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Published: December 15th 2011
Well, I've finally found some time to sit down and update the blog. I left off with my arrival at Khao San Road in Bangkok. Khao San Road was probably one of the most overrated places I have been to, if not the most. When you read about backpacking and where to go, what is cheap and popular, Khao San road inevitably makes an appearance. I can't say that I see why it is so popular, mostly for its reputation I think than anything else. Frankly I couldn't wait to leave. Its always crowded with the party crowd, hawkers, women sticking those damn wooden frogs in your face, guys selling fake id's and diplomas, touts for tailor shops and tuktuk drivers. The bars and restaurants in the road and the next road over were horribly overpriced, at least by SE Asian standards and the street food (while cheap, but almost entirely phad thai) was fairly bland. Luckily my hostel was two streets over, where it was very quiet. I did find some good spring rolls and rotee (sort of like a pancake/crepe usually with a filling banana or egg). Outside of Khao San Road, there are some sights to see in Bangkok that are interesting. There are countless temples around the city, but I only visited a couple of the bigger ones. Luckily they weren't outside of walking distance from my hostel (except when I had to take a ferry across the river). I also visited the royal palace, which was somewhat of a disappointment. It did have a very nice temple inside which housed the emerald Buddha, Thailand's most important Buddha image, but it is not as impressive as it sounds. The palace was mostly closed, which annoyed me since it was expensive to get in. I don't know if the exhibits were closed because it was the weekend or what, but they should at least charge us less if we can't see much. I could walk around the grounds, but that was about it. I also visited a temple which housed a large reclining Buddha and a temple across the Chao Phraya river where you could climb to the top and have a great view of the city. Outside of one of the temples on the way to the palace was one of the more interesting markets I've seen. All along the street were people selling amulets and small buddha statues. These were aimed at the temple-going Thai, so it was fun to walk around, there were hardly any other foreigners and the prices were cheap, so I bought a couple. You could get anything from a little 5-baht piece to much more expensive and intricate amulets or images.
On the weekend, Bangkok houses the largest market in SE Asia, the Chatutak Weekend Market, with 8000 stalls in a 35 acre area. I wandered around aimlessly for a few hours picking up a few souvenirs. If I had really wanted to, I could have spent the entire day there looking at all of the different options. Afterwards I stopped in Siam Square, the main shopping area of Bangkok with a variety of large malls. I only stopped there since it was on the way back to Khao San road, and I wasn't very interested in the shopping there.
Even after hearing of the flooding in Thailand for weeks, there was almost no sign there was any problems at all in central Bangkok. The river was high and a little bit above it's banks in places. The most obvious signs that there was some risk of water was the concrete or sandbag barriers in front of many stores and buildings. It wasn't until I was leaving the city to the north on my way to Ayutthaya that I saw any floodwater at all. Once we got far enough out of the city, near the domestic airport, the streets began to fill with water, high enough to even reach the railroad tracks at points, even though they were raised above the street level. The train to Ayutthaya was all third-class seats, not especially comfortable, but padded and the trip was short, only about an hour, and very cheap (15-baht).
Ayutthaya had only recently dried out and been cleaned up from the flooding. I stayed in a cheap guesthouse for 120 baht. The high-water mark was clearly visible on the walls, at least 8 feet up. Everywhere people were working on repairing the damage to their homes and buildings. Ayutthaya was a capital of Thailand and housed some impressive temples before the Burmese sacked the city. Most of the temples are in very poor condition, often with little left other than the floor and bases of walls and columns. I rented a bicycle there on my second day and went to most of the sites. After Angkor Wat, it wasn't especially impressive, but they did have some nice ruins and temples still in somewhat decent condition. If you only visit Thailand and don't do Cambodia, I think it would probably be worth visiting. I had booked a bed on the sleeper train to Chiang Mai once I arrived in Ayutthaya for the next evening, so once I finished visiting the sights, I had to kill several hours to kill until my train left. The second-class sleepers on Thai trains are much more comfortable than the Chinese trains. Second-class seemed to be about the equivalent of a soft-sleeper on a Chinese train, and much cheaper too. The beds were wider and only four to a compartment (open to the hallway), as opposed to 6. They were very comfortable beds and I got a great nights sleep. When I woke up, we still had a few hours until arriving in Chiang Mai, so I was able to get a view of some of the landscape. There were plenty of rice fields mixed with hills and mountains covered in forest. It was very nice.
