Hello from Ayutthaya

Hi Everyone. I apologize for not writing from Ko Samet but the Internet prices were way to high and we were way to cheap to pay them :) I'll do my best the sum up the last few days.

Ko Samet

We left Shanti Lodge (in Bangkok) bright and early on Sunday the 13th. The taxi ride was crazy. The guy's car said in big letter "I Love Farang - I speak English". The guy didn't speak a word of English except the word taxi. With the help of our handy phrase book we were able to tell him that we needed to get to the Eastern Bus Terminal. From there we took a bus to Ban Phe. We must have gotten on a private company bus because it was cheaper than we expected and only took 2 hours instead of 3-1/2. When we arrived at Ban Phe we had to take a ferry across to Ko Samet. The ferry was nice and relaxing. Man do they ever cram as many people as they can though. The thing was about to burst. Forty minutes and 50 baht later we arrive at Nuan Tip Pier. We made our way to Naga Bungalows. Let's just say that "rustic" came to mind when we saw our room. In hindsight we should have said no and tried elsewhere but we arrived fairly late in the day and we were worried they would all be full (not to mention we didn't really think of it until after). The bungalow consisted of what we think was a mattress (but as hard as the floor), two pillows and a mosquito net. The net should have been our first indication that the next few days were going to be interesting, but we didn't really clue in. This was our first experience with shared bathrooms and they were... well very gross. I don't think they cleaned them often enough and they smelled horrible!! We were too late to hit the beach that day so we relaxed, watched one of the movies that showed and had dinner. Right around 5pm is when the mosquitoes came out. Paul and I were eaten alive! Apparently Thai mosquitoes are immune to Deet because our bug stray didn't do squat. I got 14 bites in one night. It made the evenings very unpleasant. We usually went to bed pretty early and feel asleep right away. We must have been tired because Naga's bar was crowded and loud until the wee hours of the morning, but it didn't bother us at all.

The next day we hit the beach. We got up early and rented two chairs right by the ocean. We spent the whole day down there, mostly reading and sleeping. It was nice and relaxing. Just what we needed to help get over our culture shock. We had some pineapple in a bag - yummy!!Although we were plastered in sunscreen we both spent a bit too much time in the sun and got burnt. It wasn't bad, but bad enough to keep us away from the beach the second day. Instead we spent the morning of day two trekking to a 14m Buddha and the afternoon lounging in the guesthouse common area reading and playing cards. I also got to catch up on some much needed journal writing time.

And now I will write about THE SNAKE!! I figured that this needed a whole paragraph to itself. While we were in the common room minding our own business reading Paul saw a huge snake slither through the lobby and out onto the stairs that led down to the road. He TOTALLY freaked out. I saw the tail end of it and by the looks of it, it must have been at least 5 feet long. It was probably harmless, but none the less Paul looked up from his book every 2 minutes or so to check to see if the coast was clear.

Bangkok (again)

We left Ko Samet (covered in bites but semi-relaxed) on the 16th in hopes of reaching Ayutthaya by the evening. When we arrived at the bus station in Bangkok we couldn't find a taxi that was willing to drive us to the train station and use the meter! They all insisted on a flat rate. Once again, knowing we were probably being ripped off we climbed in a taxi and drove off. Luckily the taxi driver dropped us off at the TAT. We spoke to a guy there and he hold us that there was a full moon candle festival that night in Ayutthaya and that it would be impossible to find a place to stay. Paul and I were pretty upset - the last thing we wanted to do was spend another night in Bangkok. Unfortunately it didn't really seem like we had an option. The guy recommended a hotel down the street - a 10 minute walk from the train station. The cost was a little more than we were willing to spend (600 baht a night), but it included breakfast (a nice big buffet) and didn't involve another taxi ride. We did the math in our head and decided that this was the most economical decision since were weren't really close to any guesthouses that we knew of. So we spent last night in Bangkok's Chinatown in a room with air conditioning and hot water. We took advantage of our free time to do a ton of laundry which had been piling up over the past few days.

Today we got up at six in the morning, showered, packed, had a very nice western style breakfast and walked to the train station. The train ride was pretty cool. It was neat to see the countryside as we made our way to Ayutthaya. The train was full of Thai people. We've already started to get used to people staring at us. I can't blame them - it's not like there are lots of white people in Thailand.

Anyway, we arrived here safe and sound. We are staying at the U.P Inn (formerly known as the P.U. Guesthouse - I guess we know why they changed their name). The room is beautiful - better than the one at Shanti and it's inexpensive. We're not sure how we're going to spend the day today. We already had to go out and buy batteries because our battery charger is broken. We will write about our experience here in a few days. We're staying tonight and tomorrow and then heading up north after that. Peace and love to you all.