The Grand Palace & Wat Phra Keo

Overview: 

The jew­el of Thai­land, the Grand Palace is a stun­ning series of build­ings, tem­ples and mon­u­ments found in the heart of Bangkok, which has been home not only to the King and gov­ern­ment of Thai­land for more than 200 years, but which also hous­es the awe-inspir­ing, spir­i­tu­al and revered Wat Phra Kaew tem­ple ‑with­in which sits the holy jade emer­ald stat­ue of Bud­dha con­sid­ered that most reli­gious­ly sig­nif­i­cant mon­u­ment in the whole of Thai­land.  

 Con­struct­ed in the 18th Cen­tu­ry by the Thai King Rama the First, the Grand Palace com­plex hous­es more than 100 dif­fer­ent build­ings and is known for the stun­ning gold spi­rals and incred­i­ble Thai and Euro­pean archi­tec­ture, which while not only being his­tor­i­cal mon­u­ments that tell the incred­i­ble sto­ry of Thai­land – make for a daz­zling site when viewed at sun­rise.  

 Although some of the com­plex is off lim­it to the pub­lic – as the Thai­land King hosts a series of ban­quets and vis­i­tors with­in the grounds of the won­der, the Grand Palace is still an incred­i­bly pop­u­lar site in Thai­land – with more than 8 mil­lion peo­ple flock­ing to the won­der each year – which is no sur­prise giv­en the stun­ning tem­ples, incred­i­ble archi­tec­ture, and the awe-inspir­ing Wat Phra Kaew tem­ple which help make the Grand Palace of Thai­land not only the coun­tries spir­i­tu­al home but a tru­ly incred­i­ble and immense won­der of the world.  

Where:

The won­der of the Grand Palace is found in the cen­tre of Bangkok – in the old city on the banks of the Chao Phraya Riv­er that runs through the heart of the cap­i­tal of Thai­land.  

Getting there:

With the Grand Palace being found in the heart of Bangkok, hav­ing got your­self to Bangkok (eas­i­ly done by direct flight or by train from any­where in Thai­land) you can tak­en the eas­i­ly acces­si­ble sky train to Saphan Taksin sta­tion – and then jump on a riv­er boat to Ele­phant Pier – which will give you some stun­ning pho­tos of the won­der as you approach it form the water – espe­cial­ly at sun­rise.  

Alter­na­tive­ly you have the option of walk­ing there direct­ly from your hotel, or jump­ing in a tuk tuk or taxi from any­where in Bangkok – although you can expect to hag­gle and pos­si­bly argue with your dri­ver over the price.  

Best time to Visit:

You’ll find the Grand Palace is busy all year round, so what we’d rec­om­mend for the best time to vis­it is to make sure you get there as soon as it opens at 8:30am – when the won­der will be qui­eter and the bus loads of your­sits that tend to arrive at 10am have yet to arrive.  

For those who want to com­bine a vis­it to the won­der with the incred­i­ble Songkran fes­ti­val for Thai New Year – and get a vis­it into The Pan­theon to wit­ness the life size stat­ues from the Chari era, then tim­ing your vis­it for the first week of April is rec­om­mend­ed. 

Explore: 

Spread across more than 2 mil­lion square foot, the Grand Palace is an incred­i­ble and stun­ning com­plex, filled with tem­ples, stat­ues, archi­tec­ture and his­to­ry.  

The entire com­plex is split into three sep­a­rate bits to make explor­ing eas­i­er; the inner court, the cen­tral court and out­er court – with the out­er court in par­tic­u­lar being the main sec­tion for explor­ers being both acces­si­ble and home to the stun­ning  Wat Phra Kaew and the famous Emer­ald Bud­dha Stat­ue.  

 Inspired by the unique won­der of Ayut­thaya (Wat Mahathat) and set agains the stun­ning Chao Phraya Riv­er – which at one time act­ed as a Moat as a line of defence to pro­tect the Grand palace, the below are our pick of high­lights from the more than 100 build­ings in the Grand Palace Com­plex: 

 The Outer Court:

Start­ing with the out­er court from where you will ini­tial­ly enter the tem­ple grounds, you’ll find pres­ti­gious build­ings – designed in both tra­di­tion­al Thai and Euro­pean archi­tec­tur­al styles, with the out­er court once serv­ing as the gov­ern­men­tal admin­is­tra­tion of Thai­land and still serv­ing today in an offi­cial gov­ern­men­tal capac­i­ty.  

While there are a series of incred­i­ble tem­ples and gold­en spi­rals in the out­er court, you’ll also find the Tem­ple of the emer­ald Bud­dha (Wat Phra Kaew) locat­ed in the cor­ner of the out­er court, and we’d rec­om­mend head­ing straight here if you’ve arrived ear­ly – to give you the best chance to soak in the incred­i­ble stature before crowds form.  

