Ko Kret

Ko Kret is a small island in a loop of the Chao Phraya River in the Pak Kret district of Nonthaburi, about 20 km north of central Bangkok. It covers a little over 4 square kilometres and has no cars, just lanes, footpaths and motorbikes, and its seven villages still feel rural next to the suburbs across the water. Many islanders are Mon, descendants of people who settled here in the 18th century, and the island is known for their terracotta pottery and their food.

Weekends and public holidays are when it comes alive: the lanes near the main piers turn into a market of pottery workshops, snack stalls and cafes, and day-trippers arrive by ferry. On weekdays it is far quieter and many stalls are shut. Renting a bicycle to circle the island on the narrow concrete path is the classic way to see it, past temples, orchards and stilt houses along the water.

Most ferries land near Wat Paramaiyikawat, the island’s most important temple, on its eastern shore. Its leaning white chedi, Phra Chedi Mutao, stands at the water’s edge where the river channels meet. It began to tilt around 1891 as the current undercut the bank, an attempt to straighten it in 1992 failed, and it has become Ko Kret’s emblem. The temple itself was rebuilt in Mon style by King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) in honour of his grandmother, and has an ordination hall with murals and coloured stucco around its doors and windows, as well as a museum.

Elsewhere on the island, potters still throw and fire the red-brown earthenware the Mon are known for, and some workshops let you watch or try. Look out for Mon dishes such as khao chae (rice in chilled, jasmine-scented water), deep-fried flowers and fish cakes flavoured with a local wild ginger.

The usual route is the short cross-river ferry from the pier at Wat Sanam Nuea in Pak Kret, which lands beside Wat Paramaiyikawat. Pak Kret is a taxi ride from central Bangkok or from Nonthaburi pier, the northern end of the Chao Phraya Express Boat line.

Ko Kret was not always an island. In 1722, in the reign of King Thai Sa of Ayutthaya, a canal was dug across the neck of a river bend to shorten the voyage upstream to the capital. The current gradually widened the cut, Khlong Lat Kret, until it became the river’s main channel and the bend became an island. After Ayutthaya fell to the Burmese in 1767 the area emptied, and King Taksin settled Mon people here in the 1770s. During the Second World War, officials and politicians built houses on the island to escape the bombing of Bangkok.