Thailand Honeymoon Day 2 - Wat Pho | China Town | Gun Range

Day 2 started with us waking up late and having breakfast at the hotel and heading out. My wife wanted to go shopping and I wanted to explore more temples. We ended up making a deal, temple visits in the morning when the light is good to take pictures and shopping at the mall after dark. First stop Wat Pho or the famously called Temple of Reclining Buddha.

Breakdown of Itinerary 

Wat Pho 

Wat Pho is one of Bangkok’s biggest and oldest temples and thus a very popular tourist destination. Wat Pho is most famous for being home to the gigantic reclining Buddha which is 15 meters in height and 46 meters long. The figure has a brick laid core which has been mounded and shaped with plaster then covered with gold. The reclining Buddha symbolizes the arrival of Nirvana and the end of all reincarnations. Once you step inside the temple you can hear the clinging of coins people drop into tiny bows as offerings to make their wishes come true. I too had dropped a few coins and those wishes did indeed come true.

Golden Reclining Buddha 

I would recommend taking  a ultra-wide lens to capture this beautiful statue as not even my 18mm lens could capture the grand size of and immense size of the Reclining Buddha. The feet of the statue is covered in intricate mother of pearl designs which I unfortunately didn't take a pic of, make sure you check it out.

The temple grounds are covered with ornate towers called “Chedi” and they are decorated with pieces of colourful porcelain and look really beautiful. There are about 100 of these Chedi’s all over Wat Pho. Strucutes similar to the Chedi can be found in India where they are known as Stupa's and in China where they are called Pagoda's 

After exploring Wat Pho we got out of the temple complex and started walking along the streets of Bangkok searching for a good restaurant. We walked for about half hour and this little sign board caught my eye, it said “SHOOTING RANGE”. Being in India I had never shot a guns in my life except for the small air rifle that my uncle used to have back home. I was not sure if they let foreigners in or if it’s meant for sport shooting but my curiosity got the better of me and my wife did object either as she just wanted to escape the hot sun.

The shooting range was run by retired cops and they had a variety of guns that you could shoot. The rate was per bullet. I chose the Smith & Wesson revolver, a 1911 and a tommy gun. I don’t remember how much I paid but it was worth it. My wife was really amused to see how excited I was about shooting guns, she said I was like a lil kid at a toy store who just got his favourite toy to play with.

Late afternoon  we stopped by Chinatown and had a meal at Shanghai Mansion. This was one of the hotels we had considered staying in Bangkok. The hotel was very interesting with a modern Chinese art décor and the rooms were fabulous, but I would still recommend Siam@Siam for the location.

For my Blog post on day one click HERE 
For my Blog post on Koh Samui click HERE