Ayutthaya is hot! Even with a bit of a base tan it was not enough to contend with the sun while riding old bikes around old Ayutthaya. We got a tourist cartoon map and bravely headed off! Our previous night was interesting, the first thai restaurant with no english, nor pictures. We we hailed into a roadside restaurant like thing and ordered a safe pad thai. The lady kept brining out other dishes saying their name and “free” which we gladly gobbled down. We saw a lot of old ruins which eventually started to meld together as the heat kept pounding down on us. At lunch time we realized it was time to bike back.
The rest of the day involved a lot of rest and a little food at a night market. Tomorrow is a big travel day, Lop Buri and then on to Chiang Mai.
Well if this was the Amazing Race, this would have been one of those “to be continued” episodes.
We had a lot better luck at the forbidden city… aka, it wasn’t closed. It was neat to see, but I wasn’t blown away by it. Tienanmen Square was nice to visit. Impressive, and I am glad to say I have been there… the amount of security in the area is crazy. After we hit the metro/subway to get towards the Summer Palace. Turns out there are two Summer Palaces. One isn’t so impressive… that’s the one we found first. A couple picture of fake cherry blossoms on the trees and we were off to look for the “real/better” one.
When we finally arrived, we were a little taken back. It is an immense area and it was not really clear what everything was. A guide approached us and we took her up on her offer. She was nice, hard to understand, but clearly smart and really into this one Empress. I think Opa would LOVE this place. It might have been my favorite place over all in Beijing. The great wall was exciting because of how famous it is, but the Summer Palace was just beautiful. It takes some work but if you can in your head remove the thousands of tourists, and instead picture what it was like “back in the day” you really cannot help but be even more impressed with the area.
Our guide really wanted to stretch out the tour (plus I think she really really likes everything in the area, and wanted to tell us all the stories of all the pictures, legends, and buildings.) We finally convinced her we were in a rush, and she took us through what i found one of the more beautiful areas really quickly. There were few people around, and it was up in the hill (which was built by dredging the lake by hand.) We cabbed back, had an awesome meal at the Hutong (alleyway) around the hotel, and then had to head off to the night train (and therefore the “to be continued” part)
The train was interesting. Small would be a word to describe it. Also crowded, hot, smoke smelly, and generally speaking something I do not think Marijke would have enjoyed/had the patience for at all 
14 hours later we were in Shanghai. The cabs tried to take us for all we were worth, so we took the metro to Amy’s apartment. Now after some lazing about we are off for some fun times tonight. I suppose that update will need to come later.
