After three days in Chiang Mai, we now understand why people come here and never want to leave. We’ve gotten into somewhat of a routine of waking up early here and enjoying the fresh fruit and fruit juices that Chiang Mai has to offer. I’m not sure how the rest of our trip will be, but this city has set the expectations high.
Today is our last morning, so we made sure to have everything packed up and ready for us to leave right after breakfast. Joey booked a bus ticket to Chiang Rai when we arrived in Chiang Mai three days ago through the Green Bus Company (which can be purchased at any 7-Eleven). At 128 baht each, it is a reasonably priced ticket for the bus quality and distance traveled (just over two hours). It is worth mentioning that these busses fill up prior to the day of travel, so make sure you book your ticket at least one day in advance.
We began our journey from the local bus station just outside of town (locals know it as the Arcade bus station, so make sure to mention that when hailing a tuk-tuk for about 80 baht). We drove north through Khun Chae National Park and Doi Luang National Park, which were filled with elevation changes and twists like we hadn’t seen thus far. We planned some activities in Chiang Rai, one of which was exploring the unorthodox Wat Rong Khun, otherwise know as the White Temple, which is meant to symbolize Buddha’s purity (according to its architect, Chalermchai Kositpipat). This temple is spectacular, but even people who visit Chiang Rai have some difficulty accessing it, as it is about 30 minutes south of the city.
We stumbled upon a little trick (totally by chance) and wanted to share it with any fellow travelers that may face the same situation we did…limited time and a serious urge to see this masterpiece. As we were approaching the city of Chiang Rai, the bus makes one final stop before reaching the city center. The stop looks unassuming (and most passengers are sleeping), but it’s actually a stop directly in front of the white temple! We took our chances and quickly unloaded our stuff, with the bus attendant adamantly making sure we knew what the heck we were doing. Truth be told we didn’t, but knew this was our one opportunity to see the temple without getting a tuk-tuk for 500+ baht. We entered the gates and the attendants offered to store our two backpacks, which made our time there much more enjoyable.
We spent about an hour at the temple and the nearby grounds, as there is a ton of architectural wonders that accompany the main temple. Photographs unfortunately are not permitted inside the main temple, which has a very realistic lifelike monk and magnificent paintings that merge traditional Buddhist themes with wacky pop culture imagery. There were images of space ships and allusions to Marvel heroes, which seemed to have a very sci-fi feeling, all surrounding a traditional seated Buddha.
After we spent some time in and around the temple, we were faced with the issue of getting north to Chiang Rai. Like we said earlier, we hopped off the bus earlier than planned and didn’t have much time to think about the aftereffects of our impromptu decision-making. At first we thought that it’d be quite easy to find a tuk-tuk and negotiate a one-way fare up to the city center, but soon realized that the tuk-tuks that were there had been commissioned from Chiang Rai and it didn’t make sense for them to leave their unpaid party for us as we would only pay the one-way fare. Then, we thought that we might be able to hop on the next bus that came through the same stop that we had gotten off. Maybe we could play the unassuming tourist role and act like we just got off the wrong stop. Maybe they’d feel bad for us and honor our tickets, as we never initially took it the entire fare’s distance. We started the short walk towards where we had been dropped off and Joey spotted a blue songthaew! Songthaews are pretty much two door pickup trucks that have seats and a cover over the bed so that people can sit in the back…think of them as shared taxis, like NYC’s Via! The colors often represent local (red) or express (blue) service. We quickly hurried over to the truck, which just so happened to be going to Chiang Rai for only 20 baht per person (about $0.50 USD)!
After a few stops in between, the blue songthaew made its last stop at the local bus station, which is where we’re leaving from tomorrow morning. We walked a short distance to our hotel for the night, which was stunning!
After we got settled, we wanted to grab a bite to eat and see some of the famous temples in the city. We had looked up some local Northern Thai cuisine and decided to treat ourselves to a nicer than usual meal at Melt in your Mouth, which still only totaled about $15 USD, but WOW! We decided to get the Melt Lanna platter, which consisted of northern-style pork curry, spicy pork sausage, green chili dip, stir-fried minced pork, crispy pork rind, and an order of sticky rice, which was the stickiest rice we had ever experienced (and probably ever will). We also recommend one of their nondairy fruit shakes as this is a must to calm your taste buds from all the Northern Thai spices…we went with the lychee!
After lunch we went on our own little walking tour of Chiang Rai, partially because we wanted to see all the beautiful monuments and temples and partially because we needed to walk off that meal! We started at the King Meng Rai Monument and continued on to Wat Phra Sing and then Wat Phra Kaew. Wat Phra Kaew is where the Emerald Buddha was rumored to be found in 1434. The story says that the temple, which was originally called the Bamboo Forest Temple (original construction date is unknown), was struck by lightning, chipping off a piece of the temple’s Buddha. The temple from there on was called Wat Phra Kaew (not to be confused with the temple in Bangkok with the same name, as this is where the Emerald Buddha is currently located). After Chiang Rai, the Buddha traveled to Chiang Mai and Luang Prabang according to leadership before settling in Bangkok, Thailand’s current capital.
After our personalized tour of Chiang Rai, we headed back towards our hotel for a quick dip in the pool. Our hotel organizes free tuk-tuks around town at different times for different events (different temples, night market, etc.). We planned on going to the night market from 7-9pm, so we had some time to relax before heading out again.
After we got dropped off at the night market, we spent some time walking around the different shops before heading towards the food section. It seemed that multiple vendors were renting out clay hot pots, so we decided to cook our own meal in a traditional Northern Thai clay pot over flaming hot charcoal briquettes.
During our slow simmer, a live performance started up on the nearby stage and we enjoyed a duo playing acoustic guitar and erhu. Afterwards, a group of traditional dancers came on stage and we watched in amazement. Their choreography and drab was so eye-catching that we almost lost track of time!
Every hour from 7-9pm, the city’s central clock tower changes colors for the first five minutes of the new hour (7-7:05pm, 8-8:05pm. 9-9:05pm). We had spent so much time cooking our own dinner and admiring the dancers that when we checked our watches, it was 8:55pm and we were about to miss the last clock tower color show! Luckily we were nearby and made it to the tower just as the color show began. The clock tower has a beautifully intricate design and is an amazing golden color, so even if you can’t make one of the shows, it’s still a must while in Chiang Rai.
After witnessing the changing colors of the clock tower, we both knew it was time to call it a night. After all, tomorrow we plan to wake up early to catch the first local bus out of town to Chiang Khong, which is the boarder town of Thailand/Laos. From there, we plan to cross the Laotian boarder and catch a slow boat for a two day journey down the magnificent Mekong River, so stay posted!