Thailand Trip November 2016
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04/11/16, A minibus sits in the morning sun at the River City hotel awaiting it's passengers for the first leg of a five day trip and back into the Loei region. An 09:30 start will see the group travel due north along Highway 212 for approximately forty eight kilometers before turning west onto Highway 223. Another seventy one kilometers of travel and they will arrive at the first stop on their journey. At Wat Phra Choeng Chum they will stretch their legs and then walk around what is one of a major and sacred religious monument of Sakon Nakhon Province. |
Wat Phra That Choeng Chum is the in town of Sakon Nakhon. Of rectangular shape, it is made of mortar and bricks with a height of 24 meters. It is featured on the reverse of the Thai ten satang coin. Sakon Nakhon existed as a major city in the Khmer Empire of Khotraboon, with the ancient city of Srikhotraboon within present-day Udon Thani Province as the capital, at the height of its glory during the 12th to the 16th centuries.
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Choeng Chum was the first of quite a number of prominent Shrine's and Temple's we would visit during our trip. What struck me then and looking back now was how colourful and pristine everything was. The bright sunlight gave depth and vividness to all the artifacts as the slideshow will reveal. Rose demonstrated how and then encouraged us to strike this gong. A number of us did so but if you look carefully at the rollover picture, only young Mark had the strength to (inadvertantly)detach the striker head from the shaft. Well done Mark! |
After exploring the visual delights of Wat Phra That Choeng Chum, we boarded the Minibus and set off back the way we had come to Highway 223. We were going to a themed restaurant called Farm Hug. The restaurant attracts customers by selling a specially crossbred variety of beef. Apparently Thai cows are artificially inseminated by a French breed to produce a strain resistant to the heat of Thailand. The cattle are fed on Molasses and other natural foods. They live a lazy life to produce a flavourful meat similar to the Japanese Wagyu. |
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Farm Hug has other delight's besides the food. Out to the rear are mainly old British artifacts like red telephone boxes a red Land Rover and a Penny Farthing bicycle. Other countries are represented too, the USA has on Old Wild West saloon frontage and a Jeep. But there's also animals featured, rabbits and the prominent one being sheep. Correct, that's sheep. It seems to be a craze that goes back to 2012 when the first sheep themed farm opened. Now, the Thai people can't get enough of them. So enjoy the sheep on the left. (The rabbits were shy in the day so I've used a substitute) |
| We had our play with the other toys, the Penny Farthing whch had wobbly handlebars and the Land Rover were two. There were others and they can be seen in the slideshow. This seemed to be the time when the group gelled as a whole. The shared fun and laughter was genuine for all as the pictures show. We carried on playing with the toys on offer and even found time to message Noel Jackson with pictures of the 'Landy' to try to ascertain it's model and age. Ex Veh Mech Neville gave it the once over and immediatley declared it off limits to 'Taff' Williams . |
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Then it was time to travel on once more. We thought Udon
was our destination but after some time, we turned off the main Highway on to a side road. Where were we going? The Red Lotus Sea is the answer or Talay Bua Daeng to give it it's Thai name. We must have had some time to spare as Aek had not included this visit in the itinerary. As it turned out the lotus blossom was not in season with January being the optimum visiting time. So a little inventiveness was required to show just how beautiful Talay Bua Daeng really is.
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| Although Talay Bua Daeng was out of season and we were persuaded not to go and play on the boats, the visit was not wasted as other things were going on. We were told that locals were being encouraged to develope a theme of old fashioned methods to give a style to promote the area. As we were coming to the end of our visit an old chap was herding his Buffalo's with his motorbike. On the side of the road leading to the waters edge, Chalet's were nearing the end of construction, presumably so visitors can stay overnight. |
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As the late afternoon sun started to descend we drove to Highway 2 heading for the Ozone Boutique Hotel in Udon. Highway 2 took us past the Airport entrance and through the city centre heading north out of town.We arrived at the hotel at dusk and booked into our rooms. Aek asked that we could be down in the hotel reception at around 19:00. We were back in the minibus to travel to the Good Everything restaurant for our evening meal. I took three carrier bags with me as I had a task I wanted to perform. |
| The rollover image above should provide a clue to my pleasant task. Since leaving the UK my suitcase had contained gifts for our Thai friends and mentors. The Work done by Aek and Rose twelve months previously left us in no doubt that this trip would be a success. Because of that the OCA had purchased gifts beforehand in the UK to surprise our friends with. They were burning a hole in my suitcase so the occasion gave me the opportunity to off-load them onto the surprised recipients. I think their expressions says it all. |
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After a pleasant meal and (as the rollover above shows) drink, at around 21:00 we returned to the hotel. Our Thai hosts retired to their rooms but we felt the night was young and we would explore a little of Udon. We asked the receptionist if she could suggest somewhere for us go? "Walking Street" was her recommendation. "How far is that" was our retort? "About 1.5 Kilometres". She provided us with a street map and circled the Walking Street area. It was a straight forward stroll as we thought, so we set off to take in a little of Udon. |
The picture above shows us sitting outside Fuzzy Kens Bar at 302 Prajak Rd. The 1.5 Kilometre was in reality 5 Kilometres. Although we had wanted to stretch our legs, we'd imagined a short leisurely stroll to sit and slake our thirst. I would have to give the Receptionist a tutorial in how to estimate distance i.e. use Google Maps. We took a Tuk Tuk back to the Ozone Boutique, the night shift were on so the Receptionist would have to wait until the morrow for her admonishment. So day one of our five day tour ended, we had experienced a lot and had lots of fun as the slideshow reveals. We were ready to sleep but looking forward to day two. |
Slideshow
A slideshow of pictures below of day one of the tour are shown in chronological order. Place your cursor into the picture window to freeze the motion, remove it allow the slideshow to restart. Depending on your connection, it may take a while for the pictures to download and the slideshow to start |
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