Chiang Mai was, quoting a pet phrase for travelers and locals alike, “same same but different”. There were elephant rides, overnight treks, tiger kingdoms, etc. – all of which we had already seen and done.
However, we signed up for a one day trek anyway, because the scenery was bound to be different, and because I missed hanging out with elephants. Somehow, though, the three of us ended up on the laziest elephant of the bunch – he’d walk three steps, and stop and throw his snotty trunk at us to ask for bananas.
Meanwhile, this one seemed to be on sabbatical that day…
Since it was a one day trek, there really wasn’t a lot of “trekking” involved. Of course, I managed to turn the trip into a treacherous one anyway. I fell into a large hole (looked like it was made by an elephant leg) on the walk, and then as we climbed a steep rock up a narrow path, I slipped backwards with both feet on the rock, flailing and grabbing wildly at the overgrown grass next to me before finally finding my balance. We stopped at a waterfall that had become very rapid since the wet season has begun, and also a village tribe to see how the people lived.
The waterfall was not nearly as nice as the one we’d seen in Bangkok. Colourful handicrafts from the hill tribe villages.
It was an active day, and we saw quite a bit of scenery around Chiang Mai. Combined with the heat, it was actually a pretty exhausting day too, and we beelined it to the massage places in town as soon as we got back. Then we had a delicious Northern Thai dinner, with a few run-ins with chili peppers. The worst was when I mistook a green chili for green beans in my papaya salad – the result was disastrous.
The next day we had signed up to go to Chiang Rai and check out the Golden Triangle. If I were there again, I would not recommend the trip – the drive itself was long, and we spent most of the day in the minivan, getting shuttled to places. The only really cool sight we saw was the White Temple, which was stunning and very different from the typical displays of gold or technicolour.
The White Temple in Chiang Rai
We also went around the Golden Triangle, famous because it is a no-man’s land that only shows up during non-rainy-season, and used historically for opium trading since no laws govern it. To me, it just looked like overgrown grassy land in the middle of the Mekong river.
Lastly, we stopped in the village of the long-neck people. Originally from Myanmar, the long-neck women wore heavy brass rings around their necks to protect them from tiger attacks. Nowadays, they have been “imported” into Thailand, and put on display for tourism. It was quite sad to wander through the village, knowing that these people were there for tourism’s sake, and that they don’t actually need to wear these rings anymore. Some of the young girls were quite pretty, and it was really depressing to know that one day they would also fall into the fate of sitting there all day, on display for tourists to make a few dollars for their families.
Our trip was further hampered by a really annoying Taiwanese girl whose 15-day Thai visa was about to run out, but still went ahead and booked for 30 days around Thailand. She spent the whole car ride back (3 hours) telling any and everyone who would listen about her problems, dissecting the issue (which was really simple, actually), and complaining, fretting, and generally making everyone around her super annoyed (except the dude who wanted to sleep with her). Even though she kept on encouraging her travel companions to visit Taiwan, I think she was giving the place a bad name by the sheer ignorance she displayed.
Our last day in Chiang Mai was much more fun for me – but that deserves a separate post! Alex spent the day away in the forests ziplining between 39 platforms, and we both had great fun before leaving Thailand for Bali, for our little pre-wedding “sugarmoon”.