Once I arrived in Chiang Mai, I took a songthaew (pickup truck with two benches on the back) to the old part of town where there were many guesthouses. I found a place where I got a single for 200 baht before switching to the cheaper 100 baht dorms after a couple nights. It was nice enough with a nice common space, but the rooms were nothing special. Chiang Mai is a very nice city, especially in the old part of town inside the moat and the area just around, where I spent most of my time. In the old days, there used to be a city wall, but now only a few parts remain at the corners and the gates. This part of the city is very quiet with nice green streets and a few temples. Outside of the moat, the city begins to sprawl and is much more crowded. Chiang Mai has a huge night bazaar. I visited the nearby day market and the night bazaar on my first day there. I didn't think it was especially interesting though. It catered almost entirely to tourists and had mostly the usual junk, like t-shirts, sun glasses, and the usual. There were some interesting things, but since after a few stalls everything was repeated, nothing felt special. I did get some cheap pork satay and some more good rotee though. I only visited it that one night. A few days later there were the Saturday and Sunday walking street markets. I only went to the Saturday market, since I left on Sunday, but it was infinitely more interesting than the night Bazaar. There was a much larger selection of food and plenty of vendors selling interesting things. Plus many of the locals went to these markets so it was very busy. Near the Saturday market was a small market which at night turns into a variety of food stalls. I had some good cheap food there as well - good phad thai, good rard nar, good fruit shakes.
Since I was spending several days in Chiang Mai, I decided to do a few activites. I did a cooking class which was fun (although I made some of my food a bit too spicy). We made a few different dishes - I chose phad thai, a coconut chicken soup, green chicken curry and papaya salad. I also did a 1 day "trek." Not really a trek, but it was fun as well. We went to do some rafting on one of the rivers, which included some rapids (we got pretty wet). Afterwards we did some elephant riding and hiked between a couple villages through the forest. The tour guides in Thailand are a lot of fun - they are always joking and having fun, often at our expense. For example, the guides in each of the rafts were always trying to get us wet and one of them even tricked the people in his boat to do something that flipped them over. It was a good experience, even though we never spent a lot of time on any of the activities.
After four nights in Chiang Mai, I moved on to Chiang Rai, a small city a few hours north by bus. It was easy to get to and the bus was cheap and comfortable, even though the roads were winding at places. Chiang Rai is much quieter than Chiang Mai, and after a couple days it is easy to get bored there. Like Chiang Mai, there is a daily night market and the saturday and sunday walking streets. The Sunday walking market was nice, with lots of good food and interesting things for sale. The night bazaar was much smaller than Chiang Mai, but there was a cheap food court with free shows and decent food. The stuff for sale here was a bit more interesting than the night bazaar in Chiang Mai too. The city itself was nice. Not too crowded and I spent a day walking around. There is a nice river and a few sights. Nothing to keep you busy for more than a couple days though. I did have some good food though, including a nice bowl of noodle curry with a big chicken leg in it and some meat skewers.
Chiang Rai was my last stop in Thailand for a few weeks. About an hour and a half from Chiang Mai by bus is the town of Chiang Khong at the border with Laos. From there I got my exit stamp and took a ferry across the river for 40 baht into Huay Xay, Laos. Huay Xay is a small town who's main attraction is the slow boat to Luang Prabang. There are a variety of guesthouses in town to hold the passengers who arrive to take the boat the next day. The town is quiet with some good cheap food. I had taken a bus in the middle of the day to the border, planning to spend the night before getting on the boat in the morning. The alternative would have been getting on the bus early in the morning to make it in time to leave that day. I was in no rush though. The guesthouse was clean and not too expensive. Just down the street was a variety of places to buy snacks and sandwiches for the boat ride and a couple restaurants. I ordered a couple sandwiches to pick up the next day and had dinner, a papaya salad that was a bit spicy for me and some good grilled sausages. After dinner I walked up a hill behind the main stretch to a temple where I had a nice view of the river and a great sunset. The next day I woke up fairly early to get a ticket for the slow boat. I took a tuktuk to the dock (it wasn't far, but I didn't want to carry all my bags there) to buy the ticket. It cost 220000 kip to go all the way to Luang Prabang, about $30. I got on the boat after I got my ticket, but the boat didn't leave for a couple hours. Luckily the seats were comfortable - they were car seats, not the hard wooden benches. The boat got full pretty soon, but we still waited a while until we left. These boats are entirely tourists. We picked up a couple locals at some point on the second day for a short trip, but other than that it was entirely foreigners. The boats are certainly slow. It takes two full days to get down the river to Luang Prabang, with a stop about halfway in Pakbeng, another small town that seems dedicated to providing slow boat passengers a place to sleep and eat. I was able to get a place here for not too much either, as well as some good cheap meals (buffalo fried rice) and sandwiches for the second day. I had a very nice room in a little building overlooking the river for about $10, which isn't too bad considering there were only a few alternatives and two boats full of people. The trip itself was very nice, but after 6 and then 8 hours on the boat, I was certainly glad to arrive in Luang Prabang. The river was not really what I had imagined. It was very rocky and the surrounding land was very mountainous. The rocks looked very dangerous, especially if the water was a little bit higher. Some looked almost like knives that would cut through the boats. We passed some small villages along the way and plenty of people out on the river. There was a lot of livestock wandering along the river including water buffalo, cattle, goats and pigs. I couldn't quite tell if they were wild or what, since there often was no visible human settlement within miles. Overall I though the experience was definitely worth doing.
