Wat Phra Boromathat Chaiya

Wat Phra Boromathat Chaiya Rat Worawihan (วัดพระบรมธาตุไชยาราชวรวิหาร) is the most important Buddhist temple of Surat Thani, and also one of the most beautiful ones. The central chedi in Srivijaya style with its many golden ornaments is even the iconic symbol of the province Surat Thani.

The reason why the main temple of the province is not located in the provincial capital lies in the history of the province. In fact, the temple was originally in the capital of the Mueang Chaiya, one of the semi-independent city-states which made up Siam until the administrative system was completely overhauled at the begin of the 20th century. Though by then the town Chaiya was moved closer to the sea to present-day Phum Riang - it came back to its original location after the railway was built in 1915. However, by then the province Surat Thani was established by merging the area formerly under Chaiya with the one under Kanchanadit, and the new center of the province was at the mouth of the Tapi river in Ban Don.

Every side of the chedi shows a different ornament, though I don't know much about the actual meaning. Pointing north is a peacock, to the south is Erawan as the multi-headed elephant, to the east a Buddha surrounded by regalia which reminded me of the old coat of arms of Siam. The one on the west side I could not recognize at all. The chedi is surrounded by a walkway with lots of Buddha statues, and several smaller chedis, elephant and other statues, as well as nice small trees. If only it were not so hot and sunny, which made walking around on the hot plaster barefooted far from comfortable.

Much less spectacular than the chedi is the bot, though religiously it is the more important building. Inside are just several smaller Buddha statues, and no murals at the walls.

The three Buddha statues outside next to the Bot are also notable. Normally Buddha statues are always under a roof protected from the elements, however these three are believed to prefer to stay outside - when they were placed under a roof in past, lightning struck and destroyed the building. I don't know if and when this story actually took place, but it sounds like a perfectly fit explanation for these statue's location.

Directly at the temple is also a local branch of the National Museum, which has several items from the Srivijaya times on display. Sadly not allowing photography I did skip the revisit and focused on taking photos of the temple instead. Since I did quite a lot of photos, like the views of the chedi from all four sides, I uploaded the whole collection to flickr.

District museum Yannawa

When I read about Richard Barrow's test ride on the BRT, I was curious to try this new bus system myself. Looking at the route map, I noticed that along the route it has the BMA local museum of Yannawa district, though in between two widely spaced stations, so I had to do quite some walking to get there as well. Nevertheless, this new public transport opens up a new part of Bangkok for those who prefer public transport over taxis, even though these aren't expensive in Bangkok.

The trip to this museum was definitely worth it. Though the museum is a rather small one compared to some other of the district museums I visited, what made it a special visit was the caretaker. The nice woman not only showed me around the items on display, explained them in Thai (sadly I only got maybe 10% of what she told) and also helped me to take good photos by flipping open one Sanskrit manuscript. Not sure what it showed however, but it looked like something about astrology or the calendar. Since she noticed I was quite sweaty from the walk to the museum - it was a rather hot and very sunny day - she also gave me a bottle of water, and a small pack of cookies for snack. I even could get one of the very last copies of the brochures on Yannawa district which she found deep inside a drawer of her desk, hope it wasn't the last one kept for the museum itself.

She not only showed the museum itself, but also the temple where it is housed. Though Wat Khlong Phum (วัดคลองภูมิ) is none of the spectacular temples, it has some interesting sights as well. There are Buddha statues from Ayutthaya times, sadly locked behind bars to prevent theft but which also made photography very difficult; a quite old monk's quarter; the crematorium gave a great view with two failed skyscrapers abandoned in the 1997 Asian crisis in the background; and of course the bot and a viharn next to it also look great, too bad they weren't open to see inside.

My guide even wanted to make sure I will take the right bus to go to my next target, the Bangkok Folk Museum in Bang Rak district (to be featured here later), so she even went to the bus stop in front of the temple with me. I planned to continue my trip by walking to the next BRT station, and then walk within Bang Rak, but it took me a bit to explain my itinerary to her with my still bad Thai.

I had experienced several very good caretakers in the local museums, who very much tried to make my visit worthwhile, but the one in Yannawa topped it all. So if anybody visits this museum after reading my review, make sure to tell her it was "Khun Andreas" from Germany who made you go there.

Grass hill in Ranong

Phu Khao Ya (Grass Hill, ภูเขาหญ้า) or Khao Hua Lan (Bald Hill, เขาหัวล้าน) is an odd landscape feature a few kilometers south of Ranong town directly along Phetkasem highway. Unlike most hills, it is not covered with trees, but only grass, hence the names grass hill or bald hill. Since it was the last stop of a day tour through Ranong, there was not much time left to explore the place in details and walk around on the various trails over and around the hills, but just take the few photos and then continue the return drive to Surat Thani.

But even though it were only a few minutes I walked from parking lot to the most scenic view, the landscape looked really very interesting. I could not find yet what made this hill show this peculiar vegetation, I can only guess it is a secondary landscape with the soil loosing its ability to nourish trees after being deforested. Especially the area between the highway and the hill looks very much like it was made into a meadow for grazing animals.

Apart from too short, the time of the visit was also a bit badly chosen - as it was in later afternoon, the sun was already relatively low in the west, and therefore directly behind the hill when seen from street. At least from the scenic viewpoint it wasn't making photography impossible - it was one of the few days in Ranong on which it had no raining at all, but most of the time sunny. Probably in the morning sun the hill will look even better than it did for me.

