Best time to visit Wat Pho, Bangkok – Great family friendly temple to visit!
After three days of jetlag, getting used to the heat and eating our way through Bangkok, we decided to do some sightseeing. The Grand Palace was of interest as well as the several temples (Wats) surrounding the Palace region. Our jetlag still hadn’t worn off, especially for the children, as they would never normally sleep in till 12 noon! This was a problem as the Grand Palace closes at 3:30. We ended up leaving the house at 130pm and thought even if the Palace is closed, we would just get to the boat terminal, hop on the local boat and just see where we end up – If nothing else it will be a lovely boat ride on the Chao Phraya river with lovely views of the city. Little did we know then, that the timing worked out best for visiting Wat Pho!
Outer Wall of one of the temples at Wat Pho
You can get to the Phra Nakhon region where Grand Palace is located several ways. Easiest way is just to take a taxi but you have to deal with lot of traffic on the road. You can also get here by boat and Sky Train. There are different types of boats, one can find more details here on costs and where each type goes to. We first took the BTS Sky Train and then got on the Orange Flag Boat. This costs only 15 Baht (30 pence) per person, you just stand in queue, hope on the boat and buy the ticket on the boat. The ride was great with many interesting sights to see. We passed this historic buildings more than 100 years old, flower markets, Chinatown, several fancy Hotels and Malls, and many other famous landmarks.
We decided to visit Wat Pho as it was home to the Reclining Buddha and that’s the one the kids and I wanted to see. Short walk from the pier to the Temple, passing through such fascinating food and drinks stalls. We had fresh watermelons and mangoes along the way. This really is the best part of being here, having so many new and fresh fruits and fruit juices 🙂
Located just next to the Grand Palace, Wat Pho is one of the oldest and largest Wats in Bangkok. It is home to the Reclining Buddha and also contains more than 1000 Buddha images. The kids enjoyed it a lot more than they had expected. Wat Pho is very open with lots of outside areas for them to run about and explore whilst also being able to admire the beautiful architecture, shrines and Buddha statues inside. They were handing out free drinking water in many places and the toilets were clean. It cost 100 Baht (£2) per person to get in , children have to pay as well. You had to dress appropriately (shoulders and legs covered) for entering the temple with the reclining Buddha. If you weren’t, they just gave you a green robe/sheet to cover up.
Everything was just so beautiful here! I will just let the pictures speak for themselves 🙂
Happy kids with red lips and teeth after they had this horrible(in my books) Red Fanta drink!
Shama had been interested in Buddhism for a few months now, (just interested in religion overall), so it was quite fascinating for her to see the prayer rituals, the different Buddha statues, learning more about Buddhism. All the writings were in Thai so we couldn’t read anything, but it was interesting enough just to experience it all visually and then go home and google more information about the history of this temple. Shahaar found all the gold and glitter quite fascinating too! Kids learn so much (as do we) during travels – about different cultures, religion, languages and food. Did I mention how much we are loving the food here?!
Just by default, due to jetlag, we ended up going to Wat Pho after 3pm, but we felt it was the best time to visit. The temperatures have cooled down, there are less people and the light is just perfect for photographing such beautiful and colorful architecture. I am glad we chose to make Wat Pho our first sightseeing destination, and would highly recommend this Wat as a great family friendly day out sightseeing in Bangkok. I just hope the others can live up to the wonderful experience we had here 🙂
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Gorgeous photos!
Thanks 🙂
What a beautiful temple.
These are incredible photos and valuable advise. Thanks for sharing.
Beautiful! Thank you for sharing!
Beautiful, colorful and interesting. I can’t even imagine 1000 Buddha. What I can imagine is sleeping until midday when traveling. We often find that we do better with half days of exploration.
This is a place that has always been on my must-visit list and I hope to there one day soon. What a fantastic experience and its great to know that going later in the day is a good option.
Samiya, I love that sunset photo…all are good. I think that discovering new things about yourself and the world, like Buddhism, is why every child should travel. Great anecdote!
bangkok is such a study in contrasts. much of the city is rather thrown together and not attractive and the temples and the palace are mind boggling in how creative and beautiful they are. Thanks for reminding me of our time there.
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Very interesting experience, Samyia. 1000 Buddha, wow! There are some reasons why I avoided Asia so far, in spite of the many interesting places that I would like to visit. One is that I don’t like sea food and I know that I’ll be faced with it day in and day out. The second is the fear of malaria. I’ll have to overcome that before I set foot on a plane headed in that direction.
Great information on the SkyTrain and water taxis!
Love the photos! Brought me back so many memories from my trips to Thailand. Haven’t been back in eight years and dying to return. Love the photos of the kids, they look so happy. I say that in my next life I want to be a child of a travel blogger!
Haha 🙂 I want that too in my next life 😀 thanks for the positive feedback!
Wat Pho is such a beautiful place – I loved photographing it as much as the Grand Palace! I am glad that you got to visit it at a quieter, less crowded time. BTW, your pics of the place are stunning!
It’s so great when the back-up plan turns out to be the best plan! What you said about kids learning so much while traveling is so true. Really is the best kind of education!
What a beautiful place! Thank you for sharing with us this remote, for me, corner of the world! Looks like your kids had fun too, which is great. I wish more families realized that family travel does not always have to be amusement parks and roller coasters. Temples and cities are fun to visit too!
I feel exactly the same way! Just because we travel with kids doesn’t mean I have to find play areas and amusement parks only.. With our kids we definitely try more outdoorsy places, nature focused or even beaches, but never shy away from visiting temples castles and city sightseeing which is great for all of us 🙂
Brilliant blog, great to find it so Noah can keep up with Shama’s travels, I loved Thailand when I was there but its been almost 9 years now, definitely time to go back!
Noah says Hi to Shama, him and all off class 5 miss her!
🙂
Thanks becky 🙂 shama was do pleased when I read message out to her! She says hello to noah and says she misses her classmates too. We are loving Thailand, I too hadn’t been back in almost 10 years. In koh samet now, loving it 🙂
Thai culture always amazes me. It’s so beautiful and so pure, too! Whenever I think of Thailand, I think of a flower, for some reason.
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I loved Wat Pho! Great to read about it from a family perspective and fid out how many cool things for kids there are to do!
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