Thanks to Lonely Planet, I did a few extra miles of walking along major highways to get to the Northern bus terminal where the busses for Ayutthaya depart every 20 minutes. Ayutthaya is the ancient capital of Thailand, and, according to Lonely Planet, a fantastic day trip.
At the bus terminal, a nice man with a severe limp showed me the exact bus to get on, thankfully a luxury, air conditioned one, and 2 hours later, I was in the ancient city of Ayutthaya. Except where the bus dropped me off, it looked like a suburb of Bangkok. There was not an ancient wat, building or buddha in site. Oh brother.
Somehow a tourist office where I told the girl I wanted to rent a bicycle. She giggled and gestured that the bicycle was much too small for me. I pictured myself tooling around town on a clown-sized tricycle. Why did I come here?
The rest of the day went much about the same. I had a vegetarian lunch where I bit into a scalding hot chili pepper in the first bite that sent sharp pains from my lips to my ears and tears down my cheeks. I pulled my back out while riding the too small bicycle. I rode behind busses that pumped clouds of diesel fumes in my face while I pedaled from ruin to ruin.
I am not one for ruins.
