Between weeks in Ayuthaya teaching and weekends in Bangkok I've made the trip between countless times via minibus. They are 15 passenger Toyota vans running on bottled gas. The trip costs less than $2. and usually takes a little over an hour.
On a recent trip to Ayutthaya I struck up a conversation with a your Polish couple making the trip. Usually I'm the only farang, non-Thai, on the bus. Seated near each other on the bus we talked the whole way. Ayutthaya sprawls out and there is a 20-30 minute time lapse between crossing the city limits and reaching the depot. Shortly after we crossed into Ayutthaya the bus pulled over by an empty tuk-tuk. The tuk tuk driver opened the bus doors and he and the driver told us farangs to get out. I know enough Thai so I told them in no uncertain terms we were not getting out and closed the doors again.
I explained the scam to the Polish couple. If we'd gotten out we would have been 20 minutes from the depot where they planned to rent bikes. They had told me that they were on a very limited budget and didn't want to even pay for a sight seeing tuk-tuk. I would have been able to call an honest tuk-tuk, Gai and Mai, but they would have so such option. Once in the tuk-tuk they'd be at the mercy of the tuk-tuk driver.
In many, many trips this is only the 3rd time I've seen that scam. Once it was attempted on me, unsuccessfully. Another time a farang couple got out the back of the bus before I realized what was happening so I didn't intervene.
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