Day 641 - A Thai Temple Tour

Today we finally managed to so some sightseeing around Bangkok - with the majority of our stops at some of Bangkok's most famous temples. Our first destination was at the Wat Phra Kaew - the temple that houses the small but significant Emerald Buddha - and the adjacent Grand Palace. Both of these are amazing in their glistening golden glamour - we'd rec commend everyone taking a pair of sunnies to block the reflecting brightness!!!
The place is almost over the top, with so many different temples packed in a small area - you just don't know where to look, but luckily for us anywhere the eyes fall is an excellent choice.
After spending a few hours here we made our way to a small Thai restaurant for lunch, before heading over to Wat Pho. After spending so much money in the last few days shopping, we were making our way around between sights by foot, while most other foreigners zoomed by in tuk-tuks!!
In Wat Pho we were blown away by the largest reclining Buddha in Thailand, and enjoyed wandering the grounds - Adam in particular enjoyed checking out (and attempting to copy a few) the stone statues depicting yoga positions scattered around the gardens.

From here we wandered down a market street making our way to the Chao Phraya River, but after watching the massive boats spending along the huge canal - we decided we'd rather get home by foot and followed a smaller canal that provided an insight into normal Thai life (complete without the millions of tourists that come to Bangkok).

We made it to a major intersection where a large crowd was gathering, and after asking around a bit we found out that the Malaysian Queen was due to be passing in a while. We gave up waiting after a while and headed for the Golden Mount - a large temple on a hill, but unfortunately this was closed, for the Queen's safe passing.
The Adlibing way of wandering around, without following the tourist trail, provided some gems with as much sparkle as the main tourist attractions. First we slipped into a temple dedicated to female disciples, and then found ourselves at a street Muay Thai training gym perched on the edge of the canal. As we made our final walk home the Queen's convoy finally came zooming by and we're pretty sure we got a glimpse of the lady herself waving our way as we waved the Thai and Malaysian flags (with the Democracy Monument in the background)!! By the time we made it home we were completely and utterly exhausted but managed to feed and hydrate ourselves and jump on the internet to say happy birthday to Iona back in NZ.

Adlibing an exhausting walking tour.