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Published: August 15th 2013
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Today, Thursday, is our first full day in Chiang Mai. This morning we wandered into the older central part of town which is about a half hour walk from our hotel. It's an interesting mix of beautiful old temples and small shops catering to tourists and backpackers, circled by a moat and a wall. There are a few big modern hotels, but this is a less busy and less commercial place than Bangkok. We found another temple, or wat, with a lot of Buddhist monks wandering around. Note, that I've now learned that there are two "d"s in Buddhist....sorry about all the earlier spelling errors. That temple visit was followed by a cold drink, and then an epic ride in a tuk tuk. These are the three wheeled motorbike-based taxis that run around Thailand. A bit of negotiating to get the best price is par for the course and part of the fun. Weaving in and out of traffic was way more amusing that the cab rides we had around Bankok, but I'm not sure that I'd have felt safe in tuk tuk in the intense Bangkok traffic.
This afternoon we took a van ride up into the mountains surrounding
Chiang Mai. Our guide was a very nice local guy called Num. The mountains are heavily wooded and quite steep hills with deep vallies carved by streams. There are a number of waterfalls but we drove past and our first stop was a Hmong village. Minnesotan readers will be familiar with the Hmong as Minneapolis has a huge concentration of this ethnic group who mainly live in parts of China, Laos and Burma. The village felt rather fake as there were endless markets stalls selling Hmong wares, but the garden and museum (in a wooden shack!) felt more authentic. Carys made the only purchase of a Hmong skirt for about $3. Bargain!
On the drive down the narrow and winding road, we came across a moped accident. Two young Brits, Adam and Lewis. Adam had just lost control of his bike and left rather a lot of the skin from his right leg on the road, and had a deep puncture in his foot. Lewis had a deep hole in his leg caused by trying to lift the fallen bike off his friend! All rather nasty, but we stayed with them and Num called for an ambulance which came
along eventually. Adam was quite insistent that he didn't want stitches but there's little doubt that he has lost that battle by now.
After the delay we continued down the hill to a beautiful Buddhist temple called Wat Phra That Doi Sudhep. Num told us a ton of interesting things about the temple and got us some kind of a blessing from a monk and a photo with a child monk who can't have been much more than 8 or 9. The boy was smaller than Ben who is 9 and yet Num said you have to be about 12 at the youngest to become a monk. Perhaps he is looking for a place on the next Chinese olympic gymnast team? Regardless, the view from the wat over Chiang Mai was stunning and worth the trip alone.
Back to the hotel for supper before an early start tomorrow when we visit an elephant park and become elephant keepers for the day.
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Susan
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mopeds in SE Asia
A brit on a moped in SE Asia....an accident was bound to happen! (OK, so I'm American and was the one at fault, but the Brits seem to be the ones that always get hurt). Have fun with the elephants!!