Four Temples in Bangkok Worth Your Morning

Bangkok has hundreds of temples and the heat is serious. The way to do this is to start early, do two or three properly rather than six badly, and be back indoors by the middle of the afternoon.

Two rules before you set out. Cover your shoulders and knees, all of you, at every temple; the Grand Palace is strictest and will turn people away or sell them a cover-up at the gate. And take your shoes off before entering a hall, which is easier in slip-ons than in laced boots.

One scam to know, because you will meet it: a friendly stranger near a temple entrance will tell you the temple is closed today for a ceremony, and offer a tuk-tuk tour to a special gem shop instead. The temple is not closed. Walk to the official ticket window and check for yourself.

The Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho is forty-six metres long, gilded, and housed in a hall barely bigger than it is, so you cannot see the whole thing at once. You walk along its length and it keeps going.

Do not miss the feet. They are inlaid with mother-of-pearl in a hundred and eight panels showing the auspicious signs by which a Buddha is identified, and they are the finest thing in the building.

Wat Pho is also the home of traditional Thai massage teaching, and there is a school in the grounds where you can have one. After a morning of walking on hot stone, that is a well-placed idea.

Phu Khao Thong, the Golden Mount, is an artificial hill built when Bangkok had no high ground at all. A staircase of roughly three hundred steps spirals up the outside of it, past bells and small shrines, to a golden chedi at the top.

The climb is gentle rather than brutal, and the reward is one of the few genuine views over old Bangkok. Ring the bells on the way up; everyone does. In November, during the temple's festival, the whole mount is wrapped in red cloth and lit with candles.

Wat Mahathat is quieter than the others and it is a working religious institution rather than a monument: it houses a Buddhist university and a well-known meditation centre that runs sessions in English for visitors.

Go for the atmosphere, and if the idea appeals, ask about the meditation. Next to it is the amulet market, where dealers examine small Buddha images through jeweller's loupes; it is one of the most absorbing street scenes in the city and costs nothing to watch.

Across the river on the Thonburi side, Wat Arun is the tall stepped tower that appears on every Bangkok postcard. Get close and you see what it is made of: the entire surface is covered in fragments of broken Chinese porcelain, pressed into the plaster, which arrived as ballast in trading ships and was reused as decoration.

You can climb part way up the steep steps. Handrails help; the stairs are not for everyone.

The name says dawn but the light is better at the other end of the day. Cross back over the river before sunset, find a spot on the eastern bank, and watch it turn gold. The cross-river ferry costs a few baht and runs constantly.

The temples above sit near the river, and the Chao Phraya express boat is the fastest and most pleasant way to move between them. It is public transport, it is cheap, and it beats sitting in traffic in a tuk-tuk that is taking you somewhere you did not ask to go.

The old quarter around the temples is a maze of markets, canals and lanes, and it is where the city actually happens. A city game gives you a route with clues through it, which is a better way to spend the cooler part of the day than shuffling between ticket windows. It works well with friends and with a group.

Shoulders and knees covered, for everyone. Shoes come off before entering a hall. The Grand Palace enforces this most strictly.

Almost never. If a stranger outside tells you the temple is closed and offers a tuk-tuk tour instead, it is a scam. Check at the official ticket window.

Two or three in the morning is plenty. The heat and the walking do more damage than the sightseeing.

From opening until about eleven. For Wat Arun, the view from the opposite bank is best in the hour before sunset.

By river boat. The Chao Phraya express is cheap, frequent and avoids the traffic entirely.

If you want the streets between the temples, walk them with a playing route. Here is how it works, and for team outings and larger groups we have formats on this page. Questions about dates, group sizes or routes? Get in touch. Heading south afterwards? Phuket.