N 61 Samut Songkhram

We took our leave when it was time for the" hsoon" offering ceremony and hired another taxi to go to Samut Songkhram. As it was new year the driver agreed to go by meter , when at other times he would ask for more.

    

This part of the journey is longer than the first part, but when we reach Samut Songkhram which is also called Ampawa it was still early , about 11.  But there were already many people and cars there, and many shops selling souvenirs and foods. We saw water ahead of us and headed towards there and arrived at a river’s bank. We bought tickets for a boat ride which said they would take us to 5 temples which will last 2 hours.

      

 And so we started our ride and before long reached the first temple on the bank of the river. Before alighting from the boat somebody said we have 15 minutes to visit the temple and have to come back to the boat after that, The first one is a beautiful temple and needless to say built in Thai style. There are some food shops in the ground and I noticed one particular , though not a strange food. It is half fried quail eggs and they are sold in every temple ground.  I have never seen fried quail eggs in our country  but only boiled ones.. What we did at the temple were taking photos, strolling around, put some money in donation boxes and then back onto our boats.

   

  I didn’t see many foreign tourists at these temples. Nearly all are locals enjoying the new year holidays. One Thai woman was friendly and she explained to us what we should know about the trip in English. I asked her what the name of the river is and she told us it is called Mae Klong River and flows towards Malaysia. I asked her if she has been to Myanmar and she replied “ No, I don,t have time to travel “ So she would be always busy ( with business ) I guessed.

   

  When we had finished our temple visits I heaved a sigh of relief as it had been a little difficult to get on and off the boat with my walking stick but I also had enjoyed the trip greatly.

 When we came back onto the bank it was past  time for lunch and we found a place to eat under a bridge. After lunch we enquired about how to get back to Bangkok and we came to know that there is a mini bus service to Bangkok which costs 80 bahts for each person. We bought tickets and fortunately didn’t have to wait  long for take off. The ride took about nearly 3 hours but we reached the bus station at Victory Monument in good time.