Today started slightly more relaxed than previous mornings and we headed down to the breakfast buffet to eat our fill.
The Grand Palace is only a short walk from our hotel and so we set off to meet one of our tour group buddies and have a wander round. Security is pretty tight round the palace, as I imagine it would be anyway. But I feel with the King’s recent passing and flocks of people wishing to pay their respects, extra measures are in place. Which meant slightly more queuing and a short conversation with the guards at the passport checkpoint about the merits of Scotland and its Whisky!
However we managed to enter the palace fairly quickly. The palace is as lavish and beautiful as I imagined, and more of a complex of different buildings (all beautiful) there was so much to see.
We found a model of Angkor Wat and can confirm its detail and accuracy.
We ventured into the Temple of the Emerald Buddha which was teaming with people, some local, but mostly tourists. The temple did not allow photo’s inside but I feel the outside and walkway gives a pretty good idea of the lavish detail used all over the temple.
This temple is among the most sacred in Thailand and contains the Buddha image which is in fact an intricately carved single block of jade, rather than an actual emerald.
The grounds were extensive, although a portion of it was closed off for the Thai People wishing to pay their respects to the King.
We had discovered that our ticket allowed us entry into other buildings and museums too, so we decided to make the use of them and head to a Royal Museum. We figured it was slightly too far to walk in the baking heat so hopped into a Tuk Tuk for a short ride..or so we thought. Our Tuk Tuk driver was a friendly guy and chatted away to us, although with a language barrier and the sound of the engine it was difficult to catch everything he said. What we did catch though was “promotion” “10 minutes” “free fuel” and “I’ll give you half off the fare” this sounded promising and so we nodded away and this seemed to delight the driver. We had assumed that he either needed fuel or we would stop at a petrol station to get his free coupon and in return we’d get a half price fare. Having had taxi drivers stop in the middle of our journey to refuel or relieve, this wasn’t too out of the ordinary.
What actually happened was that we pulled up to a bespoke tailor store and were greeted at the door. Our friendly Tuk Tuk driver would wait for us. Thoroughly bewildered we wandered in. It became apparent very quickly that the promotion he had was with this store and if we visited (or *gasp* even bought something) the driver would get a free fuel coupon.
Needless to say, none of the three of us bought anything: snake skin slip-ons and shiny suits aren’t really my thing. So we just hung out in a nice air-conditioned shop for 10 minutes before returning to our Tuk Tuk driver. When we arrived at our destination our driver was still so delighted that we’d helped him out, and we were delighted to have a half price journey and a ridiculous story to tell!
Thinking the hilarity was over we prepared to cross the road and enter the Arts Of The Kingdom not knowing what to expect. What I did not expect however was to be stopped and told my trousers were inappropriate by the guard but he would help us out. He called a man on a moped who arrived with a skirt for me, we gave him 100Baht (about £2.30) and we entered the grounds, plus 1 snazzy skirt.
The Exhibition itself had a strict set of rules and so we were told to leave our belongings in a futuristic perspex locker. Absolutely no photography was allowed. We were however given an audioguide which gave us great detail about each of the items on display. The exhibition featured an immense amount of gold, silver, diamonds, silk, and beetlewing collage (which we didn’t realise was a thing until a room of it). And even more craftsmanship and expertise than we could fathom. One piece could take 100 artists over 2years to create and the patience and skill showed through.
All of this had gotten us peckish for lunch and so we headed back to Khao San road – walking this time.
We spent the afternoon at a slower pace, wandering round the local area and trying to catch up on blog posts before our dinner later on.
For dessert we thought it only best we had some more street food and so succumbed to this delicious treat!
This utter slice of heaven is a banana and chocolate roti and we dreamt sweetly of them all night.
Hatti x
I would have had a witty response but I too have been dreaming about that banana chocolate roti ever since! 😛 xx
Reading through your days experiences, I was thinking of many an intelligent comments to post. Until I saw the banana chocolate roti 😜! They have all gone out the window to be replaced by YUM !!!! 😂
Banana and chocolate roti yum!