Gold, Teak and Ruin: The Old City Temples

A morning walk between the three great temples inside the moat: the broken giant of Wat Chedi Luang, the teak hall of Wat Phan Tao and the revered Buddha of Wat Phra Singh.

Area

Old City

Start from

Tha Phae Gate

Distance

about 3 km on foot

Time needed

half a day

Best season

November – February is coolest; early mornings all year

Difficulty

Easy

Transport

On foot, or a red songthaew to Tha Phae Gate

Tickets & rules

Small entry fees at Wat Chedi Luang and Wat Phra Singh for foreigners; covered shoulders and knees, shoes off in halls

Why go

Inside the moat there are more than thirty temples, and you could spend a week wandering between them. If you only have a morning, these three tell the story of the city best. They sit close together along Ratchadamnoen and Phra Pokklao roads, so the walk is short, shaded in places, and broken up by coffee stops and the sound of monks chanting behind half-open doors.

Wat Chedi Luang is the one that stops people in their tracks. Its great brick chedi, still huge even after losing its top, rises out of the trees like a ruined mountain, guarded by stone elephants and serpent-lined staircases. Next door, Wat Phan Tao is the opposite: a dark, almost black hall of old teak, small and intimate, with a peacock carved over the door.

Wat Phra Singh, at the western end of Ratchadamnoen, is the most beloved temple in the city. Its little Viharn Lai Kham holds the Phra Buddha Sihing image and walls painted with scenes of everyday northern life: people courting, gossiping, smoking and working the fields, a precious record of how Lanna once looked.

The story

Chiang Mai was founded in 1296 by King Mangrai, who chose the site between the mountain and the Ping River and laid out the square city whose moat still survives. The name simply means new city. For two centuries it was the capital of Lanna, the kingdom of a million rice fields, which had its own script, its own laws and a style of temple building quite unlike Bangkok's.

Wat Chedi Luang was begun in the late fourteenth century and finished under King Tilokarat in the fifteenth, when it was the tallest structure in Lanna, around 80 metres high. For a time its eastern niche held the Emerald Buddha, now in Bangkok. An earthquake in the sixteenth century brought down the upper part, and the ruin has been left largely as it fell; the jade image you see in the niche today is a replica placed there in 1995.

In the grounds stands a small shrine to the Sao Inthakhin, the city pillar, believed to protect Chiang Mai. Each year around May and June the Inthakhin festival brings flowers, candles and long queues of locals making offerings for the rains. Near the shrine grows an enormous gum tree, said to be one of the city's guardian trees. Women traditionally do not enter the pillar shrine itself, a rule worth respecting quietly.

Wat Phra Singh dates from the mid-fourteenth century and was built to hold the ashes of King Phayu's father. Its Buddha image has a famously tangled history; at least three temples in Thailand claim to hold the original Phra Buddha Sihing. During Songkran in April, the Chiang Mai image is carried through the streets and people throw water over it for blessing.

Getting there

Start at Tha Phae Gate on the eastern side of the moat, easy to reach by red songthaew, Grab or simply on foot from the riverside. Walk west along Ratchadamnoen Road, turn left on Phra Pokklao to reach Wat Chedi Luang and Wat Phan Tao, then continue west along Ratchadamnoen to Wat Phra Singh.

The whole loop is about three kilometres. Lanes inside the moat are narrow and fairly quiet, but watch for scooters on corners.

A suggested plan

1. 7:30Breakfast near Tha Phae Gate while the pigeons own the square and the light is soft on the brick.
2. 8:30Wat Chedi Luang: circle the great chedi, visit the city pillar shrine and look for the monks' table where you can chat in English.
3. 9:30Step next door into the teak hall of Wat Phan Tao and its small pond garden.
4. 10:30Walk west to Wat Phra Singh, linger in the Viharn Lai Kham and its murals.
5. MiddayRest over a bowl of noodles on Samlarn Road before the heat peaks.

Where to stay

The old city itself is the easiest base: guesthouses line the quiet lanes around Ratchadamnoen and Ratwithi, and everything in this walk is a few minutes away. The streets just east of Tha Phae Gate are livelier and closer to the river and the night markets.

Good to know

• The monk chat at Wat Chedi Luang runs most afternoons and is a genuinely warm way to ask questions about Buddhism and monastic life.
• Carry a light scarf or sarong; some halls are stricter than others about bare shoulders.
• Go early: the light is better, the stone is cooler, and tour groups arrive around ten.
• Take off your shoes before stepping onto the raised platforms, not just at the door.