottest temperature I saw in terms of “currently feels like” was 109 degrees F (42 degrees C). 

So I had a milk tea and some water and relaxed in the shade for a little bit. 

Finally, I felt refreshed enough to continue, so I went on to visit the old palace. I wandered through, taking breaks in the shade of some trees as needed. 

When I finished up seeing everything there was to see at Wang Luang, I headed over to Wat Phra Ram. I did stop to admire the elephants doing rides outside of the temple. Sadly, modern research shows that riding elephants can be harmful to them. So while I definitely would have loved to ride one in theory, I made a conscious decision not to participate. Still, I snapped a couple photos of the elephants walking by. They are definitely beautiful creatures. I hope one day Ayutthaya will get rid of their elephant rides, but sadly that’s probably a long way in the future at this point. 

 Still, I headed into Wat Phra Ram and saw everything there was to see there. 

It was getting to be almost noon, so I hastened my pace a little, determined to see everything on my list before the heat became unbearable. 

So, as quickly as I could, I made my way across the river to Wat Chaiwatthanaram, another ancient temple right along the Chao Phraya river. 

I had thought about stopping for lunch, but again just felt any long break would only let the heat continue to increase. So with that in mind I grabbed some snacks at the 7 Eleven and then continued on my walk to the temple. 

Some might feel like “well it’s just another crumbling temple, if you’ve seen one you’ve seen them all” but for me, I enjoyed the uniqueness of each one I saw. Wat Chaiwatthanaram had several very detailed parts, and several terracotta impressions of stories from the Buddha’s life. There was some restoration work being done, so there was some ugly scaffolding on a couple parts, but otherwise it was still impressive to see. 

As I was already on the other side of the river, I opted to head down to Wat Phutthaisawan. It was one of the few temples that wasn’t completely destroyed during the collapse of Ayutthaya so it is actually still in beautiful condition and still used today. Unfortunately, it too was having some restoration work and had scaffolding, but it was still interesting to see what the former city might have looked like in its full glory rather than the crumbling archeological site that it is today. 

The temperature was reaching its peak, and in order to get back across the river to my hotel, it would be a long walk. I opted to have a Grab car pick me up and take me to the Ayutthaya Historical Study Center on the other side of the river. 

The study center was a small museum talking more about the history of Ayutthaya and giving more information about the various archeological sites. I particularly enjoyed that it was airconditioned so I could start to cool down after so much time out in the sun. 

After I’d seen everything there was to see inside, I headed back out. I debated if I wanted to go elsewhere, but honestly I was exhausted. I’d walked about 14 miles (22 km), so I needed a break. 

I headed back to my hotel, had a cold shower and otherwise just relaxed for the remainder of the hot and humid afternoon. 

I was definitely getting pretty hungry though, so I soon mustered my strength and went back out to find some food. I ended up at Malakor Kitchen and Cafe.

I sat on their porch as the inside had open windows as well, so wouldn’t be much cooler. They did have lots of fans at least, so that definitely helped with the heat.

I had a passionfruit smoothie, some spring rolls, and a curry with pork and betel leaves (a leafy green kind of like spinach). Everything was delicious. 

After finishing up dinner, I took a few more pictures of the temples lit up at night before heading back to my hotel. I needed to get packed as I would be taking off for my next destination early the next morning. However, I definitely had enjoyed what Ayutthaya had to offer. I saw so much beautiful history and it’s not a place I’ll forget anytime soon.