WarProfiteer
Senior Member
- Joined
- May 17, 2013
- Bikes
- currently renting & deciding
It's one of those places I have been meaning to get around to, but just never quite ended up. Sukothai, ancient capital of modern day Thailand. I was going with the she-wok on the back, riding a Honda CB500X. Because of her school schedule, the plan was to leave on a Friday when she finished class (around lunch time) and just get down there, check in to the hotel (Pai Sukothai resort- more on that later), then wake up early the next day & tour the historic park, then back to the hotel to check out & head home.
The intended route was 11-101-12-1-106-108...
For the most part, the weather cooperated on the way there. As we approached Den Chai, it started pouring down so we ducked off the road under a large tree beside a wood working shop. The owner came out and was chatting to me about bikes, his son and how the kid had broke both arms on a 250 a while back in a bad wreck, but now wanted a 650, etc... after a few minutes the rain became torrential- enough to penetrate our tree cover. The Thai guy suggest I bring the motorcycle into his wood shop/store & I accepted.
As you can see, he even pulled out some chairs for us. Indeed it was a simple act of kindness, the kind that goes against the grain of much of the internet writing about Thais, but we were grateful as it was really raining cats and dogs for about 10-15 minutes there. After about a 40 minute delay we got back out on the road.
Speaking of the roads, a word about the 11-101 interchange... in order to properly connect, when you hit the 101 it's a hairpin nearly back to the way you came, if you want to head towards Sukothai. There are no signs that will tell you this. As you're moving along at speed, the road just "becomes" the 101 around Den Chai, so it's tricky for those of us without a GPS. I definitely wasted a lot of time circling around Den Chai, getting continuously conflicting directions on which way to go. Turns out that there are indeed 2 ways... the first would be to stick to that section of the 101 because it suddenly "becomes" the 11 again... then go down to Uttaradit, then over via the 102, to connect back with the 101 which leads right into SuktoThai. The other is just to make the proper turn when the 11 turns into the 101. Thus there are 2 ways to go and thus my exasperation at continually getting different directions... some saying turn back, others saying go forward more. It was almost comical when I stopped at a small roadside restaurant and the two women working there pointed one direction and the two men eating behind them pointed in the opposite direction. Much debate ensued and I could only smile to the heavens and wish I had invested in a GPS. Funny, it all looked so easy on paper...
Anyway, we finally arrived into Sukothai about 6.5 hours later. I reckon without any weather issues, and if you knew to slow down and catch the afore mentioned poorly marked hairpin, it would probably be a 5 hour trip, including stops. And believe me, it's a pretty boring one. Nothing to see and no steering inputs needed... long, straight, flat, boring. If someone knows of a better way to get down there from CM, please let me know.
We stayed at the Pai Sukothai resort and it was a mixed bag. On the plus side, the bed was very comfortable, the room was big and nice, there's a pool (which we didnt use) and the breakfast is one of the better hotel breakfasts I've ever had. On the downside, it actually costs more if you check in with 2 people as opposed to one, despite it still being just one room. Ostensibly this would be to cover the breakfast of the other person, but I'd just never seen it done like that. The extra-person fee was 250 baht, making the total room cost 1600 baht. I was tired and didnt argue the point, but later I thought "that would buy a helluva breakfast elsewhere". The hotel is trying to be slightly upscale, but the service really isnt there. There are very fancy looking porcelain containers in the shower for shower gel, shampoo and conditioner... all were dead empty. They do the swan thing with the towels on the bed, but the aircon is crap. Half the staff is helpful and smiley, the other half (including the mgr) look like they're annoyed at having to deal with you. So, hits and misses. If I had it to do over again, I would've stayed for 25% the cost at The Garden House, which is just steps away from Pai Sukothai. Live and learn...
The next morning we awoke bright & early to hit the historic park (pics are coming, I promise). If there's one great piece of advice I garnered from my online research before the trip, it was this... GO EARLY. The park actually opens to visitors at 0600. That's too damn early for me, but around 9am the tour buses start showing up and offloading crowds of people... if you have any hope at all of getting a few decent shots without hordes of strangers in the background, go early. We got there about 0745 and it worked out great as we had already hit the main sites by the time the crowds were coming, and we were off to the smaller and further away ones by then.
So... on with the pix...
For those who have never been there, the historic park is a fairly large site with the individual places to see spread out around the grounds. You could, if you were determined to do so, walk between the various points of interest. Or you can do what most people do and rent a bicycle across the street for 20 baht. Tour groups get loaded on to trolley cars to ferry them around. I saw a gardener drive his motorbike inside so I pulled up to the gate and told the she-wok to ask... sure enough "big bike ok! Only 20 baht!". Sweet.
