Good morning Chiang Mai

The next morning I woke up, looked outside and I was surrounded by mountains and forest. I actually woke up to this huge noise from the bus tv where some Thai or Japanese game show was going on with crazy music, laughs and all... I glanced next to me where this curious Thai woman was looking at me with my messy hair and told me with her bad English: good morning. The next 30 minutes or so went by trying to guess words and meaning of sentences she was trying really hard to tell me. Eventually she proudly showed me her new Nikon camera of which she of course took photos of me after sleeping the whole night in a bus.. Also video clips were taken. Awesome. After changing numbers it was time for her to get off the bus, in my opinion, in the middle of nowhere. Just the previous night at the bus station me, Marie and Emilie had discussed how difficult it sometimes is to guess the ages of Thai people. This Thai woman, Ton-ook, revealed to be 43 years old! I would have said she was around 30!!

Finally arriving to Chiang Mai bus station me and Emilie decided to try to go to the same hostel and do some sightseeing together in Chiang Mai since we were basically on the same schedule to get back to Bangkok. We bought bus tickets back to Bangkok on Thursday night bus leaving at 11 pm. Then it was time to negotiate taxi prices to the center. It didn't really go that well since we didn't agree at all with the drivers. Finally we took a mototaxi or whatever you call those. The taxi driver gave us a ride to Chiang Mai gate. We really didn't know anything about Chiang Mai, at that point, afterwards we figured that the center is surrounded my these gates. Inside, there are tens of hotels, hostels, restaurants, tourist information places etc.

Walking around and spotting temples everywhere

Our first mission was to find this Woman's prison massage place, since after the bus ride we desperately needed massages. It took us over one hour to find the place! It was so hot and exhausting to walk around with two small, but heavy, backpacks. When we finally found the place it was so cozy, the women were so friendly and welcoming. We had to change into this huge gowns. The music there was relaxing and it was my first ever Thai massage. It felt a bit rough since my muscles were a bit sore but I survived. After one hour it was time for the free tea outside and WIFI ;) to check where to head next. More about the place Click here

Right outside the massage place we took a taxi again to the same gate. From there we started making our way to the hostel which Emilie had booked before hand. The place was called The Living Place and it was so so nice! I highly recommend! Even though I didn't even end up staying there since it was fully booked but I hang around there and the owner and her husband were the most nicest people ever! They really wanted you to enjoy your stay and make you feel like home! Visit this place if you are going to Chiang Mai! The place was 5 minutes walk from the gates but still right in the center of wherever you needed to go. :)

After figuring it out that the place was full it was time for me to go walk around with my bag to find a place to stay. I walked over an hour and tried to find some decent place to stay in. It was tiring, exhausting and a bit stressing. In couple of places I asked to see the room or dorm but they were not that nice and way too expensive. Julie's guesthouse was nice but so full of people that I didn't wanna wait there forever. I ended up to a place called Diva hostel right across the street from Julie's guesthouse and Saija's massage. They had only one free bed in a 6 bed dorm and it was 110 BAHT / night. I booked it and it was time to walk back to Emilie's hostel, this time it only took me around 25 minutes and by the time I got there I was so exhausted and starving! The owner Ari let me take a shower there so after that I felt a bit better!

Ari helped us to get a taxi with a decent price to this waterfall. I thought it was gonna be some huge but it was rather small. Before entering the woods we bought mango drinks outside and they were delicious! At first we sat down by the waterfall but our inner adventurers wanted to climb higher. It was hard with two backpacks (yeah, I still had them with me..). The rock and the hill were really steep and slippery. It was so refreshing finally to reach the water coming down from somewhere. Tho, after we climbed the steep steep rocks up we looked down and noticed that there were no way we could come down the same route.. So we had to take this detour through this path of sand, rocks, trees and all kinds of stuff, barefoot.. By the water we met five people and started talking with them and turned out that they all were from my dorm!! What a small place and a big coincidence! :D With the others we agreed on to see at our hostel to go to this lake nearby later on.

mango juice

The waterfall

But first we wanted to go see this mountain with this temple on top of it and it was apparently called: Wat Phra That Doi Suthep.  We agreed the price with the taxi driver to BOTH directions. When we got on the top he told us that we need to take another taxi to come down. Great. (we only paid him the trip half way of course!)  Then it was time to climb many many stairs all the way up to see the shiny temples and the view to Chiang Mai.

After wondering there about less than an hour we headed down and started getting a taxi. Turned out we needed to wait for the taxi to be full before any of the drivers agreed on taking us back to the center. At first we got really angry cause we needed to be back at the hostel to be able to make it on time to go to the lake. When we figured there is nothing we can do we chatted with couple of girls who both were traveling alone. Finally when we left from the temple it was more than 30 minute ride back. I managed to fall asleep in the truck sitting down on a bumpy road, tired much? At last we made it back and there were no sign of the others. One of the guys was sleeping on the couch of the hostel and when we woke up he told us that they decided not to go there that day. So after that Emilie desperately wanted to go walk and try to find this one swimming pool supposed to be near by.. We walked for ages and eventually when we found it, it was being cleaned so it was empty! I was so pissed of at that point so I told her that I need some food and I left towards my hostel and on the way I stopped at some place to get something to eat. Then it was shower time and meeting Emilie again in front of the gates to go see Thai boxing.

At the plaza I waited for Emilie and during that some young kids came to chat with me. It was nice chatting with them but their English was rather poor so I kinda struggled to understand them.. Oh, and eventually turned out that they both were actually one year older than I am! And I had thought that they are somewhere around 16 or so..

The Thai boxing place was pretty much what you see in the movies. Tho it was a lot smaller and they had food places around the rink (don't know if that is also in other places..), we ordered big beers for 100 BAHT and got a fighting schedule. The matches started from young boys and girls and went up to adults and heavier guys. We also had to witness couple of knockouts and that wasn't pretty.. :( 

Chiang Mai gate

After all the games we went to our hostels and I went early to bed since next morning was an early wake up to go do some day trip! :) Enjoyed and saw A LOT of things on my first day in Chiang Mai. First impression: really nice!