Wat Amphawa Chediyaram

With the Amphawa floating market becoming more and more popular as an more authentic alternative to the standard tourist target at Damnoen Saduak, I have used the opportunity to drop it a visit as well. Though I think it is definitely worth a visit, I instead write about the temple right next to it, which normally visitors to the market only notice as their parking lot. Since shopping isn't among my favorite pastimes, I had some time to spend while the family was still busy, and did some walking around the temple complex. It was quite surprising how few people I saw strolling around there, compared to the crowded market area.

Most beautiful is the main hall, which contains the large Buddha statue. While for me as a non-Buddhist the statue did not look any special, the murals on the walls were the most interesting thing to look at in the hall. The one behind the Buddha statue shows, if I am not totally mistaken, the former capital city Ayutthaya before it was destroyed by the Burmese in 1767. But not only the mural behind the Buddha is worth looking at, between each window it has one showing some historical or mythological scenes. It even has small signs under them explaining what it depicted - but sadly only in Thai, so I could not understand which one is the most notable of these murals.

But not just this main hall of the temple has something special to show, in a small and inconspicuous building is another Buddha statue, and more notable a large footprint. Light inside was a bit weak, so the photo turned out to be a bit blurred, I did not bring the tripod since most of the photos I do in Thailand are in the strong sun outdoors, when a tripod is only unnecessary weight.

The final building I entered is the courtyard, a walkway with the donated Buddha statues at the walls, and a white chedi in the middle. Though this part looked so similar to the ones I had seen in countless other temples already, here's a photo of the smaller statues.

District museum Samphanthawong

The district museum of Samphanthawong district, which basically is Chinatown, was originally located within Wat Traimit, the famous golden Buddha temple. It was however removed there in 2006 in order to make space for the massive rebuilding of Wat Traimit, which now has been fully opened. Within the temple it now has a new local museum on the history of Chinatown, the Yaowarat Heritage Centre, a museum I will try to visit in my next trip to Thailand.

The original district museum was however not completely abandoned, it was moved into the Pathum Kongka temple school, only one block away from its original location. To visit it, one however really has to know where to search, as there is no sign at the school entrance nor at the school building which houses the museum. When I went there, the school entrance was blocked by a goal net, as the students played soccer in the inner courtyard, so I had to ask me way through. I was guided to the office building to the right, the upper floor now houses the museum.

The main exhibit in the museum is a row of Chinese shop houses, one with traditional Chinese medicine, a rice trader and a general store. In the larger room it mostly has posters showing reproductions of historic photos with explanation, both in English and Thai, giving an overview of the Chinese community.

Given the much bigger, more elaborate and better located new museum, and even more the total lack of promotion by the Bangkok tourist office (who told Eric from the Tour Bangkok Legacies website that the museum is still in Wat Traimit even after he noticed it being gone) as well as the total lack of signs towards to museum, I doubt it will attract any reasonable number of visitors except those who were able to find the sparse information on it. Though the Song Wat road, at which the museum is located, has far less tourists walking by than on Yaowarat road, one or two English sign would increase the visitor numbers already a lot.

Vin de Ray winery

Vin de Ray (แวงเดอร์เรย์) is a small but high quality winery in Saraburi. If I remember right, it belongs to a Thai TV personality, but the wine is available for sale there in a small shop as well, so it is not solely for the personal fun of this personality. We bought a few bottles, and unlike a Thai wine I once bought in a supermarket and which tastes quite strange, the red wine we bought was same quality as the European ones. At least for the taste of a casual wine drinker. The only other thing we did there was photo taking, while I took only the vineyard with a few workers in behind, whereas my family did many photos posing in front of vine and grapes. Also, for me the large yellow shower tree gave a great color contrast with the blue sky.

The drive to there is also interesting. When coming from Muak Lek, one first passes a stretch of road named mystery road, as its one of those roads where the law of gravity seems to be violated. The car apparently rolls uphill, but of course this is only an optical illusion - which somehow did not work for me. A little later is a much more fascinating one, the tree tunnel. The road goes through a forested valley, and the trees have grown over the road so one drives through a nature-built tunnel. Too bad we did not stop for a photograph there.

District museum Khlong San

The smallest of the Bangkok district museums I have visited so far is the on of Khlong San district, just across the river from Chinatown. It is located within the public library of Wat Anongkharam (วัดอนงคาราม), named Udom Wittaya library (หอสมุดอุดมวิทยา). I love libraries, just sadly it has only Thai books in this one so there was no point in browsing through the shelves - besides I was coming there in late afternoon and it seemed they were about to close soon anyway.

The museum is in the first floor, just up the stairs and then to the right. When I entered, I asked the clerk at ground floor for the location of the museum with those few Thai words I can say, so she directed me upstairs and gave a warning call to the one upstairs that it has a farang coming for the museum. I guess foreigner are a rare sight in there, like in all of these museums.

The central place of the museum area is taken by a portrait of Somdet Ya, the mother of King Bhumipol. She was educated in this temple, and close by the temple a Somdet Ya garden was established around a reconstructed house of your youth.

Other exhibits include old tools used by the main professions in the district, like those salt drying tools I photographed. There's also a bell from the Khlong Sa-Tha Chin railway - originally the Maeklong railway started in this district, now the endpoint is at Wong Wian Yai. Another nice antique exhibit is a metal shop sign; also shown are a few Khon masks manufactured in the district - Ban Khon Thai (บ้านโขนไทย) is located in Khlong San.

The museum is most worth if you combine the visit with the already mentioned nearby Suan Somdet Ya, and the temple Wat Pichai Yat, which I may write about later as well.