12th Jun 2011 - 13th Jun 2011 -
Busy day and extremely long! Woke up and checked out hotel, got a songthaew to the bus station in Pattaya to Bangkoks Ekamai station. Then sky train, then underground (MRT) to Hua Lumphong station we were looking for a hotel when a TAT information lady told us we had to walk 5 minutes and hotels were £40+ then we met an german guy who said he had just checked out of the same named Hua Lumphong hotel just a few hundred yard away we thanked him and quickly checked in left bags and ran to train station as we were cutting it fine for our train.
Got tickets to Lop Buri 2nd class air conditioned carriage costing £30 more than we expected but it was a comfortable 2 hour ride and we got a meal and drink included.
We arrived in Lop Buri which is famous for it's mass population of monkeys. We visited Wat Phra Rattana Mahathat which is a ruin built in the 11th century whilst ruled by the Khmer. Then we went to Phra Prang Sam Yot, Lop Buri's most well known landmark which has hundreds of monkeys, two of which climbed on me!
We walked around and fed the monkeys. The monkeys are considered a nuisance by the locals but they get alot of tourism from them. The monkeys were running wild on roofs, and telephone wires, you could hear them getting electric shocks but they seemed fine.
We had a smoothie then got train back, and this is when I got very fed up- this train was 3rd class and cost only us under £2 but it was overcrowded and we had to stand, then I decided to sit on the floor, eventually Shannon got a seat but we were all squashed like sardines for the longer 3 hour journey. We got a KFC for dinner when we arrived back and went to the hotel, it's more basic than the others but still clean and only cost us £16 a night, we will leave our suitcases at hotels left luggage while we go to Cambodia then stay here again.