Thailand – Laos: Day 9 – Part 4 – The Golden Mount (Wat Saket)

Continued from Thailand – Laos: Day 9 – Part 3 – Wat Ratchanatdaram Woravihara & Pom Mahakan. For pre-travel, please refer here.

From Pom Mahakan, we traversed a river and a short bridge to cross to the other side.

We were on our way to The Golden Mountain or better known by the locals as Wat Saket. So after the bridge, we turned to the right guided by GPS.

Looks like a 7-Eleven in the area. Since it was already noon, we agreed not to bother looking for a halal restaurant. If we still look for it, we won’t find it. In the end, time is wasted. We better step straight to the destination we want to go to. Who knows, maybe we will come across a halal restaurant or outlet.

So we bought biscuits and snacks here.

There is also a relatively long boat type public transport. In my opinion, this is not for tourists but for locals. It would also be fun if there was a similar boat in my place, Kuala Lumpur. Of course, this boat is like a stop-and-go bus. Look there is a ‘bus stop’ by the river. From my research through Google Maps, it seems that this river connects to the west, that is, into the Chao Phraya River and to the east towards the Jim Thompson House Museum.

Along the way, I came across a fire station. Deliberately looking for differences even though the fire brigade is a common sight in Malaysia. The station is like using a shophouse or a mini-factory and is not an area built specifically for the fire brigade including quarters and so on.

We continued walking until we entered the grounds of Wat Saket. This is the stone that Godzilla used for cooking, hehe. What has the stone got to do with Wat Saket?

After the stone, we proceed to the ticket counter. Adults are charged a ticket priced at THB20/person, at that time worth MYR3.00. Children are excluded. For me, it is really cheap because:

1. The best view of Bangkok from the top of the hill. 180-degree panorama for each wind direction (east, west, north and south).
2. The area is a high hill.
3. Clean walkways and interiors.
4. Can see Buddhism as a little different from the usual.
5. Can see the three largest gongs in all areas from Thailand to Laos that we stopped at (a total of all 11 districts/cities).
6. There are large bells similar to those at Wat Khao Takiab, and even in Tibet.
7. There is a small garden to sit down to relax with green grass (it’s not real grass).
8. The story of the cholera disease that spread from Penang ??

Our walking distance is 350 meters from Pom Mahakan to Wat Saket.

There are three monkeys. Do you know what does it means?

Hear no evil …

See no evil …

Speak no evil …

Then we started to climb the stairs.

In the middle of the road, there is a mini waterfall. What is important there is the landmark sign that is “Golden Mount” as well as a replica of this Wat.

Here is a replica up close. In fact, the entire wall of this Wat is not gold in color but in reality, it is only white in color. Except for a few walls on the Wat and its stupa which are located under a gold-colored roof. The spiral-shaped staircase surrounds the Wat heading upwards. That’s what’s unique here. Yes, the shape of the stairs is indeed like that. Stay tuned for the next pictures if you don’t believe them.

This is the picture of Wat Saket from afar that I borrowed from Google. You can see the spiral staircase that surrounds the wat.

In the middle of the climb (just a quarter of the way), we stopped at a beautifully decorated mini garden by the stairs. The tree roots hanging from above really caught my eye. Coupled with the presence of a statue of a female goddess that I once described in a previous entry, named Mae Thorani.

Mae Thorani up close. Her face is also beautiful, hehe.

Just sharing a picture of the direction we started the climb, here’s the picture and the situation.

It’s been almost half the climb, the presence of Golden Mount signage as a doodle and proof that we’ve ever arrived here. And also such a big gong. This is the first gong but I forgot to compare the size compared to the other two in the same area.

There is also a mini garden. Although served with fake grass, but able to attract our hearts that are tired and want to rest for a while.

The bells are bigger than the ones we saw in Hua Hin before. It’s just that I’m not sure and I don’t know what the role of these bells is. Is it sounded for the purpose of their daily worship time or related to spirituality.

This is the second gong located close to the mini garden earlier. It is the same size as the first gong. It may weigh more than 3 motorcycles.

The second gong from a closer distance.

Wow … there are two more spiral staircases around this wat that we need to climb.

The view of the stairs from the mini garden area and the bell earlier led to the next climb.

This is not the previous ladder, but the next ladder after climbing the previous ladder. The shapes of the two are almost identical.

Ok, we have started to enjoy the 180-degree view of Bangkok from above. Also visible is the roof of a Wat which is a religious school.

There’s another bell …

View of Bangkok from the other direction through the last stairs before reaching the top of the climb. And I think those tall buildings are the main center of Bangkok.

If possible, I want to share more pictures because the view is so beautiful from above here. Beautiful in terms of the overall view of a major city when in the middle.

More pictures…

A panoramic extension from the picture above but this time on Tatie’s right. Try to look at the horizontal level and the building there, the right side has a small number of tall buildings. Actually, not many of my travel friends have ever been here. I suggest, get rid of worries in visiting such places of worship and prioritizing the attractions of the scenery found here.

I leaned on the last staircase and in front of me, there were 5 steps to enter the interior of the Wat building which is located at the top here.

Served with various types of figurines.

Buddhist relics were borrowed from elsewhere and temporarily placed here.

If you look at Wat Saket from the outside and on the roof, there is a rather large stupa. This is the ‘hole’ into the middle of the stupa. When we are inside, the roof of the stupa extending upwards will be above our heads.

While waiting for the turn of the devotees to pray here, I took a picture as a memento while Tatie stood outside.

After they finished worshiping, with a confident step and just wanting to take a picture (insyaAllah nothing will happen), I stepped into it to get closer to it. My biggest hope is to see the unique and strange decorations in it.

To the knowledge of the reader, there are four corners and each corner has the same tunnel like this.

Aqif with high confidence also went inside and posed for pictures. InsyaAllah son, we have Allah. Look at the roof that tapers upwards. So, we had completed our mission to reach the top of Wat Saket.

I was also stunned to see the golden decoration inside here. But don’t worry, I’m stunned just because of the decoration, just like if we come across a gold ingot that weighs a few kilos.

We turned to the window to see a 180-degree angle of the city from here. In this Wat, the exit and entry doors are the same only the direction is different. This is because the direction of the stairs to go down again is not the same as the direction of the stairs when going up here. We also had time to buy ice cream for each of us.

The exit door is the same as the previous entrance. Then we began to gradually from this place down the spiral staircase. This time it is presented with different sights and attractions.

Yes, it’s a bit weird, because it’s supposed to be a clockwise spiral stair. Suddenly there is also counterclockwise.

We went into a second mini garden.

Information board about Wat Saket. You can read it in the picture above.

Suddenly we saw many people gathered here. What did they see? A corpse was seen lying there.

The statues were made of wood and stone and looked like a vulture was eating a human statue and tearing its stomach. What happened?

Oh here’s the story…

Apparently, it was caused by cholera which started in 1824. To my surprise, there was the word Penang which was the original cause of the disease. It spread all the way to Bangkok and killed nearly 30,000 people! At that time, it was customary not to cremate corpses in the old city of Bangkok, but to bring them here. Due to too many corpses, all were left alone in the open. Eventually, it catches the attention of vultures and comes here tearing up the existing human corpses. And the worst peak occurred in 1849.

This cholera disease continued each dry season until 1881.

And at the end of our mission to Wat Saket, we were presented with a third gong and I felt it was a little bigger than the two gongs at the beginning. This time more beautiful with golden color decorations.

As usual, after the visitation session, Buddhists will place wishes to be affixed to this tree. We are exempted.

The next attractions are ideal for children. Dear parents, please get ready and follow us to the Funarium located in Sukhumvit.