Sawasdee Ka! Temples and Buddhas everywhere in Thailand

There's an ongoing Bangkok photo contest on Facebook and I was planning to enter one of my photos but as usual, I was sidetracked by memories of our trip last year. Take me back to the land of shopping, pad Thai, temples, and elephants, please?

And because I never got to blog about our 5 day trip last 2010, here are some pictures from the Land of Smiles! Most our tour was actually all temples, temples, and more temples! We went to Ayutthaya to explore the ancient temples filled with gold statues of Buddha. It was a couple of hours from Bangkok by car. We were sick of temples and Buddhas at the end of the day but it was awesome nonetheless. 

Golden Buddha! There was an ongoing worship going on and about fifty people were chanting, bowing and pulling the HUGE orange cloth around the buddha and around themselves. It was an awesome thing to experience.

Because I have a thing for elephants--here's an offering to buddha. You have to respect these offerings so be careful not to move or touch them.

I'm THIS small standing beside the gold-flecked feet of the reclining buddha.

Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho!

We then went to a complex where there are ancient crumbling temples filled with buddhas. 

I ran up to the top like crazy, and my legs were shaking on my way down that I almost fell twice. My reward, though, was seeing the lone monk manning the place of worship on the top-most part of the dome. People seemed to worship him.

Ancient temples at Ayutthaya.

And yes, the Sleeping Buddha!

And Pou, our tour guide/driver told me these were the oldest buddha statues in Thailand. I swear, Thailand is amazing.