Ancient City – Bangkok
Just outside of Bangkok in Samut Prakan province is the Ancient City, a spacious historical theme park that provides a good option for a day’s getaway from Bangkok. Featuring replicas of many of Thailand’s most important historic sites, The Ancient City is quite large, covering some 320 acres of land and is commonly billed as ‘the world’s largest outdoor museum’.
The Ancient City features 109 replicas of famous monuments and architectural attractions in Thailand. The considerable expanse of Ancient City is shaped to replicate the basic geographic locations of Thailand itself and the monuments are placed roughly according to where they are located in Thailand.
The reproductions in Ancient City are accurate, with their construction having been overseen by experts from the National Museum, providing visitors who may not get a chance to see all of Thailand’s architectural attractions with an impressive sampling of what they’re missing, and in some cases wonders that no longer exist. One of the more impressive works in this regard is the recreation of the former Royal Hall of Ayutthaya, which was destroyed by the Burmese in 1767.
While there is quite an impressive showing of Thailand’s royal history on display at the Ancient City, there are also several examples of different styles of Thai houses from the past and distinct to different regions of the country. In addition to the recreations on display at Ancient City are actual architectural structures purchased by the park, and reassembled here, such as the wooden temple located in the northern section of park, which was purchased from a hill-village in the North of Thailand.
The Ancient City contains numerous small food shops offering basic Thai fare, however, for a bit of a more traditional Thai experience the park also offers lunch in a restaurant set on a recreation of a Thai floating village. A small model Thai village in the Ancient City has ceramics, paper umbrellas and lacquer items produced by craftsmen for sale.
The Ancient City benefits from being so spacious and it is rare to find the park crowded. A very pleasant day can be spent here taking in the sites at your own pace. Walking the entire park in a day would be quite a chore, however the park lends itself to bicycle riding and rental of a bicycle is now included as part of the park’s admission charge. The Ancient City also offers a mini-rail service complete with a guide (instruction in Thai) and stops at the different parts of the scaled down Kingdom – tours begin from the southern end of the park and visitors make their way to the “North”.
Given The Ancient City’s out of the way location from Bangkok, it is recommended for convenience sake that you look into a tour arriving here or simply take a taxi, directing the driver to Muang Borang, as it is known in Thai. The cost of admission is Bt300 per adult, which includes the cost of bicycle rental and a free ride on the park’s mini-rail system. It takes about 45 minutes to get there by taxi and rush hour should certainly be avoided. We recommend you depart for your return journey no later than 3:30pm.
Traveller tale: Tour Thailand in a day
The Ancient city is a remarkable historic-themed park recreating the best of Thailand’s landmarks...more
