Today we headed to Old Sukhothai, a world heritage site of ruins which is 12km from where we're staying in New Sukhothai. We hired bikes for 50p each and off we went.
There were loads of ruins with a main site holding the most impressive collection set out in a beautiful coconut palm tree park with regular moats, lakes and ponds spread out. There were 3 other sites as well but after 3 hours of cycling round on a rare scorching day, we didn't want to pay another £2 each for the others. We were tired, needed a drink and I had a very sore bum!
The ruins were really impressive, much more so than I thought they would be. My favourite was a massive Buddha who in his prime, had his eyes peeping out the top of a temple. The roof of that temple has gone now though, so he's just half surrounded by a wall and still impressive (see pic).
We also saw 2 big lizards. One was like a giant gecko (the little ones we're so used to seeing on roofs and walls daily). But this one was about 20 x the size, like he'd swallowed some toxic or something to make him so big. The other looked like a mini iguana though still big compared to our normal lizards. He had a beautiful electric blue mane going down his back and one of those puffy out chin things that was a lovely purple. I loved him! I managed to get some good photos of him on my camera.
Tomorrow we head to Ayutthaya for more ruins and for a day trip to the 'Jungle Book' town of Lopburi. The ruins there are overrun with monkeys, which also roam the pavements around town too. I'm a little nervous about them but still want to witness it nonetheless!