Wat Phra Singh is a large, wealthy temple complex in the center of Chiang Mai’s old city. I walked in when the apprentice monks were being led by elder monks in chants in the largest of the temples. I wanted a picture or two, but about the time I got ready to point and shoot, the chanting stopped and everybody got up and filed out of the temple. I did, however, get a number of images of the grounds, of which this is one.
This photo was taken in late May when I visited the Temple of the Emerald Buddha in Bangkok. Passed right by this image the first time I looked at the pictures I shot that day, but a second look got me to reconsider. The roof moving off into the distance on the right, I think, makes the composition very dynamic. This movement really sets off the two people—the woman in her lovely rainbow colored serape—framed by the white columns as they escape the blistering hot sun for a few moments.
Wat Chedi Luang was established in the 14th century, but the 1990s reconstruction pictured here is controversial with some claiming the structure is not in the Lanna style of northern Thailand. Or so I have read.
The sun breaks through a mostly overcast sky washing Wat Pan On in soft, late afternoon light.
This morning I set out with Jason, an American friend met in Chiang Mai, to visit quiet, lovely Wat Pha Lat. The trip involved a gentle 45 minute climb up to the temple complex. Wat Pha Lat is in fact on the road up the mountain to the larger, better known and more visited Wat Phrathat Doi Suthep, which is sort of the center piece of Thailand’s Doi Suthep – Pui National Park in the mountains to the west of Chiang Mai. But it was nice to come at this smaller temple on foot, getting some exercise in the process.
Although Wat Buppharem was established over 500 years ago when Chiang Mai was still at the center of a northern Thai kingdom, the wat’s largest structure pictured here, the Dhamma hall, was completed in 1996.
Wat Panping is one of the many small wats in the Old City of Chiang Mai.
This stupa stands in Wat Muen Lan, a small temple in the eastern part of Chiang Mai’s Old City.