"Blessings to you people," smiles Goddess Guan Yin
First, you are on top of mountain in Muang County. This huge area sits a giant 23-storey tall Goddess Guan Yin, a 9-tier Chinese pagoda and a sparkling white temple.
For 40 Baht, you are able to take the lift inside the Guan Yin statue and travel up to her "forehead" for a fantastic view. However, when we were there, the temple was holding an event for the poor people. Monks were there to give out bags of rice and other food stuff to the crowd. The lifts were closed on that day, much to our disappointment.
Marble status around the giant Guan Yin statue
The lifts to go up to the Guan Yin's forehead!
Bags of rice and food
sparkling white temple
9-storey Chinese Pagoda
This is the biggest wooden Buddha statue on the ground floor of the pagoda. You will see when you walk into the main entrance. See the young man on the right with a pail on the wooden platform? He was carving the wood right then and there. I stood by him for ages, marveling at his talent and patience.
This baby elephant was the cutest thing of all in the temple!
It was crazy tiring walking around this complex. Walk up and down to Goddess Guan Yin was already tiring enough, but the view was amazing at her feet. Then walking down the stairs and up another hill to enter the white temple was already crazy tired. After that, it was another walking down a flight of steps and climbing up another hill to enter the pagoda. And, inside the pagoda another 9 flights of steps up and dow. God bless our feet!
We had fun exploring this huge place. We only noticed Goddess Guan Yin's shine in our photos when we returned to our hotel room. Was that a sign?
