I woke up today morning around 6 AM, had a quick breakfast and walked straight to the Grand Palace entrance. There, I was one of the first visitors to queue up in front of those metal detector gates. At 08:30 sharp, the gates were open. This time I was ready, unlike yesterday. Yesterday I went there in bermudas and flip-flops. Of course, they re-directed me already at the first gate from the queue directly into a shop of some sort, so that I can buy long pants. 200 baht for sh!tty 100% rayon pants? No way. I walked away yesterday. But today – a different story. Long pants, shoes instead of flip flops…
Bought the ticket (500 baht) and went inside. So beautiful. Right after the entrance gate there was an official desk offering free guided tours. Cool! So I registered for the first tour, which was at 10 AM. The tour started and I learned really a lot about Thai history, Royal dynasty, architecture, some religious background etc. Only, after 5 minutes, I lost my group because of the crowd. And when I say “crowd” I mean crowd: 10.000 Chinese tourists filling up the last square inch of the temple grounds.
So I went back to the desk and signed up for the tour at 10:30 AM. Actually, I first tried to find my original group, but after just one round of running around in the heat, I gave up. Which turned out to be quite a lucky strike! Joie, the new guide was even better. By far. And she was also kind to wait for and look after her visitors π. And she told us so many amazing stories about the temple’s architecture, royal family, Thai history, the Emerald Buddha,… Really nice.
After literally running through the public area of the Grand palace in the hot midday sun, I went outside to catch the shuttle bus to Khong, Thai masked dance. After a short bus ride we reached the theatre. And the show was AMAZING!!! Excellent live music and marvellous dancing with some really cool scenography. And all that included in the Grand palace entrance fee. Great.
My first ever TukTuk ride
After the show, I decided to walk a bit instead of taking the shuttle bus. And sure enough, after a few meters, a young guy approches me and we started some chit chat conversation…
Uh. My eyes are closing. I’m so tired… sorry folks, to be contd. tomorrow. π