White Temple. Thailand

In our guesthouse there were several day trip packages you could book,  one of them was to Chang Rai which also took you to Laos and to the  border of Burma which David really wanted to do. It was also going to a place called the White Temple which when I googled it looked absolutely beautiful. 

So we arranged to take this trip and set off early the next day leaving at 7 o'clock in the morning. The minibus went around several hotels picking people up and once we were all gathered together our guide introduced herself, her name being Apple. At this me and David looked at each other as the night before the receptionist at our guesthouse told us her name, which was Som which apparently means orange, which she went on to say as in the fruit that you eat. So the night before we met Orange and today we met Apple. 

It was going to be a long trip so on the way we had a short break at a hot spring, which was nice to see, roasting to touch and if you stood down wind a little whiffy.  

David decided to dip his toes in the water, was too hot for me. 

After we were all refreshed and had stretched our legs we got back into the minibus to continue our journey. Apple was very good at explaining things as we went along about the crops, towns and temples and was happy to answer any questions that were asked.

 Soon we were at the White Temple which was built by a man with his own money, it is totally different from the traditional temples we had already seen and was designed and funded by Chalermchai Kositpipot in  1997. It is a work in progress and is not planned to be finished until 2070. Temples in Thailand are generally yellow, red and gold in colour so this one was totally different.

Leading up to the temple were trees with heads hanging from them

This golden building is actually the toilet and is supposed to be the poshest toilet ever, it is certainly very grand.  Apple refers to toilets as the happy place, which totally confused us at first, when she asked if anybody needed to visit the happy place. When we figured out what she was talking about we asked why she called it that , she said " Because you always feel happy once you have been." So there you go, makes sense now! 

The side entrance to the White Temple, sadly there was an earthquake 5 months ago which caused damage to the building  so we could not actually go in as repairs were being done. 

The building really glistened in the sun. 

The dragons at the entrances are supposed to protect Buddha inside.

At the temple you could buy these silver leaves which you can write your names on or the names of family and friends, these then get put on a Buddha tree and it is supposed to bring good luck. 

Our leaf on the tree.

Our leaf is hanging beneath the tree but will be moved up above where the others are hanging.

The Temple reminds me of the Snow Queen's palace.

The entrance to the temple , the ramp leading up is supposed to be going over hell, the bits at the front of the picture are supposed to be people trying to escape from it. 

It was a beautiful place to visit, inside there is a mural which although partly traditional also has pictures of Spider-Man, Kung fu Panda and Harry Potter amongst other more modern images. This has proven to be quite controversial if you google it you can see these images online.