I moved westward for the New Years celebration, arriving in Sukhothai on the 30th, late in the morning. After finding a guesthouse to stay at, I walked around town to get a feel of what kind of action to expect for the eve. Not much to report, I saw lotsa commercial activity, but I didn't see any signs of events going on.
Later in the afternoon, I jumped on my bike and did another stroll thru the city, this time, covering more ground and circling the city. Still not much to report. In fact, it seems as though I covered the whole town in just thirty minutes of casual riding. I did find a restaurant to eat, Poo. (see above picture)
Yes I went for some poo for dinner. Actually, Poo in one tone is the word for crab. It's also the name for Thai women. (Thais actually usually have long, muli-syllable names. Everyone then has a one syllable nickname. My friends from camping up in the mountain nicknamed me "Ken". The restaurant actually didn't have any crab on the menu, so instead, I ordered chickened stir-fried with veggies.
The food in Sukhothai is nothing to rave about. The spicy sausage balls had the hard "bone-like" substance that I haven't encountered since Phuket. The fried chicken was super greasy and lacked any flavor in the plain flour-water-salt batter.
I spent the actual New Years Eve party at my guesthouse. They had a Thai buffet of noodles and a spicy curry sauce, green curry and pork over rice, stir-fried veggies with oyster sauce and varieties of fruit and sald veggies. There was a couple performances of traditional Thai dancing, complete with costumes. Of course, there was music. Raise-The-Roof Dance music and lots of it. I escaped at one point and did a tour around the town at 11 PM. The best thing going seemed to be at a bar/restaurant that was watching a Manchester United football game. So I went back to the guesthouse to finish the countdown.
The only big attraction that causes tourists to stop thru the city is to tour the ruins of Old Sukhothai. Almost 800 years ago, this was the capital and hotbed of the ancient Thailand. About 12 km away are the remains of temples, buildings and buddhas. There has been an attempt to restore some of the original structures, but for the most part, it's just a collection of bricks laying in a field with weeds growing on them.
