Travel || Thailand: The Grand Palace, Bangkok

I thought it was only fair to dedicate a whole post to the Grand Palace, as it is a major tourist attraction in Bangkok and I have loads of photos from there I didn't want it to get to crazy with including another attraction as well. Be warned as well as being very photo heavy, it contains a lot of red and gold and general glitz.

I'm sorry some of the photos have the odd tourists head here and there, but this was by far one of the most touristy locations we went too. Personally I found it too much but I don't like big crowds and outside the palace it is extremely busy. It does calm down a bit when you get past the ticket barriers but still there is A LOT of people, and the amazing thing about it is that people don't complain about the amount of tourists which is very unlike England where people would be mumbling and grumbling.

There is loads of advice about visiting the Grand Palace in the guide books and online but here is some of my own from my personal experience. First off you need to accept the amount of tourists which are going to be there, there are literally bus loads of people streaming in but it is a big place and everything is so big and dramatic you do get to see it all. While you are outside of the whole grand palace walls there will be people coming up to you saying its not open, your not wearing the right thing, they will take you in their tuk tuk to a better place and all this but DO NOT believe them. When you get closer to the walls you will hear it being projected out that the palace is open daily. But the challenge of getting in doesn't stop here once you are inside the gate, there will be loads of people offering tours and offering you deals and information, again keep ignoring them. People even buy the police officer uniforms or army uniforms and stand around there so be seriously wearing. Once you have bought your tickets are have passed through the ticket checking point then there's no more of this, but as with all public spaces just be weary of your stuff.
If you are wearing the incorrect clothing they have things which you can cover yourself up with but its always easier if you go along with the correct clothing, if your finding it too hot just carry a wrap around or sarong like thing in your bag which you can wrap round your waist to cover your legs/ shoulders. Also a useful tip would be to wear shoes which you can take off easily because you will need to take your shoes off a lot.

As you can see I don't have any photos of the Buddhas inside the temples because you can't photograph many of them. Although it was a good experience and you had to go and see it because of how famous it is but personally its not what I would recommend to other people going and there are loads of other temples which are much nicer, and a lot less busy. As  you can probably tell from the pictures it is very over the top, glitzy and a lot of red and gold. Something which if you come from England you won't find anything like that here!

Have you been to the Grand Palace? What's your favourite country you've visited?






 

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