Temple Hats

Monday was our first big escapade, a "temple tour" if you will. I didn't realize how massive each one of these things was going to be, so naturally my legs were done for by the end of the day (and maybe I was a little crabby too). Sorry Walt.

We traveled up the river to get to our destinations. The water was mirky and disgusting, and I hated thinking about going overboard, especially after our run-in with the monitor/monster (amy) lizards. No thank you.

Here's what we saw!

I wouldn't quite call this a dream home

So Walt thought it would be funny to make the temple steeples my hats in all the pictures. At first I went along with it.

By the end I wasn't so compliant.

The Grand Palace! This is what we first walked up on (after being misled by every fake "tourist policeman" possible - they even had badges ugh) and it took my breath away. So unlike anything I had ever seen before. Little did I know, this was just the outside of the complex.

Walt and the temple guardian.

I loved this gold temple. So shiny. Let's take a closer look...

Turns out it's not real gold. Just millions of tiny gold tiles glued on the edifice. I don't even want to think about how long that would take.

One of the few pictures that we have together

Look Louie! We found you an elephant!

Ok this was the most impressive thing that I saw all day. Definitely my favorite. This is the Reclining Buddha, and let me tell you he is GIANT! I had no idea this was going to be so massive. I think it's 39 meters long. Pictures don't do the size justice.

Apparently we surpassed the size requirements for this temple

Great picture? Trickery I tell you. See that TINY sign in the bottom right corner saying 40? Neither did we until AFTER we snapped the photo. Then a small Asian woman pranced up to us and took 40 baht right out of our hands. Not worth it.

This is Wat Arun (wat=temple). This place was pretty awesome. Unfortunately it was near the end of our day and I was losing my friendliness/patience/smiles/etc... My family can definitely relate.

Climbing these stairs was intense. SO STEEP! I held on to both rails the whole time and was still scared. Going down just about gave me a heart attack.

Leaving our mark

Now THIS was Walt's favorite part of the day. Why? Oh, well because that is a 3 meter hunk of SOLID GOLD. Of course, he was thrilled, and gave me stats on how much gold is on the planet and how this has got to be the biggest solid piece. I think he stood and stared without blinking for 5 minutes straight. He wants one.

The house of the Golden Buddha

As you can see, it was a pretty involved day. And an involved post as well- which is why it took me a while to get it up. Sorry mom. We'll try to be better!