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| KHLONG KHAO SAN |
| Text by Tricky Vandenberg - June 2010 Photographs by Tricky Vandenberg - April 2011 |
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| Khlong Khao San or the Canal of the Milled Rice flows on the border between Phai Ling and Suan Phlu Sub-district. It links Khlong Dusit with the Pa Sak River. At par with Khlong Hantra, Khlong Kramang and Khlong Dusit, this canal was probably once a stretch of the Pa Sak River. [1] This canal is also referred to as Khlong Ko Kaeo. [2] The King of Hongsawadi, having spoken, marched his army down to Ayutthaya on the following day, on Wednesday, the tenth day of the waning moon of the second month, 911, a year of the cock, first of the decade. The army of the Uparat, the vanguard, set up its stockade in Phaniat Township. The stockade of the King of Præ, the left wing, was set up at Thung Wat Photharam Township to Kò Kæo Canal. Khlong Khao San houses only one active Buddhist monastery, Wat Ko Kaeo at its mouth on the southern canal bank. The canal forms two islands: a northern island, bordered by a stretch of the Pa Sak River, Khlong Ban Bat and Khlong Dusit and a southern island, called "Ko Kaeo" or "Crystal Island" formed by a stretch of the Pa Sak River and Khlong Khanom Tan. In the Ayutthayan era, a thriving floating market existed at its mouth (Pak Khlong Khao San floating market). [3] The canal probably ran into the Front city moat, as King Maha Thammaracha (r.1569- 1590) let dug an extension of the canal of the moat in front of the capital from the Mae Nang Plum monastery down to the mouth of Khao San canal. (1) [4] Khlong Khao San can be paddled by kayak. A description of the Khao San kayak trip can be found on this web site under the section "kayaking". Footnotes: (1) The Front city moat became in 1584 a riverbed of the Lopburi River. (See the essay "The quest for the holy water: Ayutthaya’s ever-changing waterways". References: [1] Our Wars with The Burmese - Prince Damrong Rajanubhab (1917) - Re-edited White lotus (2000). [2] The Royal Chronicles of Ayutthaya – Richard D. Cushman (2006) - page 47 / Source: Phan Canthanumat, British Museum, Reverend Phonnarat, Phra Cakkraphatdiphong & Royal Autograph. [3] Discovering Ayutthaya - Charnvit Kasetsiri & Michael Wright (2007) - page 271. [4] Our Wars with The Burmese - Prince Damrong Rajanubhab (1917) - Re-edited White lotus (2000). |
| (Aerial view of Khlong Khao San) |
| (Canal view) |
| (Canal view) |
| (Canal view) |
| (Canal view) |