The Ancient City and Erawan Museum

The Ancient City and the Erawan Museum are two sights in Samut Prakan, south-east of Bangkok, created by the same man. The Ancient City is an enormous park of replica monuments; the Erawan Museum is a giant three-headed elephant that you can climb inside. They are usually visited together.

The Ancient City (Ancient Siam)

Known in Thai as Muang Boran, the Ancient City is a museum park of replicas of famous Siamese sites, built by Lek Viriyaphan. It covers 320 hectares in the rough shape of Thailand, with 116 structures placed roughly where their originals stand: some life-size replicas, some scaled-down, and some creative designs. Replicas include the former Grand Palace of Ayutthaya, destroyed in the Burmese invasion of 1767, and Phimai Sanctuary in Nakhon Ratchasima (Wikipedia).

Lek originally planned a golf course shaped like a map of Thailand with miniatures on it, then changed it to an open-air museum for education. He kept working on the Ancient City, the Sanctuary of Truth in Pattaya and the Erawan Museum until his death on 17 November 2000.

What the replicas include

The monuments are arranged by region and, within the park, by era, from the Dvaravati and Srivijaya periods through Sukhothai and Ayutthaya to the Rattanakosin period of today's Bangkok. The list on Wikipedia includes:

• Northern region: Lanna-style structures such as the Wihan at Wat Phumin and a replica of Phra That Chom Kitti.
• Northeastern (Isaan): the Phimai and Phanom Rung sanctuaries, Prasat Phra Wihan (Preah Vihear) and Phra That Phanom.
• Central region: the Sanphet Prasat Palace, Prang Sam Yod and the Dusit Maha Prasat Palace.

That makes it a convenient way to see the shape of regional styles in one place, but a copy is not the original: for the real Ayutthaya, see Ayutthaya from Bangkok.

Getting around

Our day trips guide says it is large enough that you will want a bicycle or a golf cart, and that it is a short taxi ride from the eastern end of the BTS Sukhumvit Line.

Hours and tickets: we could not find an official timetable or price list. Resellers list it as open daily from 9am to 7pm, but ticket prices vary widely by seller. Check the official channels before you go (checked October 2026).

The Erawan Museum

The museum, built in 2003, is known for a giant bronze three-headed elephant that weighs 250 tonnes and stands 29 metres high. You go inside it (Wikipedia):

• First floor: Chinese vases from the Ming and Qing dynasties, and the history of the museum's construction.
• Second floor: antiques and art including ceramics and European pottery, and a statue of Guanyin, the goddess of compassion.
• Top floor, in the elephant's belly, represents the Tavatimsa heaven of Buddhist cosmology, with Buddha images from the Lopburi, Ayutthaya, Lanna and Rattanakosin periods.

The museum is served by Chang Erawan station on the BTS Sukhumvit Line.

Seeing both in one day

KKday lists tours of about six hours that combine both sites, and a shared transfer that leaves from Siam Paragon. A tour makes most sense if you don't want to arrange the taxi leg yourself; if you do, a BTS journey plus a short taxi ride is enough.

Who it suits

• Architecture and history enthusiasts, who can see copies of monuments from across the country in one place.
• Anyone who wants a quiet day out of the city centre.
• Not ideal if you have only a couple of days in Bangkok; the Old Town temples and the Grand Palace show the real buildings.

• Best Day Trips From BangkokA day trip costs you a whole day of a Bangkok trip, so it needs to earn it. Ayutthaya does. Some of the others are better as half-days or not at all.
• Best Things to Do in BangkokThirty-plus experiences, grouped the way you will actually plan them: by what they are and where they are. Each one says who it suits, how long it takes and what to pair it with.