Bangkok, Thailand

I am normally not a city person but a short visit to Bangkok was quite nice. I stayed at the Sinsuran Airport Suite ($50 including breakfast and airport shuttle). It is actually quite easy and inexpensive to get public transit into the city if you are near one of the train routes.

Grand Palace, Bangkok, Thailand

The Grand Palace was incredibly crowded. As we were walking the grounds and saw the huge lineup of tour groups going in we decided it was not worth going in just to see the jade Buddha since we wouldn't want to fight through the crowds.  Just down the street was the Saranrom Royal Garden. A much more peaceful place the garden just had a few people walking, running or using exercise machines in the park. I found the fact that there were public exercise machines that were free to use brilliant. I would love it if Canada had something like that. The machines included a variety of weight machines and bicycles. The weights were under a pavilion but the bicycles reminded me of a kids playground since they were mostly plastic. They still work great and definitely would be a good enough workout. I wish Canada would get past all the bullshit insurance issues and just put something like this in public parks to encourage people to be active.

Saranrom Royal Garden, Bangkok, Thailand

The park was also one of my first looks at some birds in Thailand. These included: House Sparrow, Eurasian Tree Sparrow, Rock Pigeon, Red-collared Dove, House Crown, Black Collared Starling, Barn Swallow, Pied Fantail, Coppersmith Barbet, Zebra Dove, Pond Heron, Asian Koel and Common Myna.

Black-collared Starling

Asian Koel

The gardens even had a few reptiles basking or foraging in the afternoon. A sign said that previously during a different kings reign there were crocodiles in the ponds but these are no longer there. Many water monitors and turtles were around the ponds in the center of the park. 

Common Water Monitor (Varanus salvator)

Wat Pho/Wat Phra Chetuphon was much less crowded than the Grand Palace but we did arrive at the end of the day so maybe it was just our timing that made the different. The temple is even more colourful than the Grand Palace, which was very very brightly decorated on the roof. The temple complex had many chedi, intricate archways, statues, small gardens and planted trees as well as all of the buildings having brightly coloured roofs and mosiacs. Everywhere you look was patterns and colours. The chedis were my favorite part of the temple complex and the four large ones (42m!) called 'Phra Maha Chedi Si Rajakarn' were massive and had intricate colourful mosaics all the way up.

Wat Pho, Bangkok, Thailand

Phra Maha Chedi Si Rajakarn, Wat Pho, Bangkok, Thailand

I have never seen so many statues of Buddha in my entire life! This temply complex is said to have the largest number of Buddhas in Thailand (more than 1000) but I can't imagine a place that would have more anywhere. Most of the statues were painted gold but the simple stone ones were actually my favorites.

Reclining Buddha, Wat Pho, Bangkok, Thailand

 The Reclining Buddha is a 46m long statue in its own building with a passage that you can walk around it. Large pillars block you from having a good view of the entire statue but it is huge and literally fills the entire building.

Buddhas, Wat Pho, Bangkok, Thailand

The main building of the complex is the only place where they enforced needing long pants/skirts to enter (as well as taking off your shoes that is). I would recommend to all travelers visiting Thailand to bring a sarong or something you can put on quickly when you visit temples to meet this requirement so that you can still walk around in shorts in the hot weather. Phra Ubosot is the main hall for Buddhist rituals and had a large open area to sit (NOT WALK OR STAND) and a large Buddha statue on a high pedestal.

Inside Phra Ubosot, Wat Pho, Bangkok, Thailand had a

 Visiting the temple complex at night also had a lovely perk of seeing the lights turn on and light up the scenery around sunset. It was like seeing everything for the first time as we walked a final loop around the grounds. I would HIGHLY recommend visiting Wat Pho at the end of the day for the lack of crowds and the sunset.

Wat Pho, Bangkok, Thailand

Phra Maha Chedi Si Rajakarn,
Wat Pho, Bangkok, Thailand

As night crept up on the city, geckos came out over almost every wall or tree you could find. They moved quickly but I was able to identify at least three different species. The largest species I found was the brightly oranged blotched Tokay Gecko.

Chinese Gecko (Gekko chinensis)

Flat-tailed House Gecko (Hemidactylus platyurus)

Tokay Gecko (Gekko gecko)

Tokay Gecko (Gekko gecko)

Despite not being a city person I would actually have liked to spend some more time exploring Bangkok. I believe there is a lot more to the city than you can see in a day. I would have also loved to visit more restaurants. The Navy Boat Club near the Grand Palace area had great seafood and curry for reasonable prices but I'm sure Bangkok has many hidden gems to eat at.

On our way out of Bangkok by train from Hua Lamphong Station we visited Wat Traimit. This temple contains the Golden Buddha, officially called 'Phra Phuttha Maha Suwana Patimakon'. The Golden Buddha is a gold statue weighing 5500 kg. The story of the Golden Buddha is that it was covered in stucco and coloured glass to hide the gold during a time of war and for 200 years people didn't know there was gold underneath. When it was moved from its temple to a new location the stucco chipped and revealed the gold underneath.

Golden Buddha, Wat Traimit, Bangkok, Thailand