Loy Krathong - The Floating Lantern Festival

Loy Krathong is held on the evening of the full moon of the twelfth month of the Thai lunar calendar, which fell on November 11th this year. @faitherz33 and I were lucky enough to be on the beach in Pattaya for this event.

"Loy" means "to float" and "Krathong" is a small container. The floating lanterns are usually made of banana tree trunk and leaves, and they hold candles, incense and flowers.

One of the reasons why Loy Krathong is celebrated is to pay respects to the spirits of the rivers and thank the water god for the rain and the sustenance that it brings.

As people release their lanterns into the water, they make a wish and release all negative thoughts and past mistakes and look to a positive future.

Yi Peng - Sky Lantern Festival

Yi Peng is the Sky Lantern Festival and it is mainly held in Northern Thailand. Chiang Mai is famous for the largest Yi Peng festival in all of Thailand and tourists from all over the world come in each year to take part in the festival. It is held alongside Loy Krathong, but lasts for 3 days.

Yi Peng has deeps roots in Buddhism and is thought to originate from India. When you release your lantern into the air you are symbolizing releasing your bad luck and mistakes out into oblivion.

If your lantern disappears into the sky before the light goes out, you are going to have a very good year, but if your lantern catches fire and falls out of the sky, your year will be full of bad luck.

As we were watching the sky, we saw a few of the lanterns catch on fire and turn into a ball of fire into the ocean. I wonder how those people felt that lit those lanterns and were all happy watching it float off and then their luck for the year just burst into flames and go crashing down into the ocean.

One of the best parts of these festivals is seeing the joy and happiness on people's faces as they were setting their lanterns free. I could only imagine how amazing it would be to experience this festival in a place like Chiang Mia where you are surrounded by thousands of lanterns going up at a time.

Experiencing our first Loy Krathong and Yi Peng was such a cool experience. It was such a great night of happiness with my wife on that beach.

Thank you for stopping by and checking out my post and my pictures. You are awesome!