Sukhothai itself is so big that unless it’s a whirlwind tour, there’s no way of doing it in one day. Tom and I took two days to check out selected temples. Some beauties were in the central area, like this one so reminiscent of Angkor Wat.
It was fantastic how the structure still remained and the hedge and grass was so beautifully manicured. I’m not sure if it’s an accurate reconstruction but it sure does look grand this way!
Further along in the Sukhothai complex was this delightfully concealed Buddha image which you could only see through a slit in the surrounding wall. There were quite a few obstacles in the line of sight and only from certain special angles could I get a picture.
And only right at the base of the Buddha could I get a good shot at the entire statue. Here Tom and Erico show exactly how big the statue is.
As usual, the elegant tapered fingers of the Buddha are testament to the skill of the craftsmen who created it.
And here we are going up to the last part of complex. The clouds were gathering and Erico still gamely soldiered on. Tom and I met Erico the day before when he stopped us and asked for directions. We fell into conversation and bonded over food at the Sukhothai Food Festival. We continued on together for a few days after that. It was good fun to have another friend on the adventure!
This last stop was a rather dilapidated Buddha image on the top of the hill. The standing Buddha looked like it had not only seen better days, it’d probably seen much worse ones in storms too! Its charred -looking body made me think it’d been struck once too many times by lightning.
One of the Buddha images on its side was in slightly better shape. I like how the gilding on its lips still remained, making it look incongruously made up.
And that was us on the top of the hill before the storm broke: a Brazilian, a Brit and a Singaporean enjoying a Thai adventure.
We made it back to shelter just in time. The storm broke over us as we enjoyed our lunch of pad thai and my favourite pad kapow (stir-fried pork with holy basil). After the storm was done, we wandered around some more and enjoyed the lovely dusk over Sukhothai.
eat. drink. cook. travel. 