We’ve been in Chiang Mai for 1,5 days and we love it! It’s much more quieter and calmer compared to where we were. It’s located roughly 700km north of Bangkok and it’s surrounded by hills up to 2km. Our flight to here took about 1h10m but there’s also an option to travel by bus or a train (roughly 10-12 hours). Bangkok is a great place to visit for up to 5-6 days but we wouldn’t have wanted to stay longer.
Our Hostel here is great! It’s located in a quiet alley and the breakfast is just 25m of walking in a cozy cafe plus there are several dishes to choose from. As in Bangkok the hostel is located very near to the main city attractions. We have a huge bed 2×1,8m (or even wider), a TV, refrigerator, a fan + all the other conveniences. Only weird thing is that for some reason we have besides the bedroom and a toilet/shower a separate room with just a small sink. Don’t know why but we don’t complain – we got a 3 room accommodation :)! In addition there are 3 really cute hamsters in the lobby (in cages:) ) who we greet every time entering the hostel :).
Yesterday we just looked around in the neighborhood, visited the local Warorot market, had an exquisite cup of iced latte for 35 baht (most likely we will visit that place every day we’re here, we already did today:) ) and also a huge portion of Tom Kha Kai chicken coconut soup for 70 baht. It was delicious!
Today in the morning we stumbled upon a small adventure. Our original idea was to have a small walk in the old town when we were approached by one of the tuk-tuk riders. He said we would take us on a trip around the old city for 1 hour. In the beginning it was 150 baht, then 100 and in the end 50. The usual stuff :). At the end we agreed with 50 but of course we knew that there was some sort of a catch. First he drove us around on different streets, made some stops for pictures and we also visited a very beautiful temple.
At some point though he took us to one of the Thai silk shops where there was also a small handicraft factory (as said in the beginning something like this was expected). For a moment we looked around but after that there was another stop in yet another handicrafts place. It turns out that for every time a tuk-tuk driver takes tourists or just passengers to the shop they will get a stamp. If they get together 10 stamps then they are provided with free fuel. At first it was a bit uncomfortable going through these totally overpaid shops (all in all we visited 5 different places) but since they weren’t too pushy in the shops and the driver still was a nice guy plus we got a 2 hour tuk-tuk ride around the town we were actually quite amused with all of it going on :). Wouldn’t do it again but for one time it was fun:)!
In the evening we went for our first massage in Thailand. Although there are many places in Chiang Mai top-rated by tripadvisor and similar sites today we just walked around and went for a place what seemed cozy and offered a good price. And it was worth it! For 340baht in total (8,7€) we both got an hour long massage for feet, back, neck, head and shoulders and it was extremely good! In a matter of fact I actually loved it and we will definitely go back! At some point it was actually a bit painful but you just feel so much better afterwards! I don’t understand why massages cost so much back home!
Anyways there are still so many things to do here in Chiang Mai and I already cant wait for another day to start! Tomorrow we plan to visit the local zoo and we need to get an early start.
I’m also making a video or two of Chiang Mai so you could get a better overview of our adventures.
Until next time :)!
The World As It Is 