This was the king who established Sukothai. He was also supposedly the first to create the formal Thai written alphabet. So there's a newer monument to him there.
There's one site with a trio of Khmer style temples. As we didnt rent the headsets (I just didnt see a place to do so at the gate I entered- bikes cant go in the main gate, they have to use one on the southern side of the site), I dont know if this was something the Khmers built when they owned this plot of land or if, because of there being so many Khmers still living there, one temple was built in their style to sort of show they were welcome. Anyway, here's a few shots of that one...
There are lots of ponds and ditches around the place... my guess is they provide drainage to keep the water away from the historic structures. It's really well integrated, to be honest... it actually makes the place look nicer. Attractive yet functional... win-win.
A few more random shots...
We finally headed out around 3.5 hours later. A visit there could easily be made longer or shorter, depending on the circumstances and what you'd prefer. I will say that having now seen both Ayutthaya and Sukothai, the latter is far superior. You can tell a lot of money and actual planning went into preserving and presenting this historic area. It is absolutely worth the boring drive to visit this place. Entry fee was 100 baht for farangs, 20 for Thais and 20 if you want to bring your bike in. We brought some water with us, which I recommend, but if you forget there are vendors around here and there.
We checked out of the hotel and headed over to Tak, then up the 1 to the "historic route" of the 106. Unfortunately the rain wasnt being so kind to us on the way back and we ended up stopping 4 or 5 times because of it. Towards the end as we approached Lamphun, I was pretty much ready to just ride on home and get soaked. The she-wok felt different though. I could have just made an executive decision, but I somehow knew I would be in for an "I told you so" if I pushed on. I also wanted to end my trip, as I do all my road trips, with a celebratory beer at Rider's Corner, so staying semi-dry was the right move.
Unfortunately, while coming through Lamphun, there's a large market on Saturdays apparently. I could not go down the roads I needed to go down to connect to the 108. Without a GPS, trying to find the way over to 108 was hopeless... that part of Lamphun felt like a damn rabbit warren. Looking back now, I should have circled around via the 116 and just avoided the city all together. I wont be going into Lamphun like that again... a frustrating waste of time, that place. Or maybe I was just ready to get to Phil's & have a beer.
Ok, hope you guys enjoy the pix and gain some insight from my trip. It really is a fairly lame ride, with the 106 providing the only fun twistys there are. Still, this time it was more about the destination. And it was very much worth it... hell, to show how much I enjoyed it, I would actually even go see it again. It's that good.
The intended route was 11-101-12-1-106-108...
For the most part, the weather cooperated on the way there. As we approached Den Chai, it started pouring down so we ducked off the road under a large tree beside a wood working shop. The owner came out and was chatting to me about bikes, his son and how the kid had broke both arms on a 250 a while back in a bad wreck, but now wanted a 650, etc... after a few minutes the rain became torrential- enough to penetrate our tree cover. The Thai guy suggest I bring the motorcycle into his wood shop/store & I accepted.
As you can see, he even pulled out some chairs for us. Indeed it was a simple act of kindness, the kind that goes against the grain of much of the internet writing about Thais, but we were grateful as it was really raining cats and dogs for about 10-15 minutes there. After about a 40 minute delay we got back out on the road.
Speaking of the roads, a word about the 11-101 interchange... in order to properly connect, when you hit the 101 it's a hairpin nearly back to the way you came, if you want to head towards Sukothai. There are no signs that will tell you this. As you're moving along at speed, the road just "becomes" the 101 around Den Chai, so it's tricky for those of us without a GPS. I definitely wasted a lot of time circling around Den Chai, getting continuously conflicting directions on which way to go. Turns out that there are indeed 2 ways... the first would be to stick to that section of the 101 because it suddenly "becomes" the 11 again... then go down to Uttaradit, then over via the 102, to connect back with the 101 which leads right into SuktoThai. The other is just to make the proper turn when the 11 turns into the 101. Thus there are 2 ways to go and thus my exasperation at continually getting different directions... some saying turn back, others saying go forward more. It was almost comical when I stopped at a small roadside restaurant and the two women working there pointed one direction and the two men eating behind them pointed in the opposite direction. Much debate ensued and I could only smile to the heavens and wish I had invested in a GPS. Funny, it all looked so easy on paper...
Anyway, we finally arrived into Sukothai about 6.5 hours later. I reckon without any weather issues, and if you knew to slow down and catch the afore mentioned poorly marked hairpin, it would probably be a 5 hour trip, including stops. And believe me, it's a pretty boring one. Nothing to see and no steering inputs needed... long, straight, flat, boring. If someone knows of a better way to get down there from CM, please let me know.
