Wat Umong was completed around 1300, and is still in use today. It's nickname derives from the design, which includes a main underground tunnel, with several intersecting cross-tunnels, each with a Buddha and offerings at the end. There is also the typical above-ground stupa, with a meditation path around it. Here is a photo inside a tunnel.
The next stop was Wat Prathat, located on Doi Suthep, the highest point in Thailand at around 5,500 feet. Fortunately, there was a funicular to get us (and hundreds of others) up and down the steep incline. (For once, I opted out of walking the 300+ very steep steps to the top!)
This temple was built in the late 1300s, and contains a Buddha relic...although no one knows what the relic is. (We were told that any temple with "Wat" in its name contains a Buddha relic.) There were several types of worship areas we hadn't seen in the temples visited to date, and several areas with a monk leading prayers. Photos follow in the next post of the stupa, which contains the relic, young monks-in-training, and a series of oil-burning candles, which worshipers replenish with what had dropped into the trough below
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