Woolly says – I was ready hours before anyone and had even made the morning toast, I’d told them that the days tour would be starting at 7.30am and it was now 9!
And we’d told him that we would be ready for 9 and we were…..well nearly. We headed back to the underground system and very proudly navigated our way to the station nearest to the Grand palace, coming out of the cool environment and back into the humidity was a struggle.
Woolly says – Things for the girls was about to get worse, as we joined the queue to enter the palace, a very officious woman was barking at everyone about legs and arms, I merely sauntered past but Jo and Zoe started to rummage in their bags for there covering clothing and added extra layers to their attire. The palace has been the official residence of the Kings of Siam (and later Thailand) since 1782 until the abolition of the monarchy in 1932. Construction of the palace began on 6th May 1782 on the orders of King Phutthayotfa Chulalok (Rama I), the founder of the Chakri Dynasty, when he moved the capital city from Thonburi to Bangkok. Throughout successive reigns many new buildings and structures were added, especially during the reign of King Chulalongkorn (Rama V). it was my first Thai palace and the small amount I had seen from the surrounding wall looked good, as we entered the complex we found ourselves in a shaded veranda with beautifully painted walls and dark red ceilings, I stepped into the sun and nearly fell over my tusks in shock at the buildings that were in front of my trunk. Gold, mirrors, tiles and more gold were everywhere, I didn’t know which way to go there was so much to take your breath away. I just hoped that Jo would be able to get some pictures to show the place off.
So did I, and I really did try but no photograph could do this justice!
Woolly says – First to grab my attention was two of the Demon Guardians that protect the Emerald Buddha from evil spirits, they were immense and any spirits coming along would think twice once they had bumped into these chaps. My eyes kept being drawn to all of the glitter and glitz everywhere, each temple had its own style and colouring and with the exception of the ceramic ones they were dazzling in the light. The golden stupa which had been erected in 1855 shone and as I circuited it I had to wonder how much it would cost to regild something that big! Although not so blingy I loved the smaller ceramic structures with their beautiful flower patterns and tiles. The Royal Pantheon which was originally built to house the Emerald Buddha and was covered in blues and golden decoration and guarded by some fierce looking mythical creatures, sadly we couldn’t go in, but it was worth staring at for several minutes. We sat for a while on the edge of another veranda and tried to take all the finery in, it was impossible.
Words seriously can’t describe how incredible the buildings were and having rested and waited for a huge group of tourists to pass it was time to view the Green Buddha.
Woolly says – As the girls discarded their footwear, I sat and stared at the gold coated building with it’s mirror tiled columns, no finer have I seen. Built in 1782 the whole building had been restored in the 80’s and boy had they done a good job. Inside we found ourselves staring at a huge mass of gold, it took a while for it to form into separate pieces of lamps, statues and many other objects, perched right at the top in a small box was the 66 cm jasper Buddha who was carved in the 15th century, you could barely see him under his golden crown, but he was defiantly green. As we moved on to allow others to see I padded my way down the steps and sat chatting to a large golden dog who was on guard duty outside the temple doors, he was a fine specimen or craftmanship and having patted him on his paw I followed Jo to the side of the temple to have a look at the intricate artwork. The whole building had a continuous line of golden monkeys above which is gold etched in fine patterns, incredible, we reached the rear of the building and stood admiring the door frames with two more fine dogs who were having there moment of glory as tourists took snap after snap of them.
With water supplies running out and the need for a sit down we left the temple area and headed towards the Grand Palace itself.
Woolly says – Chinese figures stood in front of buildings, beautifully carved from single pieces of rock. The palace was grand but no where near the temple’s level of bling, the building next to it however was another work of art. Known as the Dusit Maha Prasat hall it’s golden tower was impeccabl, the building has been used for lying in state since it’s construction and is still used today to for an annual consecration ceremony. Having passed through a glorious ceramic gate I saw to my delight a seating area where people seemed to be licking ice creams, luckily the women were way to hot and bothered to argue about sticky paws and ears and failed to notice how much ice cream I got on myself. The break did us good but with the humidity so high none of us were keen to go onto the second destination of the day so added it to tomorrows list and sat and people watched instead.