Once I arrived in Luang Prabang, I set out to find a nice guesthouse. All around the city center were the expensive places however, so I had to take a tuk-tuk out to the only hostel in town it seems where they have cheap dorm beds ($4 a night). The hostel, SpicyLaos, also has a good social atmosphere with plenty of people around most of the day, and free snake whiskey. So far I've been here 5 nights, and I am planning on leaving tomorrow morning, although I could just as easily stay here another week. The city is very beautiful, but very touristy. Almost all the buildings in the center of town are guesthouses or restaurants or something else relating to tourists. It is still very nice to walk around. Luang Prabang has temples around almost every corner. A few of the big ones have admission fees, but the small ones you can just walk into. The monks are very friendly, saying "Sabaidee" and some will ask you where you are from. Mostly the temples are just nice and quiet, very peaceful places to rest. They all have a big hall, some stupas and some Buddha statues. Some have guardian statues around the main hall and behind the main buildings are the monks' quarters where you can often see a few sitting and talking (or looking at something on their phones). Walking along the streets you will inevitably see a few monks walking around town in their bright orange robes. Its a very nice sight to see.
For the most part, I've been relaxing and just hanging out. There are some treks available, but I haven't felt like doing another one-day "trek" or spending the energy doing a multiple day one either. Instead, I rented a bicycle one day to explore a bit farther out in the town and visit some of the farther temples. Another day I did a one-day weaving class where we made some dyes using the materials grown in their garden and grounds and then wove a placemat sized piece. I also woke up early one day to see the alms-giving procession in the morning where the locals (and tourists) line up to give alms to the monks in town. It is a very beautiful event, but the behavior of the tourists (not the ones giving alms) pretty much ruins the experience. So many people stand right up next to the monks taking photos right in their faces, many with flashes, not at all respectful. Besides that I've spent some time wandering around town or relaxing at the hostel. In the evening the tourist night market opens. There are the usual variety of silk scarves and wall hangings and other silk textiles. Also, there are some t-shirts (not too many), some blankets, some ethnic minority products and fabrics, snake whiskey, silver and a whole lot more. I am enjoying the shopping here much more than anywhere else so far. Not only are the people less pushy and don't call out to you when you walk by (mostly), but the products are much nicer as well. The patterns on the silk here are very beautiful and incredibly varied. The silk in Thailand and Cambodia had fairly simple patterns, but here they are very intricate, colorful and different at each place. I think I will buy the rest of my souvenirs here rather than in Thailand. Right next to the market is a food street with a few 10000 kip ($1.25) per plate buffets with a ton of noodles, vegetables and rice. There are also a bunch of grilled meats and fish available too. I ate some big pieces of grilled chicken, 10000 kip each, that were some of the best I've ever had. A number of women also have stalls selling good cheap fruit shakes nearby. Everywhere in Laos I've been so far there have been countless people grilling fish, meat and sausage. I hope this continues through the rest of Laos because it is cheap, delicious and fast.
The town has been busy since I've been here. Near the night market there is an indoor stadium where there has been a tournament going on - I can't remember what the game is called, but basically its like a volleyball/soccer hybrid where they kick a small rattan ball over the net with their feet. It is very impressive, they jump and flip over to kick the ball over the net. Also, yesterday was the opening of the Lao Games, the national tournament between the different provinces in a variety of sports.
The weather has been pretty chilly here, at least compared to Thailand and Cambodia, which of course would almost be like summer back home. Its felt freezing most of the days, especially since it has been cloudy. Luckily the hostel has a nice firepit to keep us warm. The last couple days the sun has come out and it has been better.
Tomorrow, I think I mentioned, I will be moving on. I will head to Phonsavan, about 7-8 hours by bus. Phonsavan is home to a site called the plain of jars, where there are big fields filled with medieval stone jars whose purpose and origins are still much of a mystery. From there, probably to Vientiene, the capital, for a couple days at most before heading to the south of Thailand for some beach time before I have to leave the nice warm weather for the cold.
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