Friday 25th November 2022
We checked out of the hotel, left our bags, and went for a walk in search of an early lunch. We ate at หมูกรอบ ส.สามชั้น, another very local restaurant with no English. We managed to order a spicy pork and rice dish topped with a fried egg, which we shared between us. It was very tasty.
After eating, we went back to our hotel to pick up our bags then got a Grab car to the station. Phitsanulok station is very attractive, with a steam train outside the entrance – this seems to be a common theme in Northern Thailand!
Outside of the station is a decent sized market. As we’d arrived at the station with plenty of time to spare, Pete and I took it turns to look after our bags and go and have a wander around the market.
We were in the 3rd class carriage with fans for this journey, and the train was very busy. There was intermittent rain showers along the way, so the windows kept getting closed (as otherwise you get soaking wet) so at times it was a bit hot and not the most comfortable journey.
We arrived in Nakhon Sawan to find Grab doesn’t work (at least not in the station area). A women asked if we needed a taxi, Pete showed here where we were going (the Hop Inn hotel), she said it’d be 150 baht (about £4) and then ushered us into a green songthaew (a bus / taxi hybrid vehicle). It was a bit of an odd journey. Usually the songthaew follow a set route and cost about 10 baht per person. The one we got into was full, but after driving a few metres the driver told everyone except us to get out and transfer to another one. She then drove us straight to the hotel door (we never managed to work out the songthaew routes, but pretty sure our hotel wasn’t on one!). I guess she saw us and thought she’d use the opportunity to transform her songthaew into a taxi and earn a bit of extra cash (to be fair it wasn’t any more than a Grab car would’ve been).
It was pouring down with rain, so we chilled in the hotel for a bit, and used the time to do a bit more trip planning. After a couple of hours the rain had eased off, so we grabbed an umbrella from the hotel lobby then set off in search of dinner. We ate at เตี๋ยวโต๊ะขาว by หม่าม๊า” สูตร ยกซดเจ้าเก่า, and shared some stir fried flat rice noodles with crispy pork and some egg noodles with crab and pork between us. The food was very good, and I especially enjoyed the wide rice noodle dish.
We were both feeling tired, so went back to our hotel for a couple of episodes of Manifest on Netflix before bed.
Saturday 26th November 2022
This morning we decided to head to the Ganesh idol park and fortunately were able to book a Grab car to take us there. However once there, we found we were outside the area that Grab serves and so (with the aid of google translate) asked the driver to wait for us.
The Ganesh idol park is a park in Nakhon Sawon, and it’s main distinguishing feature is a huge bright pink temple in the shape of Ganesh, the multi-armed Hindu god. It was magnificent to see!
You can go inside the temple, and there are multiple statues of Ganesh, each one unique (but all bright pink).
Behind the temple, the park continues. There’s another temple, but this one shaped more or less like a normal building, although some of the structure is made to look like tree trunks. It’s an interesting place to visit.
We returned to our Grab car, and asked our driver to take us to the Nakhon Sawon observation tower. It’s on the top of the mountain, and has commanding views over the city.
You have to take you shoes off to enter the building (which seems to be a common thing for museums in this area) and can then take an elevator or the stairs up to the observation deck. The ticket price was 20 baht (about 50p). The observation deck has 360 degree views over the city, although there’s unfortunately no outdoor area. There’s a few informational signs, but they’re all exclusively in Thai.
Behind the observation tower is a big Buddha. Not as big or impressive as the one in Bangkok, but still worth seeing.
There’s also a temple nearby, Khiriwong Temple, which is also known as The Golden Hilltop Pagoda. At the back of the temple is an imposing and beautiful golden chedi.
At this point it had started raining heavily, so we were glad of the shelter.
We decided to walk down the mountain. Ignoring the intermittent bouts of heavy rain, it was a very pleasant walk, passing several small temples and shrines along the way.
We were nearing the bottom of the mountain when a truck pulled up and insisted we get inside. The back seat was loaded with boxes, so it was a bit of a squeeze with the woman half squatting and half sitting on my lap in the back, while Pete was squeezed into the front seat which was on its furthest forward setting. It was very kind of them, and saved us from getting soaked in the latest downpour though!
We exited the truck, thanked the couple for the lift, and went into ผัดไทยเจ๊ใส for some lunch. It’s a Pad Thai place and they only do Pad Thai, which they do very well. So well in fact, that Pete had to order seconds!
Nakhon Sawan is built on two rivers. At the point where they converge, there’s a monument / artistic modern bridge, called Phasan, The Origin of the Chao Phraya River. We ordered a Grab car to take us there. It’s a very Small cool looking bridge!
You can also walk over and inside the bridge. It makes for some pretty good photos!
It was a hot day (the rain had long since stopped!) so we stopped for a cold drink at Rabbit bubble milk tea. There are quite a few cafes by the bridge, but we quite liked the name of this one (and the drinks looked good in the pictures!). Pete chose strawberry and I had cocoa, they were both very good and just what we needed in the heat of the day.
Grab unfortunately doesn’t work here, and there were no obvious taxis around. We decided the best (perhaps only!) option was to walk the 40 minutes across the island and over the river into town. We set off but were soon stopped in our tracks by a dog blocking the road and barking somewhat aggressively at us. There seem to be a lot of dogs out on small country roads in Thailand, and we didn’t want to take our chances so headed back to the bridge. There were a couple of touristy looking minibuses in the car park, so with the aid of google translate Pete asked them if they were going into the city centre. Both said they were full. One of the drivers, however took pity on us and took us into the nearest cafe where he had a lengthy conversation with the owner. Eventually he used google translate to tell us “they take you”, and the owner and his son pulled up on their motorbikes. Pete and I got on the backs of their bikes and had a lift over the river. We gave they money for the petrol, which they seemed very confused about (and it didn’t help that they speak no English and we speak no Thai!) but eventually accepted.
We walked along the river and then stopped at Bitter*Sweet Homemade Icecream for an ice cream. They didn’t have banana, but did have the next best thing – banoffee. So Pete was happy. He had one scoop, along with one scoop of coconut, I opted for a single scoop of almond and toffee. It was very good ice cream, and nice to sit in an air conditioned restaurant away from the heat.
We continued walking Wat Nakhon Sawan, a large and impressive looking Buddhist temple near the river. As we approached we could hear chanting being piped out of loud speakers. There seemed to be a prayer service going on, so we didn’t try to go inside.
We walked a little further to Ko Yuan Canal Park, and walked the length of the canal. This is a lovely little area, with some street art on the walls and plenty of fish (you can buy fish food to feed them)
The far end of the canal is quite near Paradise Park, our final destination of the day. By this point, the sun was setting but the park was still very busy with joggers and people relaxing, and looked beautiful.
It had been a long day so we took the lazy option of ordering a Grab takeaway to our hotel room. One of the high rated options was the Pizza Company and they did mini pizzas for a few quid, so we decided to give them a go and ordered a spicy chicken and a pepperoni. To be honest, they were a bit disappointing- the chicken one tasted like it had mayonnaise instead of tomato sauce in the base, and wasn’t particularly spicy.
Emma and Pete’s Asian Adventure 