City tour of Bangkok

Day 8
Nov 19, 2013
Bangkok, Thailand

Bangkok would be the last city of our 9-day, 4-city vacation. To get there, we took a cheap Nok Air flight which left Changmai at 8:30 AM. We arrived in Bangkok an hour later and took a taxicab to get to our hotel. The cab we got unfortunately got lost - the driver took a wrong turn in a one-way lane and got caught up in a traffic he caused. It's good that we had GPS in our phones so we knew the hotel was already near and eventually decided to get off the cab and just walk since the cab meter was already at 450 Baht.

After a few minutes, we finally found Hotel Vista Express Lodging which was located in the middle of a very busy marketplace. The hotel room we got was cozy and the shower area was elegantly designed.

It was already 3:30 PM when we got to the Grand Palace - 30 minutes before closing time of Wat Phra Kaew (!) which is located within the vicinity of the palace. Wat Phra Kaew is the most sacred Buddhist temple in Thailand and it houses the statue of the Emerald Buddha.

A giant demon (Yaksha) near the entrance to the temple

Golden Chedi at Wat Phra Kaew

Main building of Wat Phra Kaew

External decorations of the Ubosoth, the main building of Wat Phra Kaew

After being forced by security personnel to get out of the temple complex, we spent the next hour around the Grand Palace and its perfectly-manicured lawn.

Grand Palace

At 5 PM, we looked for a way to get to Wat Pho where the 15-meter high and 43-meter long reclining Buddha can be found. A "helpful" bystander we asked for directions told us that Wat Pho was already closed and he suggested that we just instead take a "cheap" boat tour which would pass by a few sights around the city. He really did not leave us any choice as he already called and instructed a tuktuk driver to bring us to the dock. Once in the dock, we knew at once that the boat ride was a tourist trap so we just walked towards Wat Pho, which we found was actually still open until 630 PM.

Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho