Baking in Ayutthaya

Ten years ago I went solo backpacking through South East Asia. Although I was solo, I made many friends along the way, and was even joined by some friends from home… I came to Ayutthaya with Dan, who was visiting from the UEA at the time. We got the train from Bangkok to Ayutthaya and stayed 2 nights before heading back to Bangkok to catch up with Ben. However the city was super interesting and very big with lots of historical sites, I was keen to go back, and also show Dave. And it also conveniently cut up the journey back to Bangkok from Pak Chong…

Ayutthaya used to be the capital of Thailand, (or the Kingdom of Ayutthaya as it was known back then). Founded in 1350, the city was filled with stunning temples and stupas, reflecting its wealth and spirituality. But in 1767, Ayutthaya’s glory came to a sudden end when the Burmese army sacked the city, leaving much of it in ruins. Today, the ruins are a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and a popular tourist destination, especially given its only 1.5 hours from Bangkok.

So, we stopped here on the way back to Bangkok for one night. The ticket was only 23 Baht this time. Honestly, we still can’t get over how cheap the train is!!

We checked into our hostel, Chommuang Guest House, which was very cute with a balcony and private bathroom. Then we took 2 of the bikes from the hostel and after a pit stop at a little vegan joint (which was amazing), headed towards the historical park.

A quick note on vegan joints… Being vegan in Thailand is kind of hard, kind of easy… It’s hard because meat is so uniformly eaten in every dish, and sometimes impossible to omit. For instance the soup broth will be made with blood or bones, or the sauce will have shrimp paste in (almost every curry paste has shrimp in as flavouring), not to mention fish sauce, which is in practically everything here… So there’s no way you can just walk into any restaurant and get something mocked up that’s veggie. But on the other hand, there are a lot of Buddhists, and a Buddhist diet is often “Jay”, which is vegan, but without onion or garlic too. And so most towns have a Jay restaurant (or even several), which is denoted by Thai characters which looks a bit like a number 17, always red in a yellow background. They always tend to do traditional Thai food, but with mock meats and veg instead, and always pretty tasty (and very very spicy!!). So I use HappyCow, and we’re always on the hunt for this ’17’ symbol!! Beating that, there’s always veggie pad thai, or veggie khao pad (fried rice) if we can find somewhere which do these dishes (not all Thai food places do), but these might sometimes have egg in too. We’ve had to resort to this a few times. Especially since, annoyingly, all the jay restaurants seem to close at 5pm, clearly vegans here don’t eat in the evenings… 🤣🤣

Anyway, today was absolutely boiling, definitely the hottest day we’ve had in Thailand so far, so by the time we got to the temples we were already melting. I bought a little handheld electric fan from the shop near Wat Mahathat, which did help a little, but I don’t think much could help in this temperature!!

We just went to Wat Mahathat, Bueng Phra Ram Park and Wat Ratcha Burana before deciding too much was too much. We’d both sweated through all our clothes, honestly I don’t think there was one dry patch on my shorts or T-shirt 🤣 we headed back to shower and hide in the AC for a bit

It cooled down a little after sunset, and so we headed out to the night market. There was a pretty cool storm in the distance too, and we’re both pretty sure we saw a plane get hit by lightning. We walked through the whole night market and this time, we didn’t see anything which was (or could be) veggie or vegan, but there was a touristy restaurant open which had a couple of vegetarian options.

After food we headed down towards the bar area of Ayutthaya (Naresaun Soi 2) and managed to find a place with a pool table for a few frames and drinks!

Then the next day we headed back to Bangkok on the train and this time stayed closer to Khaosan road area. We stayed in Baan Nampetch Hostel, which I’d definitely recommend.

That evening we went out for a wander and a mini bar crawl down Ram Buttri Alley, and then Khaosan, which is mental, even now in low season. We stopped at prime burger for possibly the BEST EVER vegan beyond burger I’ve ever had 😋 omg it was so good!!! There are way more vegan options on Bangkok, especially in the touristy places.

Then the next day we said goodbye to Bangkok (for now), and decided to start a slow journey south in search of the sea again… Dave stopped at a Decathlon to invest in a nice new snorkel mask, and we’re hoping to be back in the water soon… Watch this space! 😊

I have a list of several Thai islands I want to visit… At the top is Koh Phayam, Koh Tao, Koh Lipe, Koh Haa, but it’s a long list so hope we can see them all, and we will definitely add to them as we go, I’m sure… (For instance, Koh Bulon now also on the list haha).