My main reason for coming to Old Lopburi was not the laid-back, hippy feel of the town, and it wasn’t the scattered ruins that can be found there. It was the monkeys! A town where wild monkeys, specifically crab-eating macaques, roam freely throughout the city streets was something I had to see for myself. I found the idea of monkeys hanging out at a temple romantic, very Indiana Jones. I also went for the sunflowers, but as Thailand was experiencing a drought, there wasn’t much to see on that front.
Even though I knew what to expect, I wasn’t prepared for my first monkey sighting. They were just sitting on the rooftops of buildings, swinging from the power lines. I was intimidated. They were bigger than I expected, and as I kept walking, they were everywhere! Dozens of monkeys were hanging out on doorsteps, on vehicles, on shop signs, and they lined the sidewalks. A man shot them off his storefront with a slingshot. Another woman chased them out of her shoe shop with a broom. These critters had the run of the town. I took a wide berth past them on the sidewalk, preferring to walk in the street and take my chances with the crazy drivers.
Then I hit it, the monkey motherload– Phra Prang Sam Yot, Monkey Temple. With trepidation, I paid my 50 baht entrance fee and walked toward the temple ruins. Monkeys played out front, they fought also, skittering towards me as they did. I was alone here and nervous as hell. What if the monkeys took a liking to me, or worse?
As I circled widely around the temple on the shady side, I froze in my tracks. There were hundreds of monkeys hanging out here– babies, mommas and hairy, scary daddies. They lounged in the shade, climbed the stones, picked bugs from each other to eat, and had sex, everywhere and all the time. The young ones would get into skirmishes and next thing I knew, a crazy angry monkey was barrelling towards me. I scrambled to get out of the way of many fights that day. The possibility of rabies kept me at a distance.
The temple is small. There is only the one building and it is monkey territory. The more time I spent there, the braver I got. They really weren’t interested in me. I had read countless stories of monkeys stealing bags, hats and glasses from tourists, but they showed me little interest. I did keep everything tucked away and made sure I had no food or tempting dangly bits on my bag. The young ones would run any time I raised my camera and focussed on them, the older ones tended to just turn away from me. I bravely inched closer towards them as the day went on, but I never got too close. I wanted to stay out of jumping distance, although truthfully I didn’t really know how far that was. If anyone looked at me too intently, I withdrew. Being alone, I also had to keep an eye on my back. With my attention given to my camera, the odd teenager monkey would draw near to me from the rear. I had no idea what their intentions were, so I kept a close eye all around.
It’s possible to enter Monkey Temple, which is cool and calm, and also a great place to observe the monkeys from close up. The four barred doors had several small monkeys hanging off them and they were as interested in me as I was in them. It was fun to watch them. When you get to the centre of the temple look up– its covered in bats! Luckily the ceiling is high and they seemed quite content to stay where they were.
The monkeys keep mainly to a part of town in the vicinity of Monkey Temple, but I did see them scaling buildings and walking along the power lines in smaller groups around my guesthouse. For that reason it is suggested that you don’t leave your guesthouse windows open unless they are protected. Some hotels near the temple are covered in a cage. How’s that for irony?
I never did get up the courage to walk through a few dozen monkeys when they took over the sidewalk. Come to think of it, I didn’t see any of the locals use their main sidewalk either.
I would go back to Lopburi in a heartbeat. It is a friendly city with a laid-back vibe that has an awesome, bizarre monkey attraction that is definitely worth checking out.
This puts me in mind of the rat temple in India, or the snake temple that I chose not to visit. Or Nara, in Japan, that is overrun by deer. They sell deer cookie treats on the street to tourists. One deer walked up to my husband and ate our map out of his hand. It’s hard to imagine a place overrun by any certain animal, but there sure are all sorts of weird places in the world, aren’t there?
Fun Beatles fact – did you know Paul McCartney was inspired to write the song “Why Don’t we do it in the Road” after seeing monkeys doing it in the road? Why not, indeed.
Snakes and rats, very Indiana Jones! Deer not so much. I thought only goats ate things like maps! Love the Beatles fun fact! Those monkeys weren’t shy, and the act took them all of 10 seconds! Must be some kind of mammal record.