Loy Krathong

Last night, November 24th was the first of 2 days of celebration of the full moon called Loy Krathong. This is something between Christmas and Thanksgiving and it is a fun time of year for all. Many people decorate their homes, and businesses and the temples are also decorated. There are some very beautiful natural decorations,using plants and flowers, and some very garish plastic ones too!

We went down to the edge of the Ping river to float our 'sins' away (Tom had plenty and Bev had none) and to watch the festivities. Lots of food (this is Thailand after
all), fireworks coming from every direction and beautiful Khom-loys floating into the sky. After walking by 10,000 food stalls and many,many stalls selling Krathongs we reached the main street where we hoped to see a parade. At first we thought we had missed it,but eventually we found the beginning of a very long parade. The variety of floats was spectacular. Some were carried by men, and some were on huge trucks with spotlights and HIGH power sound systems with generators and computers controlling everything. The pictures below show some that I could capture, and there are some videos that I will post in a few days. By the time we were heading home at 9ish the sky was full of glowing lanterns.

Tonight the 25th we launched our own Khom-loy and again ventured down to the river area. The crowds seemed bigger and the floats seemed a little less hi-tech and more traditional but there were some spectacular big floats too. The fireworks seemed more intense and our friend mentioned that anything goes so people are setting off some VERY big rockets along with the small ones!

Click on the middle play button to see a slideshow or click anywhere else in the picture to see a "senior sized" version of the slideshow. Below is a short video too.


Click on the play button for a short video.