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Hi all, welcome to a long delayed recap of what we got up to in Chiang Mai and the North of Thailand...
We stayed in Chiang Mai (including a quick mountain trek detour) for a grand total of 10 days - our longest stay yet, and we were glad we did. After all the madness of Bangkok and the beaches, it made a really nice contrast. As a city, Chiang Mai was a charming, leafy place whose realtively small centre is mostly located in or around the walled and moated old city - with almost everything within walking distance of our hostels. We also notched up our second Emerald Moon reunion - Wayne and Michelle arrived in Chiang Mai the night before us, and stayed the whole time we were there, so it was lovely to spend some more time with them. On their journey up, they had also picked up a stray 28 year old Swede named Tommy who - as is the travelling way - was quickly absorbed into the group.
Our first few days in the city, were packed full of the hallmark Chiang Mai activities - a Thai cookery lesson, catching some Thai boxing, and taking far too many snaps of the numerous Wats (temples) that are nestled into the city's streets. Unfortunately, before we could do much of this, we had to make a one-day diversion to the Thailand-Myanmar border in order to renew our soon to expire 30 days tourist visa's. A minivan collected us from 7am from our hostel, drove us up some impressively windy mountainous roads towards the border and deposited us at Mai Sai. We walked through the immigration checks, crossed a bridge into Burma, checked into Burma, and promptly walked straight back into Thailand. The only plus point was a very busy page of stamps in my otherwise rather empty passport! Anyway, back to our Chiang Mai activities...first up was an evening at a Thai boxing tournament, which was definitely an experience. Thai boxing is very different to the style we would recognise at home, all flying fists, slapping legs and punishing high-kicks - a real spectacle. There was a total of eight matches, and the first couple of 'fighters- can barely have been out of single figures. That was a little unconfortbale to watch, but as the contestants edged towards double decades, we were treated to a some really impressive displays. An amusing diversion was provided by a blindfolded match whereby three contestants aided by a rather punch-happy referee proceeded to stumble around the ring, beating eachother senseless whenever they came into contact!
Only slighlty less intense was our day-long Thai cookery course at the hands of our friendly but firm instructor Wanee. She picked us up from our hostel, immediately memorised our names (all ten of us!) and took us to a local market where we purchased the ingredients. Guilty highlights included staring like schoolgirls at the heaped stacks of pig heads and chickens legs. Each person chose six different dishes from a massive categorised menu - literally, by the end of the day we were so stuffed, we couldn't move - and under Wanee's fierce tuition ('quick stir...quick stir!') whipped them up in quick succession. My favourite dish was the Panang curry, learning how to make Spring Rolls was another highlight. Place your orders now - we'll be starting up our own Cornish-Thai School of Cuisine on our return!
Me and Em spent another fun day day in Chiang Mai hiring some bicycles and bumbling around the town, getting happily lost in maze-like back streets and checking out the ancient temples. A noticably different style of architecture from the temples we had encountered elsewhere, each one was spectactular in its own way. My favourite - Wat Suan Dok - had a huge central temple around which was clustered some kind of monk university. Indeed, had we visited later in the day, we could have made use of 'Monk Chat' (I kid you not) where Western visitors are encouraged to speak with the monks; one party gets grass roots culture, the other a free English lesson - everyone's happy. A separate trek to the imposing hills surrounding the city, this time via hog and with Wayne, Michelle and Tommy, led us to a more secluded Wat next to some rocky falls and deserted other than the artisans and buliders working on the temples itself.
The overall highlight of Chiang Mai for all of us was the three day jungle trek we booked through our second hostel (Nice Place 2!). Unlike many of the other conveyor belt tours from surrounding hostels, Nice Place's expedition was more isolated, far north of Chiang Mai near the Pai area. The itinerary of the trek was fairly jam-packed, encompassing elephant rides, bamboo rafting, waterfalls, visits to several hill tribes and of course, the trekking. Despite never actually having to walk very far or for very long, the walking was hard going - the jungle humidity, steep terrain and coutnless spiders in the canopy overhead (which Sarah loved) made it tough enough, and we were thankful for the activities which broke up the stomp. Elephant riding was great fun - Sarah and Emma got a bench seat on the elephant's back, whereas I was wedged onto the top of the neck, every movement of the elephant's shoulders' slowly but surely reducing my chance of every having children. Our elephant was a huge, but rather dopy male. Wayne and Michelle had a hungry, mischievious mother-elephant, doggedly followed by her adorable little baby. We were led on our trek by a true eccentric who dubbed himself Crazy (real name Dipoler, as Emma later discovered), and lived up to his namesake by downing bottles of rice whiskey in the evening, and spending the days walks' singing and shouting, punctuated by the occasional manic giggle. He also had a brilliant catchphrase, picked up (we think) from some embittered Manchester United fans; 'f***ing Liverpool'. It seemed to apply to every scenario anyway...
After the trek, we returned to Nice Place 2 in Chiang Mai and for the first time since we had come away, spent a few days doing nothing of much at all. We mooched around the city a bit more, stocked up on essentials that were running low, and abused the criminally cheap internet cafe's - 20 baht or 40p for an hour! It was nice to hang around with Michelle and Wayne some more - their love of Indian food influenced several evening meal decisions, and our combined collection of board/card games were given a good workour. I know, rock and roll. Our trekking group enjoyed a fun, drunken night out, starting at a cool Rooftop bar, before eventually ending up at the nightclub Spicy, where you literally couldn't move for being molested by an eager young Thai girl. I was also startled to receive an impromptu Thai massage at the sink, after using the toilets. As I later heard from Wayne, it could have been much worse - he was cornered whilst actually doing his business, so to speak.
Staying in any place for a lengthier amount of time gives you a chance to properly explore what it has to offer, and soak up the atmosphere. Feeling we had successfully achieved this in Chiang Mai, we zoomed back down to Bangkok - armed with a full arsenal of traveller-knowhow and ready for Round 2 with the nation's capital...
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