Royal Barge Procession

Yesterday I was excited to attend The Royal Barge Procession to celebrate the King's birthday here in Thailand. It consisted of a flotilla of 52 traditional style barges arranged in 5 columns, based on a battle formation from ancient times. There were 4 major royal barges. A total of 2,311 sailors from within the Royal Thai Navy served as oarsmen.

Once a year these amazing boats are taken from the Royal Barge museum to participate in this amazing ceremony down the Chao Phrayo river through Bangkok. The King presents robes to the monks at the Temple of Dawn. This year because the King's health is so poor, His Royal Highness Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn did the honors.

It was a beautiful day, the riversides were flooded with people witnessing this parade. The barges all look brand new which is amazing considering some of them were built in the 1800's and all are still sea-worthy. All the oarsmen, chanters, signalmen, Royal Regalia bearers...were outfitted in traditional costumes.

I was thrilled to be able to take Khun Nok (my housekeeper) and her mother to the festivities. They have always watched the procession via TV and were so excited to have front row tickets to the event! Before the parade there were several performances. At one point a performer was playing the mournful sounding flutella and I was looking across the river at the Thai landscape, the Thai flags flapping in the wind and I became all teary. We know our time is winding down here in this amazing country and there are so many things that I will miss. So happy I was able to witness this special event before moving.

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