 Wat Phra Kaew – Known as the tem­ple of the Emer­ald Bud­dah, Wat Phra Kaew is home to the famed Jade Emer­ald Bud­dha – con­sid­ered Thailand’s nation­al sym­bol and a sacred place for Bud­dhists.  

 The Tem­ple itself sits inside the ordi­na­tion hall of the Grand Palace, which is eai­ly found in the cor­ner of the Out­er Court as it is pro­tect­ed by two giant stat­ues who guard both the tem­ple and the stat­ue – with the tem­ple and the stat­ues both being exquis­ite piece of archi­tec­ture. Vis­i­tors who pass through the guards are then encour­aged to take a moment to reflect and pause, and take in the poems and teach­ings of Bud­dha which are depict­ed on the pas­sage­way into the hall where a small stu­pa – which accord­ing to leg­end con­tains a piece of Bud­dha sits.  

 Upon enter­ing the Tem­ple of Wat Phra Kaew, you’ll need to observe and respect your sur­round­ings and stay silent, and from a dis­tance – as only the King of Thai­land is allowed close to the incred­i­ble stat­ue – you’ll be able to observe and take in the incred­i­ble and awe-inspir­ing Jade stat­ue of Bud­dha which lies care­ful­ly in the lotus posi­tion, and is made up of shim­mer­ing green Jasper stone and clothed and carved in sol­id gold. 

Believed to have been carved in the 15th cen­tu­ry, the 25 inch stat­ue sits tow­er­ing on a plat­form and will be heav­i­ly guard­ed, with any­one who attempts to cross the rope line being severe­ly dealt with. For those who observe the stat­ue close­ly you’ll notice a dis­tinct coloured robe dressed over Bud­dha – which is again an impor­tant ele­ment of Thai Cul­ture – as the robe changes each sea­son in line with Thai Cul­ture and the chang­ing of the Robe which hap­pens three times a year and is only allowed to be per­formed by the King of Thai­land believed to bring good for­tune to the peo­ple of Thai­land.  

We’d rec­om­mend tak­ing a few moments when lay­ing eyes upon the Bud­dha to not only pay respects, but take in the incred­i­ble and beau­ti­ful­ly carved icon that lies before you, before exit­ing the tem­ple and con­tin­u­ing on with your explo­ration of the Grand Palace. 

The Pan­theon – Prasat Phra Thep Bidorn – Con­tin­u­ing inside the out­er court you’ll notice the Roy­al Parthenon which is one of the grand­est and most exquis­ite build­ings in the grand Palace with two dis­tinct gold Spi­rals and stun­ning stat­ues.  

This Pan­theon once held the stat­ue of the emer­ald Bud­dha but as a result of archi­tec­tur­al mis­cal­cu­la­tions mak­ing it too small and a small fire which destroyed the inte­ri­or. Yet since recon­struct­ed the Pan­theon now hosts stat­ues of pre­vi­ous Thai kings from the Chakri era – which are only view­able on one day a year on Chari Day – so we’d rec­om­mend mak­ing some time to view the incred­i­ble gold spi­rals and out­side archi­tec­ture which make for stun­ing pho­tos before mov­ing on around the Grand Palace Com­plex.  

Roy­al Recep­tion Halls – Only open when no cer­e­monies are tak­ing place – the Roy­al recep­tion halls sit inside the cen­tral court and are still used by The King of Thai­land for impor­tant cer­e­monies, but get here on a qui­et day and you’ll be able to enter inside the giant halls which are styled on those of the Roy­al Fam­i­ly in Eng­land – with a large antique throne found in the cen­tre of the halls – inside the halls you’ll also be able to grab some stun­ning pho­tos of the archi­tec­ture inside the halls and we’d sug­gest tak­ing a few moments to appre­ci­ate the halls unique splen­dour before con­tin­u­ing your explo­ration of the Grand Palace com­plex.  

Boromabi­man Hall: Fur­ther inside the Cen­tral court and next to the grand recep­tion halls, you’ll find the incred­i­ble Boromabi­man Hall which is cur­rent­ly home to vis­it­ing Monks to the Grand Palace and is an archi­tec­tur­al won­der – with the  Euro­pean style again evi­dent and the hall fea­tur­ing stun­ning carv­ings of the four ele­ments and four Indi­an Gods that are believed to bring good for­tune to all who enter the hall.  

 The hall also looks out over the lawns of the Grand Palace – again a place off lim­its to all but roy­al­ty – and is the set­ting of the annu­al Kings ban­quet a great feast in which the king of Thai­land treats his advi­sors, so for those who wish to vis­it be sure to time your vis­it out­side the annu­al ban­quet.  

