Simply cycling around
The next visit of the day is this Chinese temple made by Thai people. Underneath that huge dragon there is a museum (about Dragons) but the entrance is something like 300 baht for Thai people and 500 for foreigners, something like this. That will be without me guys.
Today is such a day full of pictures and stories that I decided to cut it in 4 parts. This morning we started with an unexpected and short visit of an old temple. Then we cycled to Suphan Buri where we ate breakfast and visited a famous temple called Wat Palelai. The rest of the visit will be described in the coming posts.
First day travelling towards Chiang Mai. Today we left Ratchaburi with Pita, Kate and Grandin. On the way we visited the most famous floating market in Thailand where we had a brunch. Then we kept on cycling towards Nakhon Pathom and reached Grandin’s friend’s house. His friend invited us to stay for the night. Khunoi owns a bicycle shop. He is specialised in rebuilding Retro bicycles. That evening, he proudly showed us what he does which was very impressive.
Let’s resume Bangkok in one post. I’m not particularly attracted by these megapols at all. I’ve done all I had to do here and certainly too much shopping malls. I’ve been to the embassy, cycled around the city to reach the different places, try to sleep in the cheapest backpackers I could because I stayed only one night at Pita’s mom “boombed” place and saw Stéphane few more times before we take different directions across Asia. That’s all!
This afternoon, Pita offered to visit a pot factory. Pottery is the emblem of Ratchaburi which for decades had the best mud in the country and produced very good quality products. Today it’s still the case but there is more competition with material coming from north of Thailand. Today, their worse enemy is plastic. Since the last 10-15 years, their production decreased a lot because people prefer using polluting plastic rather than handmade pottery. Naturally the prices are very different but that should not be a reason! By 2050, because of our crazy plastic production (helped by the overfishing industry) there will be more plastic than fish in the oceans! Humans, we are irresponsible.
Today is a plenty day! Pita did for us a pro tour with lots different things so see and discover. First we worked on her Adobe house this morning, had lunch and hopped on our bicycles again. The original goal was to visit one of her friend who is an expert in Adobe house. He lives about 20 kilometres from where we started. On the way, we stopped first at a factory where they made traditional textile. Then we stopped at two other places where they do the same but handmade. Then we kept cycling and stopped on the way at a brick factory. The guys were very nice and showed us the whole process. Then, we kept on going until we stopped to the place where Grandin (The monk I’ve been cycling with from Singapore to Malacca) built an Adobe house for a friend. And finally, 4 or 5 hours later, we arrived at Pita’s friend property where we had dinner. After that we cycled the 20km back to Pita’s home.
When Pita offered us to visit a Pagoda she said “it’s very old and not nice, do you really want to visit?” haha, we said “yes! of course, sounds good :-)” We hopped on our bicycles and started the tour. This temple is actually a new one. Well the original was built 1000 years ago, then destroyed partially, then finally restored 700 years ago. I guess the white patworks have been added along the way to maintain the Pagona in a decent shape.