After breakfast we set off to meet Phra Tea to go to Doi Suthep. Jono berated me for my foolishness when I suggested the city gate was where we were meeting him but had to eat his words after walking back to the city gate to meet him exactly where I said (I waited where he was convinced we were meeting and enjoyed an ice coffee).
The guy who made my ice coffee also deserves a mention, he had one of the moving stalls that is attached to a scooter and carried his ice in an esky on the back. His name was Arm and he had a spray paint design of his smiling face with ultra cool sunnies in black on his orange esky. He mixed my ice coffee not in a blender but between two carnation sweetened condensed milk cans pouring from about 1m between the two. Very sytlish and all for 20B.
We braved the horrible winding road up to Doi Suthep in a songthaew and then the 306 stairs to the top. Prae Tea showed us round and explianed the place to us. The view would be amazing without the haze.
We watched a half of the Hawthorn vs Sydney game in a Irish Pub before heading out shopping for breakfast.
Football's fun to watch in a pub, except one with nothing but Irish and Aussie guys being loud with each other. We did get to try beer with ice. Not sure it would hold off a hangover or improve the taste of the beer for that matter. Interestingly the manager/owner of the bar came in to tell us he'd have to move us for the premier league match. He'd been out drinking all day and could barely stand up without swaying from side to side. Ahhh responsible service of alcohol. As long as your not as drunk as the owner you're sober.
Monday, 6 April 2009
3rd April
Today was a quiet day. We went to the forest wat which was very atmospheric, with lots of signs posted on trees and a small artificial lake apparently (we couldn't find it). The most interesting were the tunnels under the hill that the main chedi was on. Just high enough for me to walk through and thankfully lit by lights (it was still a little claustrophobic).
We had a vegetarian buffet lunch at which I tried to sample every dish on offer and the desserts as well. Quite tasty but not as spectacular as our dinner there a week before. Afternoon nap to digest lunch before heading out to dinner (there is some walking involved to conteract the amount of food consumed) at a market. Jono sampled KFG (fried chicken) and we have a great photo of him out the front of the stall. We soaked up the atmosphere of the market (as well as the car fumes) and then wandered back to the guesthouse. The best part of the city doesn't really start until about 8pm when it cools down and everyone is out eating.
We had a vegetarian buffet lunch at which I tried to sample every dish on offer and the desserts as well. Quite tasty but not as spectacular as our dinner there a week before. Afternoon nap to digest lunch before heading out to dinner (there is some walking involved to conteract the amount of food consumed) at a market. Jono sampled KFG (fried chicken) and we have a great photo of him out the front of the stall. We soaked up the atmosphere of the market (as well as the car fumes) and then wandered back to the guesthouse. The best part of the city doesn't really start until about 8pm when it cools down and everyone is out eating.
Wednesday, 1 April 2009
Thursday 2nd April
We got up early (8:30am) after being woken at 5am by chanting outside our window, or so it felt, apparently it was across the river.
5am was if you weren't really listening all night to the hill tribe partying. Apparently it was some Buddhist festival for young boys like bamitzvah/first communion etc and they pay for an all night party. Except if you're not invited, it kinda takes the fun out of it. There was also a kind of hush hush conspiracy going on in Pai, because all the tourists who were kept up at night started asking what was going on last night and most of the locals were going "What music/noise/sounds, I don't know what you're talking about." There was a lot of banging drums and singing very badly.
We headed off to the largest of the falls- Mok Paeng it was quite pretty and we had a great time along the way. Watching chickens and even this family of pigs. One pig was doing its thing rooting in the ground and his side kick chicken was waiting for him to stir up some worms. Very cute.
Unfortunately the hill tribe people that look after this area don't have much help from the local council to keep it clean. It had more rubbish in one spot than I've ever seen and that includes the MCG after a Carlton v Collingwood game. There was also a herd of Jersey looking cows wandering around whichwas cool, but the pigs I nearly ran over in the scooter were the coolest. Everyone should have pigs and chickens their cool.
We headed back into town, acquired some meds for nausea and were on our way back to Chiang Mai.