 Phra Mon­dop – Next up as you jour­ney around the stun­ning Grand Palace Com­plex is the incred­i­ble stun­ning build­ing of Phra Mon­dop. You’ll notice Phra Mon­dop as a small glass build­ing made out gold pat­terns with incred­i­ble archi­tec­tur­al pat­terns and a unique spi­ral. While access if off lim­it to the pub­lic – as the Phra Mon­dop hosts the sacred text and teach­ings of Bud­dha in their orig­i­nal form – the out­side of the build­ing which is a reflec­tion of great Thai archi­tec­ture is cer­tain­ly worth a stop off to grab some stun­ning pho­tos. 

The Upper Ter­race – Con­tin­u­ing your jour­ney around the Grand Palace and you can wind your way up the upper ter­race – where you will have stun­ning views of Wat Phra Kaeo. The Upper Ter­race is also home to some incred­i­ble tem­ples and build­ings, includ­ing our per­son­al favourite the repli­ca of the won­der of Angor Wat.  

Angkor Wat (Repli­ca): Lying in the upper ter­race is a stone recre­ation of the Cam­bo­di­an based won­der of Angor Wat – which was intro­duced into the gold­en tem­ple com­plex by the Thai King Rama the fourth that once sat inside his ter­ri­to­ry. 

While of course not at the same scale and beau­ty as the true won­der in Cam­bo­dia, the Angor Wat com­plex inside the Grand Palace is a great won­der, and is sur­round­ed by col­oru­ful and beau­ti­ful tem­ples, that were cre­at­ed to watch over and in rever­ance to this repli­ca.   

Hav­ing tak­en your time to explore the full beau­ty of the out­er court and the stun­ning tem­ples that lie with­in the Grand Palace com­plex includ­ing the Wat Phra Kaew tem­ple, you’ll find your­self at the south end of the Grand Palace – and we’d advise before you head back to the entrance and into the bus­tle of Bangkok tak­ing one last moment to grab some final pho­tos  soak in the beau­ty of the Grand Palace and this tru­ly incred­i­ble won­der of the world. 

 How long to stay:

We’d rec­om­mend bud­get­ing four hours to vis­it the Grand Palace – start­ing at 7am you have a chance to grab an incred­i­ble sun­rise pho­to over the com­plex before grab­bing some break­fast and then enter­ing the palace com­plex, where once inside the two and half hours inside will give you enough time to vis­it the inner and out­er courts and soak in the majes­tic beau­ty of the emer­ald Bud­dha before the crowds start to take over the won­der.  

Top Tip: 

We’d real­ly rec­om­mend get­ting there as soon as the Grand Palace opens at 8:30am chances are even in the off sea­son it’s going to be incred­i­bly busy, and you’ll find that around 10 am bus loads of tourists are dropped off – which can detract from your over­all enjoy­ment at the Palace.  

You’ll also need to come pre­pared for the heat – with both sun­glass­es, sun­tan and water a must, but be sure to fol­low the strict dress codes that apply, as the grand palace is a holy site you’ll need to be cov­er­ing your shoul­ders and knees – and any­one wear­ing flip flops will be auto­mat­i­cal­ly thrown out.  

Final­ly and unfor­tu­nate­ly, make sure to keep an eye on your belong­ings and be wary of scams that oper­ate at the gates of the Palace – with the Grand Palace being a major tourist attrac­tion there are unfor­tu­nate­ly peo­ple who attempt to take advan­tage of vis­i­tors, either by offer­ing false tours, false tick­ets or claim­ing the palace is closed and drop­ping you off in the mid­dle of nowhere on the oth­er side of Bangkok for extor­tion­ate fees – so make sure you have your wits about you when vis­it­ing this stun­ning won­der of the world.  

Cost:

While most tem­ples in Thai­land are free to enter, the Grand Palace com­plex charges vis­i­tors 500 Thai Baht to enter – rough­ly $16 usd to enter, with an audio head­set tour avail­able for a fur­ther $200 Baht – we’d advise get­ting there ear­ly (the tem­ple is open from 8:30am – 3pm) as audio tours are known to sell out fast on busy days.  

You’ll also find many unof­fi­cial tour guides stand­ing at the gate and has­sling vis­i­tors offer­ing tours – while we’d sug­gest avoid­ing these as the infor­ma­tion giv­en out by these guides is not always accu­rate, for those who do wish to get them­selves a guide, expect to pay a fur­ther 250 baht.  

Best photo spot: 

While grab­bing a spot of the Grand Palace the Emer­ald Bud­dha up close in the grounds makes for spe­cial pho­tos – for a tru­ly mag­i­cal pho­to we’d advise grab­bing a pho­to of the majes­tic Thai­land sun­rise or sun­set over the Grand Palace com­plex – with the full beau­ty of the palace best seen from the banks of the riv­er Chao Phraya Riv­er.