Wats on outside Bangkok

Partly to escape the heat and grime of the city out for a trip to the country. At 6am we had breakfast on the Kao San Road and watched the beautiful ladyboys returning from a night out - at that time in the morning we struggled to tell their sex so we pitied the men on the pull with their beer goggles on the night before! We also witnessed what we deemed to be the Buddhist Monk protection racket. It seems that at 6am the monks wonder from restaurant to restaurant, silently taking breakfast from the restaurant owner who is often bowing so low you fear he will head-butt the floor, tuck the offering under their fiery orange robes and then move to the next cafe, disguising their stash beneath their robes. We are only surprised that backpackers have not found a way to disguise themselves as monks and copy the practice!

Kao San road seemed a little sorry for itself at this time in the morning, full of litter and devoid of the normal stalls that make the hustle and bustle an intricate part of Bangkok. When we eventually got collected by the tour company, our first stop was to see how the Thai's made coconut sugar. It was too sweet for even the sweet-toothed Steve but it certainly gave us more energy to tackle the heat which even at 7am was becoming unbearable. The next stop was the famous floating market of Damnoen Saduak - 70km outside Bangkok city but one of the only genuine markets remaining and the largest of it's kind in Thailand. Feeling like we were in a James Bond movie we were taken at high speed through a channel of water until we reached the canal system where wooden huts border the water edge and old Thai ladies sat on the jetties washing or making flower chains for shrines.

The floating market itself opens for trade at 4.30am with the floating traders selling mainly food stuffs to the locals. By 8pm the hats, fans and pineapple on sticks come out for the tourists. We spent an hour being paddled through the floating stalls, admiring the colourful fruits and wooden carvings for sale. The surrounding 'dry' markets were nothing special though and the goods were overpriced in comparison to central Bangkok. After a lunch stop we sweated on the bus in 40 degrees heat until we arrived at the second world war cemetery commemorating 6000 mainly English soldiers who were captured by the Japanese defending Thailand and worked as POW on the Burmese-Thailand railway and the now famous bridge over the River Kwai. The war museum was equally moving and we came away with a much greater knowledge of how the second world war required such huge sacrifices from these men - mostly in the form of their life. Finally we walked over the construction bridging the river Kwai and a little of the 'death railway' - so named as it is said that as many men died during the construction as sleepers on the track. We had already seen the film location on our honeymoon in Sri Lanka but it was a million times more powerful seeing it for real.

Our second day trip from Bangkok was to the ancient city of Ayuthaya - Thailand's capital before it was almost destroyed by the Burmese centuries ago. Our tour guide (who we never quite worked out whether was a male or female) took us to the ancient city where we were stunned by the tombs and walls tumbling down into an orgy of broken Buddhas and crumbling heritage. Many, many wats later we finally came to the picture-postcard shot - a Buddha's head supported by tree roots and caressed into place by the branches. It was a long day but worth every minute - particularly to gain a greater understanding and appreciation of the Thai's religious roots of Buddhism.