Driving Scooter around Bangkok [2]: Golden Mountain, China Town and Sampheng

The next day I told my boyfriend to ride to the Golden Mountain. WE missed it the day before. I didnt want to climb up the mountain when I was in pants, neither did he. We rode pass the China Town. The traffic there was terrible. But he knew how to ride scooter in Bangkok, we passed that area quickly. Well I was wondering how it would be about him an the scooter in Bangkok. The traffic here is always crazy but he learnt how to drive like thai people so fast. If you wanna see how the traffic here is you can visit his blog, he writes about living in thailand as well.

The Golden Mountain is not far from Wat Phra Kaew or Kaosarn Road. You can buy Bangkok map at any book store but you will certainly find the english version at Asia Books. I have been living in Bangkok for more than 10 years but this was my first time going there.

The Golden Mountain is in Saket temple. It was built in 1787 A.D. (Ayutthaya era). The mountain has 100 meters height. You can climb up to the Chedi by using the stairs which there are 2 sides, north and souths, 344 steps for each side.

When you climb up to the to the top you will see a small room with a smaller pagodah containg Buddha's relics in the inside. Not far from there you will see the stair to climb up to the very top with a sign says something like "to heaven". After you take those stairs to the heaven you can look down from up there to see the whole area of the temple, yeah its a big temple, and you can also see the Bangkok as well. Sorry I didnt take many photos there :(.

Man I thought I was dying when i was climbing up the stairs!!

After that we left to Chinatown or Yaowarat. The traffic was bad so we parked the scooter somewhere beside the road and walk to the shopping area. The shark fin and bird nest are popular there. Plenty of food there such as fish belly, crabs, ducks, goose, shark fins, birs nest, chestnuts, etc. We agreed to come back at night for dinner.

We walked in the street to see what was inside and wow there was a huge market, lots of stores! I then knew that we were at Sampheng, a big shopping area with cheap prize. We walked around that area for an hour or so but still couldnot explore the whole market.

We came back there at night for dinner. We walked around and couldnot find any spicy food so we left there and headed to Saun Lumpini Night Bazaar.

related stories:

• Driving Scooter around Bangkok [1]: Emerald Temple and Wat Pho
• Driving Scooter around Bangkok [3]: Sapan Lek Square