Well, I decided to take a day off to see if I could kick start myself and get over the cold or whatever quickly. Jen and Amy went off and saw the Royal Palace (possible name) which is a museum with some history related stuff in it (Luang Prabang is the old capital of Laos, don’t know if I mentioned that before.) After that they went up a hill to a little temple.
They also babied me a bit and brought me food and a watermelon shake which has become my absolute favorite thing to drink over here in Asia. Later in the day we checked out the night market. It was slightly different, but not all that unique from the many we have seen so far. We had a crepe again, it was superb.
There was a pyramid of chocolate which looked like rip-off Ferrero Roche, maybe like 30 or so making up the pyramid and it was only 1/3rd of the price of a much smaller number of ACTUAL Ferrero Roche, so I had to try it. We got back to the room and broke them open. I tried one, and had to spit it out (secretly) so I could still get Amy to try one. She wasn’t as discrete with her displeasure and so Jen never even tried them. A shame, I had high hopes for what ended up being a pyramid of lardy lumps.
Well so far every night in Thailand (outside of Bangkok) we have stayed in a different place every night… tonight is no different. It is a really nice place, but our two rooms are separate buildings and we are without AC, and the mosquito nets, while very pretty, seem like an ominous threat alluding to some potential night time visitors.
Today was more like a recovery day from the trek. We all slept in till about 10, which really isn’t common for all of us (maybe some of us, but not all of us.) We had a nice big meal, I took a chance to eat a pizza while it was sill available… it was good, but it was not an “American pizza.” We hit the internet cafe, and did some research on how we were going to get to Laos at some travel agent places around our hostel.
Every sunday there is a massive street market in Chiang Mai. We walked around for hours on end, and we had barely made a dent by the time exhaustion set in and we had to head back to bed. I don’t think it would have been possible to simply walk around the whole thing which spread through court upon court, and block upon block, never mind actually looking at the stands.
On the way back we got a quick massage for 2 dollars and then hit the sack.
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.
