Advertisement
Published: November 1st 2009
Umbrella Village Bo-Sang
Here they make umbrellas by hand. Bruce's First Overnight Train Ride
The train was a new adventure! We sprang for a first class sleeper car, which meant we had our own compartment with a banquette that turned into upper and lower bunks (guess who got which). There was a tiny sink in the room and at the end of the car were 2 toilets, one western style, the other a Thai-style squat toilet. It's not for nothing that I have been strenghthening my thigh muscles at the gym for the past 6 months. We were so exhauted (Bruce still very bummed) that we were asleep by 9 o'clock and slept until the customary 3:30. Breakfast, ordered the night before, arrived at about 6:30. We were the usual hour late into Chiang Mai station, which gave us a couple daylight hours to see the lovely mountainous jungle scenery. Chiang Mai, at 2400 ft. elevation and about 400 miles north of Bangkok, enjoys a cooler and dryer climate than Bangkok and is often the southerners' vacation place.
Seeing the Sights
We were picked up at the station by Peter, owner of Secret Garden, where we are staying. The place is quite a way out
of town and would be impossible to find, but is a delightful oasis. I will get some pictures tomorrw and tell you more about it then. I had hired a tuk-tuk driver/tour guide to take us around town; however Bruce opted to stay in and I started him on the antibiotics that I had purchased from the Travel Health people at home for just such an occasion. So once again I set out on my own - probably just as well, because I saved him the agony of having to traipse in and out of craft shops. My driver, named Paul, whom I found through recommendations on TripAdvisor.com (thanks TA forum participants!) is the only farang tuk-tuk driver and licensed guide in Thailand, having been born here of American Presbyterian missionary parents who now teach in local universities. It was fun to see the reaction of locals when they discovered that he spoke Thai as a native. Besides the shops, where I witnessed the production of paper, umbrellas, celadon, lacquerware, and silk, we visited the Chiang Mai Cultural Museum, which had interested exhibits and artifacts. We visited a Wat and chatted with a monk. Then we stopped for lunch at
Monk Chat
At Wat Chedi Luang we met with "La" in their Monk Chat patio a local eatery, where a bowl of delicious noodle soup was about $1US, as was the backpacker favorite, a fruit shake - mine made of banana, orange, and crushed ice. I know, I know - never drink the water and never use the ice, but I keep getting assured that the ice is fine in decent restaurants. Hey! If I'm going to forgo the malaria tablets, I might as well throw the dice with the ice!
Loy Kratong is on for the next few days. It was the main purpose of coming to Chiang Mai when we did, but until Bruce gets well I might have to settle for the home-spun version. This means, tonight, sitting in the lovely garden here and listening to the neighbors set off firecrackers.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.151s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 6; qc: 46; dbt: 0.1073s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Loren
non-member comment
Get better, Dad
We hope Dad starts feeling better; all your pictures show some beautiful sights and events, and I know he's been so excited he would be seeing them again. Not the craft shops, though.