{"id":824,"date":"2014-02-06T23:38:44","date_gmt":"2014-02-06T23:38:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/radcopter.com\/brianandmarisa\/worldtrip\/?p=824"},"modified":"2014-02-06T23:38:44","modified_gmt":"2014-02-06T23:38:44","slug":"the-ruined-kingdoms-of-ayutthaya-and-sukhothai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/2014\/02\/06\/the-ruined-kingdoms-of-ayutthaya-and-sukhothai\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ruined Kingdoms of Ayutthaya and Sukhothai"},"content":{"rendered":"

After Bangkok, we decided it’d be interesting to have a completely different change of scenery and visit the ruins of Thailand’s former capitals. Ayutthaya, the capital of the Siamese Kingdom from 1350-1767, is located about an hour and a half north from Bangkok. According to UNESCO, Ayutthaya was one of, “the\u00a0world\u2019s largest and most cosmopolitan urban areas and a center of global diplomacy and commerce.” It was destroyed by the Burmese and rather than rebuilding it, the capital was moved to what is now Bangkok.<\/p>\n

Ayutthaya today is a small town with sites of the ruins interspersed with contemporary life. We stayed in a guesthouse on the other side of the river, so we had fun renting bicycles and ferrying them across to the ruins on what must be the world’s shortest ferry rides (I’d estimate it took us not much more than two minutes to get across.) From there, we easily cycled around the ruins.<\/p>\n

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Ferry crossing like a local and sticking out like a tourist!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Sadly,many of the Buddha statues here are headless due to looters taking them and selling them West, but they do make for interesting pictures.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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More headless Buddhas.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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And sometimes there are heads and no bodies!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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At the site of the best preserved chedis (another term for stupa).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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We even saw a bride and groom taking pictures there! I guess the location would make for some very unusual wedding photos.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The coolest thing to see in Ayutthaya is this Buddha head which has roots from a banyan tree growing around it. Very auspicious!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Statue carved into the side of a temple.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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I’m so tiny!!!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After we spent a day in Ayutthaya (which is all you need to see the place), we made our way 6 hours north to Sukhothai. Sukhothai was the capital of the Kingdom of Siam in the 13th and 14th centuries. Although older than Ayutthaya, the ruins are much better preserved in Sukhothai.<\/p>\n

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Unlike Ayutthaya, many of the Buddhas are well preserved and fully in possession of their heads.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Brian took this artistic shot.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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It was actually somewhat pretty and green around the ruins.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Cycling through the Sukhothai ruins. Brian is so serious about bikes, that it is pretty funny to see him on a cruiser bike that is too small for him.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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This is the most famous Buddha in Sukhothai, due to its exceptionally long fingers.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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A close up of the famous fingers.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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I just liked this picture.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After Bangkok, we decided it’d be interesting to have a completely different change of scenery and visit the ruins of Thailand’s former capitals. Ayutthaya, the capital of the Siamese Kingdom from 1350-1767, is located about an hour and a half north from Bangkok. According to UNESCO, Ayutthaya was one of, “the\u00a0world\u2019s largest and most cosmopolitan […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,16,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-824","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-places","category-seasia","category-thailand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}