Chiang Mai (13th - 17th March)

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After a 10 hour bus journey we arrived in Chiang Mai (suprisingly early as we'd thought it was going to take 12 hours!). We booked into the SK Guest House which was very well decorated and had a large (but cold!) swimming pool. Our room was quite large with fan (I'd managed to persuade Dan than he didn't need A/C) and hot water. We had a good Thai curry a couple of doors down from the hotel and a couple of beers that being quite strong, knocked us for six!

The following day was relatively relaxing. We first sorted out a trip for the next day then headed over to the Night Bazarre to book a Night Safari that we'd heard about. The Night Bazarre was about a 15min walk away. Chiang Mai was much more of a city than we'd expected and was a lot more modern too. The area seemed more affluent than most that we've been too. There was still some poverty but it didn't seem as severe as in other areas.

Unfortunately the Night Safari wasn't what we were after. It was more of a zoo that you get
driven around than what we'd done at Taman Negara, so we decided to give it a miss. To cheer Dan up after this bad news, we went to McDonalds (we still haven't found one in Thailand that serves Veggie burgers!) and then headed off to see some of the temples reccomended in the Lonely Planet.

On our way to the first temple we passed a sign for a fishing trip at a place called Dreamlakes and Dan took a shine to the idea and as it wasn't too expensive we decided to do this on our last day in Chiang Mai, as an early birthday pressie for Dan. Then it was on to the temples.

The first one we vistied was Wat Chedi Luang. Here there were some very beautiful temples, with amazing carvings and decorations, a large reclining Buddha who we dedicated some candles to in return for luck (we didn't really have much choice as they were pretty much forced upon us!), a huge smiling Buddha and a partially restored (though not noticably) ruin of a chedi from the 16th century.

We next headed over to the Wat Phra Singh, a temple larger than the previous ones, but again beautifully decorated. There were amazing gold pictures on the doors and the front of the temple was dedicated to a number of statues of Buddha and important monks. We think
there must be a school for monks next door as the area was filled with young monks milling around in their bright orange robes. Women are not allowed to touch monks or their belongings or sit next to them, so Dani always gets a little nervous around them.

The next stop was Wat Chiang Man, the oldest temple within the city. Outside the temple we
found a woman with a load of birds in a couple of baskets selling them for good luck for you and your family. Being the wildlife lovers that we are we couldn't leave the birds in the baskets so bought them all for a mere 300 baht (!) and set them free (definitely a case for bird-flu if ever there was one!). We realise that we're only encouraging them to continue doing it but at the end the day the birds would have probably died and at least if everyone keeps releasing them they may get smart and not get caught!! This temple again had a beautiful front and was filled with statues of Buddha and other monks. In a separate building there were supposed to be two famous Buddha images but as the building was under restoration (it would have been
incredibly beautiful without all the scaffolding) we only saw them briefly and even then weweren't too sure that they were the right ones. Around the back of the temple there was a very large Chedi surrounded by elephants which was impressive and a load of stray dogs that the monks looked after.

Finally we visited one more temple, though I'm not quite sure what this one was called as it doesn't match the description of the one we were aiming at visiting seeing! This one was very similar to the previous one in layout and decoration and we didnt stay long as Dan was beginning to wilt in the heat.

That evening we went to the Night Bazzar for dinner and ended up eating at what looked to be a nice restaurant but the food wasn't anythign special and was rather expensive for what it was.

On Thursday (15th) we went on a day trip to see the local sites around Doi Inthanon National
Park (named after the highest mountain in Thailand). We had wanted to do some trekking but all these trips lasted two or three days and we didn't have enough time in Chiang Mai. Anyway, the trip we actually went on sounded alright, though it didn't really turn out that way. The day started off badly when we got to the outskirts of the city and they realised that a couple who were in the bus weren't meant to be and couple who were meant to be were somewhere else! So we had to stop and wait for a car to come and change the couples over before we could head off again. This made us an hour late, which meant that the rest of the day was rushed. our first stop was the Vachiratarn Waterfall that was impressive but we only got 20mins there to appreciate it. Next we went to a place called the Royal Project which was a bit like a garden centre, although you couldn't buy the flowers. We got about 20mins to walk around here aswell but that was all we needed as our guide didn't explain what it was all about, but there were some really colourful flowers to look at. As we later found out, the project is used to educate the local hill tribes in new agricultural techniques that are mainly based around cold-climate flowers. Next we had lunch, where we got chatting to a very
interesting Aussie called Alex who we later had dinner with.

After lunch we headed up to the King and Queen Pagodas, built for the King and Queen of Thailand, set at the summit of Doi Inthanon. The pagodas were very modern looking and had some really beautiful gardens around them. The flowers were the most colouful that we've ever seen. The four stories of Buddha in the King's pagoda were really interesting and shone some light on some of the images we have seen repeated all over Thailand. The Queen's Pagoda was a lot prettier inside and had an amazingly decorated ceiling. the views from the Pagodas would have been awesome if Chiang Mai hadn't been covered in a haze of smoke (they burn the grass at the side of the roads and because of the weather they've had at the moment, no rain since November, the smoke is lingering over the city). We had 40mins here then headed up to the peak of Doi Inthanon, 2,565 meters above sea level, and the highest point in Thailand (the last mountain of the Himilayas). There wasn't much of a view from here
as the highest point is actually in the middle of a wood but it was still cool to have been there.


After this stop our guide tried to take us back to the city when we were supposed to go and visit one of the hill tribe villages. Luckily Dan spoke up so we did get to visit the Karen village, though we only stayed about 10 minutes. The village was made up of about a dozen wooden houses on stilts. There was one building where women from the village would weave and sell the items and we had a look at the paddy fields that were used during the monsoon.

After this last stop we headed back to Chiang Mai and our guest house where we got ready then went over to the riverside where we met up with Alex for dinner. The restaurant was really good; the food was good, service was good and the beer was good too. Alex told us some wicked stories and was really good company, so good that we met up with him for dinner the following night too!

On Friday (16th) we went fishing, and I would say it went well, especially as Dan has called it the Greatest Day of his Life. We were picked up from the hotel at 7.30am and it took about 20mins to drive to the lake. We spent the day with one other chap, an Italien called Marco, and our guide, who called himself Mr Tuk Tuk(!). They used ham sandwiches from seven eleven as bait but it obviously works! Dan got a fish on his first cast, which turned out to be a 37 lb Mekong Catfish...not bad! Over the course of the day, I had a dozen fish ranging from 10 lbs to just over 50 lbs. The biggest took nearly half an hour to land and was an absolute monster! It was easily the best fishing i've ever had and don't know how if i'll ever be able
to go back to catching minnows (or nothing) back in the uk!

That evening, after a quick dip in the swimmimg pool (it was freezing!) we caught up with Alex again and had a few beers (Dan couldn't wipe the smug grin off he's face all night and didn't stop talking about the fish!).

The following morning we checked out of the hotel and headed out to the airport where we caught plane to Bangkok (such luxury!).

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Comments

[Dad]

I'm on my way to that Lake!!
So, how do I go about getting a season ticket for this place? Excellent blog update D's - brilliant photos as ever (particularly those fish!!)