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Phuket Wat Phra Thong

Location: Thalang district, the road from Phuket to the Airport

Wat Phra Thong is located on the road from Phuket Town to the Airport, about 6 kilometers north of the Heroines Monument on Phuket Island. This temple complex is not spectacular from the outside, but it has probably one of the most interesting stories behind it. Parts of the movie Good Morning Vietnam where filmed in the Thalang Area.

(The burried Buddha Image at Wat Phra Thong on Phuket)

At Wat Phra Thong you will find a golden Buddha image which is half buried. You can only see the Buddha from the waste up. According to local legend a boy found the statue buried under the ground when he was looking for a place to tie his buffalo with a rope. He found a strange stone covered in mud and tied his buffalo to it. When he got home he fell sick and died the next morning.

(One of the temples at the Wat Phra Thong temple complex)

The people from the village went to check on the buffalo that also died. When they washed the stone they realized it was the head of a Golden Buddha. The governor of Thalang ordered to dig up the Buddha, but many strange things happened, the diggers for example where attacked by wasps. For this they left the Buddha image in the ground and built a temple on top of it. At this moment you cannot see the original Golden Buddha, a newer image was built on top of the old one to cover it.

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