Thailand’s temples the star of luxury boat trip from Bangkok to the ancient kingdom of Ayutthaya
Starting with Wat Arun, one of Thailand’s best-known landmarks, a journey on Anantara’s new vessel shows off the impressive temples along Chao Phraya river
Disparate architectural styles are the highlight of Bang Pa-In, while temples in Ayutthaya’s old town recall counterparts in Indonesia and Cambodia
The three bell-shaped Buddhist stupas at Wat Phra Sri Sanpetch in Ayutthaya’s old town, in Thailand, house the ashes of 15th-century kings. The temple is one of several on the itinerary of a luxury boat trip run by Anantara. Photo: Penny Watson
There always seems to be one too many temples on tours in Thailand. On this trip, I confess, we bowed out of seeing the final one, the searing heat at the end of the day being too much for even the marathon runner among us. But now I’m left wondering what I missed.
Thailand’s stupas, spires, steeples and statues rise delightfully out of the urban concrete of its big cities – beacons of luminescent gold in a backdrop of grey. In the countryside, shimmering peaked rooftops and ancient crumbling domes stand proud against vivid green trees and the flat expanses of striped rice paddies.
Accessing some of the most impressive of these temples is as easy as taking a day trip or an overnighter on one of the many flat-bottomed teak rice barges that ply the Chao Phraya River.
On this wide, murky-brown hydro-highway – which springs at the confluence of the Ping and Nan rivers, in Nakhon Sawan province, and flows 372km (231 miles) through Bangkok to the Gulf of Thailand – travellers can slip seamlessly between the city and rural areas, tapping into an ancient trade and travel route while immersing themselves in the spiritual and cultural side of Thai life.
Anantara’s new Loy River Song vessel on the Chao Phraya River. Photo: Penny Watson
Hotel chain Anantara’s new Loy River Song vessel was bespoke-built in the tradition of the century-old teak rice barges but with luxury overnight stays in mind. Its four staterooms, named for the Chao Phraya’s four headwaters – Nan, Yom, Wang and Ping – are styled in modern Thai fabrics and fittings, and have king beds, dapper ensuites, Jim Thompson bathrobes and concierge buttons.
The boat’s two-night, three-day return journey begins in Bangkok and continues upstream to the ancient kingdom of Ayutthaya, stopping at some of Thailand’s treasures along the way.
In Bangkok, the Chao Phraya is choppy with to-and-froing ferries and tugboats hauling strings of huge engineless barges piled high with sand and gravel. Rainbow-topped longboats, the tuk-tuks of the river, navigate between them, the put-put of their motors adding to the hubbub.
The grittiness of the city’s concrete bridges and nondescript riverside buildings is punctuated by architecture typified by that at our first stop, Wat Arun. Built in the early 19th century, during the reign of King Rama II, this is one of Thailand’s best-known landmarks.
Its central prang and four outer spires are decorated in a mosaic of Chinese porcelain. Up close, the craftsmanship is almost rudimentary – broken willow pattern plates and chipped tiles included – but from afar the vision is spectacular; a monument that shines pearly white in the glow of the sun.
Wat Arun in Bangkok is one of Thailand’s best-known landmarks. Photo: Penny Watson
Upstream, the city’s taller buildings thin out and are gradually replaced by plots of greenery and rows of wooden stilt houses, their gangly legs knee-deep in water. Industry is here too. As we’re served sundowner canapés and cocktails on the deck, the towering fermenting vats of the Singha beer factory throw a shadow our way.
A staff member points out the “white spirit” as we motor past a magnificent gold Buddha looking munificent on the water’s edge. It turns out he is referring to the vodka factory behind it.
We stop at Wat Chaloem, a 160-year-old temple built by order of King Rama III and uniquely (in these parts) encircled by a fortified wall. At Wat Bot, where we moor for the night, young monks, swaddled in rust-orange fabric, wander past us on the waterfront promontory. It’s easy to sleep in such serene surrounds.
A room on the Loy River Song. Photo: Penny Watson
Day two begins on the upper-deck salon, an open space with contemporary Thai-inspired furnishings and a communal dining table for the maximum eight guests on board. Sliding windows reveal riverside scenery that slides by like a movie. Floating bright-green water hyacinths crowd the river’s surface and the eye rests on passing gold Buddhas and glittering temple rooftops, their eaves turning upwards like coquettish eyelashes.
Bang Pa-In, known as the Summer Palace, is our next stop. When the capital moved from Ayutthaya to Bangkok in the mid-17th century, this space was abandoned for 80 years. But the European proclivities of King Rama V saw it revived during the 18th and 19th centuries.
Its temples, monuments, pavilions and residences – some more folly than functional – were inspired by disparate architectural styles: the throne room from China, the residential halls from Europe. With tourists still largely absent as the tourism industry recovers from the Covid-19 shutdown, we have the manicured gardens, grand pathways, quaint bridges and selfie-ops all to ourselves.
The throne room at Bang Pa-In. Photo: Penny Watson
The grounds of Bang Pa-In. Photo: Penny Watson
Similarly, on a longboat tour around the island of Ayutthaya, waterfront cafes and tourist teak boats remain closed, but among the riverfront temples are a silver-domed mosque and the first Christian church in Thailand – a country that is 95 per cent Buddhist – bell tower and all.
After lunch (a four-course feast featuring royal Thai dishes) comes the trip highlight: Ayutthaya’s old town, a Unesco World Heritage Site. In the centre are Wat Phra Sri Sanpetch, its three oversized bell-shaped chedis (Buddhist stupas) housing the ashes of 15th-century kings, and Wat Mahathat, a vast collection of crumbling red brick temples and pagodas dating back to 1374.
The antiquity of the latter recalls Indonesia’s Borobudur temple and, when I see Buddha’s head tangled in the roots of a banyan tree, Cambodia’s Angkor Wat temple complex.
A Buddha’s head in a tangle of banyan tree roots at Wat Mahathat. Photo: Penny Watson
A headless Buddha at Wat Mahathat. Photo: Penny Watson
On our return to Bangkok the following day, the scenery plays in reverse: green hyacinths, the Singha factory, bridges and all those temples in between. The one we missed was Wat Rat Burana, said to be one of Ayutthaya’s most impressive Khmer temples.
Next time.
Penny Watson was a guest of Anantara Riverside Bangkok and Loy Pela Voyages.