Hello, we are now in Ayuthaya. We flew down from Chiang Mai to Bangkok, and avoided the capital by getting the train straight to Ayuthaya from the airport. Ayuthaya is a historic old capital full of ruined temples, and we spent an enjoyable day visiting the main sites by bicycle. It is currently the Thai New year, Song Kran, which entails soaking passers-by with water (preferably iced water) by bucket, water pistol, hose-pipe or elephant trunk, whichever is most ...

We've been in Sukhothai for two days. We arrived late in the afternoon, and luckily for us there was a local food festival in full swing, complete with live music and dancing. We sampled various items from the stalls, including crispy pork, noodles and prawns. Unfortunately we had to have a day off sight-seeing yesterday due to a bout of stomach upsets, but we are better now. Don't think that it was anything to do with the food festival, but you never know. T...

We only arrived in Chiang Mai this lunchtime, and we're leaving tomorrow, but we managed to fit quite a lot into our half day. We'll be coming back here in a few days to see some more. We visited five wats (temples). At one of them we participated in "Monk Chat", which is a scheme designed to allow visitors to find out more about monks and monks to improve their English and find out more about us. They were shocked and surprised to find out that we have no geck...

We are in Nong Khai, a town in the north-east of Thailand on the Mekong river. On the other side of the river is Laos, where we are heading tomorrow morning. We came up to Nong Khai on the bus from Bangkok, with a stop for one day in a town called Nakhon Ratchasima (or Khorat). We managed to arrive in town during a large festival, and so there were fireworks and lots of stalls in the streets selling everything from fake watches to grilled insects. We bought neith...

Zoe here, I didnt like Bangkok, but then I was ill. The Grand Palace was great, and the big buddha and emerald buddha were interesting but from then on I was mostly bed-bound, surrounded by loud noise as we were staying near the Khao san road which is a nightmare place. I have recovered since we left. This is Ed's bit: the Grand Palace was excellent, even though I'd seen it before. We also went to Wat Pho (with an enormous reclining Buddha) and Wat Traimit (wit...