In the Bangkok area, floating markets are a major attraction. We have seen, visited and spent plenty of money at many markets. But I still wanted to see this unique bit of local culture. The main market is Damnoen Saduak Floating Market – a morning market. It is one of the busiest and most touristy of the bunch. The second most popular is the Amphawa Floating Market – a weekend market that opens Friday evening. It has been touched by tourism, but remains far more local oriented right now. Luckily, they are just 25km (15.5 miles) apart so we were able to experience both! We’ve had some poor experiences with some of the hotel tours we’ve booked, so we opted to make our way there ourselves and spend a night in Amphawa.
To get to Damnoen Saduak, we cab to the Southern Bus Terminal and city bus number 78 to Damnoen Saduak. It took around 3 hours in total. It is recommended to leave earlier in the morning (before 7AM) to avoid the crowds. We planned for this, but didn’t have too much trouble since it isn’t high season right now. But of course it didn’t drop us off at the market. We were however greeted by tour boat operators eager for our business. (These tours basically take you down the market in a longboat for 30 min – 1 hour.) When we told them that we didn’t want a boat, one woman told me in a very annoyed and exasperated tone, “No boat, no market.” Thanks to the internet – I knew that wasn’t true. Thanks to maps.me we knew the market was only a half a mile away. So we walked.
Since we were spending the night in Amphawa, we had all of our stuff with us. But we managed to get a coffee shop owner to let us leave our bags there in exchange for a few drink purchases, and were able to wander the market with a bit less weight and bulk. It was very cool and pretty busy and we enjoyed wandering around – and spending more money of course.
When it was time to go to Amphawa, we were told to wait for the “minibus yellow” across the street. Seems easy enough. We were waiting next to a small shop and the owner, who spoke no English, began a game of charades with us to try to explain how to get to Amphawa. It was not as easy as just taking the “minibus yellow.” We (Brandon) managed to figure out that we would need to take this to another stop, get off, walk a bit, change to another bus, and that should take us to Amphawa. As we waited and lots of minibus vans drove by we wondered – would “minibus yellow” actually be yellow? Or was that just the name of the bus company? Turns out – that yes, it is simply a yellow covered tuk-tuk. And luckily another woman who spoke fairly good English was also heading to Amphawa, so we were able to follow her.
The charades made sense as we made the journey. The yellow bus dropped us off a little way down the road. We then had to cross the main road and go around to the back side of a strip center to catch the Amphawa minibus. We were going to offer to buy lunch for the woman who was helping show us the way, but instead she silently (well, in Thai) volunteered us to pay her fares on both buses. (I figured that out when I paid for the minibus tickets and was given 3 instead of 2.) She also blamed the “minivan yellow” driver for “overcharging us.” Sneaking little helpful lady.
Once we made it to Amphawa and found our guest house, things became slightly less eventful. We took a motorbike to grab lunch and see another temple (wat) that had been overgrown with trees. Unique to this site in our eyes was the gold leaf that seemed fresh on the Buddha. Many people leave food, money, and we’ve even seen beer, as offerings. Here it appears you can buy the gold leaf to apply directly to the Buddha. It gave it a unique and dynamic texture I really enjoyed. Plus right next to it was a Muay Thai sculpture garden of sorts, so we got in a quick kickboxing workout.
We of course hit up the Amphawa Floating Market that night. This one actually seems quite long, and we only saw a small section of it. But there were foods and sweets of all kinds along the canal (not floating), and many offered free samples that we enjoyed as we wandered. For dinner, we found a spot on some steps on the edge of the river, and ordered fresh seafood that was grilled on the longboats. We had grilled squid, prawns and a mussel pancake(?) which were all pretty good. The pancake part of the mussel dish was strange, but the rest was tasty. It was good we sat down when we did, because the market was half closed by the time we finished eating. And these vendors cleared out fast!
If you have some time to get away from the big city before you go beachside, I would recommend a visit to Amphawa. It was a charming little town with tons of wats to visit and a nice market to explore. But be sure you go on a weekend to get the full experience.
Brandon & Devon (BaD) Journey 