We stayed at the Pai Sukothai resort and it was a mixed bag. On the plus side, the bed was very comfortable, the room was big and nice, there's a pool (which we didnt use) and the breakfast is one of the better hotel breakfasts I've ever had. On the downside, it actually costs more if you check in with 2 people as opposed to one, despite it still being just one room. Ostensibly this would be to cover the breakfast of the other person, but I'd just never seen it done like that. The extra-person fee was 250 baht, making the total room cost 1600 baht. I was tired and didnt argue the point, but later I thought "that would buy a helluva breakfast elsewhere". The hotel is trying to be slightly upscale, but the service really isnt there. There are very fancy looking porcelain containers in the shower for shower gel, shampoo and conditioner... all were dead empty. They do the swan thing with the towels on the bed, but the aircon is crap. Half the staff is helpful and smiley, the other half (including the mgr) look like they're annoyed at having to deal with you. So, hits and misses. If I had it to do over again, I would've stayed for 25% the cost at The Garden House, which is just steps away from Pai Sukothai. Live and learn...
The next morning we awoke bright & early to hit the historic park (pics are coming, I promise). If there's one great piece of advice I garnered from my online research before the trip, it was this... GO EARLY. The park actually opens to visitors at 0600. That's too damn early for me, but around 9am the tour buses start showing up and offloading crowds of people... if you have any hope at all of getting a few decent shots without hordes of strangers in the background, go early. We got there about 0745 and it worked out great as we had already hit the main sites by the time the crowds were coming, and we were off to the smaller and further away ones by then.
So... on with the pix...
For those who have never been there, the historic park is a fairly large site with the individual places to see spread out around the grounds. You could, if you were determined to do so, walk between the various points of interest. Or you can do what most people do and rent a bicycle across the street for 20 baht. Tour groups get loaded on to trolley cars to ferry them around. I saw a gardener drive his motorbike inside so I pulled up to the gate and told the she-wok to ask... sure enough "big bike ok! Only 20 baht!". Sweet.
This was the king who established Sukothai. He was also supposedly the first to create the formal Thai written alphabet. So there's a newer monument to him there.
There's one site with a trio of Khmer style temples. As we didnt rent the headsets (I just didnt see a place to do so at the gate I entered- bikes cant go in the main gate, they have to use one on the southern side of the site), I dont know if this was something the Khmers built when they owned this plot of land or if, because of there being so many Khmers still living there, one temple was built in their style to sort of show they were welcome. Anyway, here's a few shots of that one...
There are lots of ponds and ditches around the place... my guess is they provide drainage to keep the water away from the historic structures. It's really well integrated, to be honest... it actually makes the place look nicer. Attractive yet functional... win-win.
A few more random shots...
We finally headed out around 3.5 hours later. A visit there could easily be made longer or shorter, depending on the circumstances and what you'd prefer. I will say that having now seen both Ayutthaya and Sukothai, the latter is far superior. You can tell a lot of money and actual planning went into preserving and presenting this historic area. It is absolutely worth the boring drive to visit this place. Entry fee was 100 baht for farangs, 20 for Thais and 20 if you want to bring your bike in. We brought some water with us, which I recommend, but if you forget there are vendors around here and there.
We checked out of the hotel and headed over to Tak, then up the 1 to the "historic route" of the 106. Unfortunately the rain wasnt being so kind to us on the way back and we ended up stopping 4 or 5 times because of it. Towards the end as we approached Lamphun, I was pretty much ready to just ride on home and get soaked. The she-wok felt different though. I could have just made an executive decision, but I somehow knew I would be in for an "I told you so" if I pushed on. I also wanted to end my trip, as I do all my road trips, with a celebratory beer at Rider's Corner, so staying semi-dry was the right move.
Unfortunately, while coming through Lamphun, there's a large market on Saturdays apparently. I could not go down the roads I needed to go down to connect to the 108. Without a GPS, trying to find the way over to 108 was hopeless... that part of Lamphun felt like a damn rabbit warren. Looking back now, I should have circled around via the 116 and just avoided the city all together. I wont be going into Lamphun like that again... a frustrating waste of time, that place. Or maybe I was just ready to get to Phil's & have a beer.
Ok, hope you guys enjoy the pix and gain some insight from my trip. It really is a fairly lame ride, with the 106 providing the only fun twistys there are. Still, this time it was more about the destination. And it was very much worth it... hell, to show how much I enjoyed it, I would actually even go see it again. It's that good.