Arrived back in Chiang Mai. The meds worked, no motion sickness nausea stuff. Admittedly Jono was passed out for the entire trip (one side effect of taking the maximum dose) and Em was acting like Lt. Dan from Forrest Gump on the shrimp fishing boat during a monsoon, "Is that all you've got?" to the windy roads.
5am was if you weren't really listening all night to the hill tribe partying. Apparently it was some Buddhist festival for young boys like bamitzvah/first communion etc and they pay for an all night party. Except if you're not invited, it kinda takes the fun out of it. There was also a kind of hush hush conspiracy going on in Pai, because all the tourists who were kept up at night started asking what was going on last night and most of the locals were going "What music/noise/sounds, I don't know what you're talking about." There was a lot of banging drums and singing very badly.
We headed off to the largest of the falls- Mok Paeng it was quite pretty and we had a great time along the way. Watching chickens and even this family of pigs. One pig was doing its thing rooting in the ground and his side kick chicken was waiting for him to stir up some worms. Very cute.
Unfortunately the hill tribe people that look after this area don't have much help from the local council to keep it clean. It had more rubbish in one spot than I've ever seen and that includes the MCG after a Carlton v Collingwood game. There was also a herd of Jersey looking cows wandering around whichwas cool, but the pigs I nearly ran over in the scooter were the coolest. Everyone should have pigs and chickens their cool.
We headed back into town, acquired some meds for nausea and were on our way back to Chiang Mai.
Arrived back in Chiang Mai. The meds worked, no motion sickness nausea stuff. Admittedly Jono was passed out for the entire trip (one side effect of taking the maximum dose) and Em was acting like Lt. Dan from Forrest Gump on the shrimp fishing boat during a monsoon, "Is that all you've got?" to the windy roads.
Day 20 Really another day
Today we hired a bike and rode to the hot springs. One bonus about low season is that there was no one there and we got to bathe in the hot mineral bath part by ourselves. Best bath ever, so hot even Steph you would have found it warm. Really helped you cool down when you got out.
We rode back and started on our way to Mae Yen waterfall. We left the bikes and one point and started walking, it is supposed to be 7km so we headed out. We stopped after an hour when we met up with a couple who had stopped after 2 hours. We found out later it takes 3 hours to get there each way.
There's a little thing in this country that is forgotten well and truly and that's safety. If on the tourist map you have a picture, the biggest picture of a waterfall on the map and 7km by foot next to it, you probably need to provide a little more information!!!!! Like it's a six hour return journey on an unmarked trail criss-crossing a river/stream with a bit of slippery log crossings required. And it wasn't even picturesque. No flowers, no beautiful plants. The only colourful thing on the walk was a blue poly pipe that piped water down from the mountain.
And that brings me onto another of my new pet loves, plumbing. It would be good if the pipes attached to buildings actually plumbed something. Sometimes there just there for decoration, others they just flood out onto a piece of land for no particular reason other than the owner's block finished there and the council/government hadn't put in a pipe to connect to it. Most of the pipes are external inside the building...aesthetics people.
So we had lunch instead. Tomorrow we we try to get to biggest of the falls (apparently only an hour away and very little walking).
We rode back and started on our way to Mae Yen waterfall. We left the bikes and one point and started walking, it is supposed to be 7km so we headed out. We stopped after an hour when we met up with a couple who had stopped after 2 hours. We found out later it takes 3 hours to get there each way.
There's a little thing in this country that is forgotten well and truly and that's safety. If on the tourist map you have a picture, the biggest picture of a waterfall on the map and 7km by foot next to it, you probably need to provide a little more information!!!!! Like it's a six hour return journey on an unmarked trail criss-crossing a river/stream with a bit of slippery log crossings required. And it wasn't even picturesque. No flowers, no beautiful plants. The only colourful thing on the walk was a blue poly pipe that piped water down from the mountain.
And that brings me onto another of my new pet loves, plumbing. It would be good if the pipes attached to buildings actually plumbed something. Sometimes there just there for decoration, others they just flood out onto a piece of land for no particular reason other than the owner's block finished there and the council/government hadn't put in a pipe to connect to it. Most of the pipes are external inside the building...aesthetics people.
So we had lunch instead. Tomorrow we we try to get to biggest of the falls (apparently only an hour away and very little walking).
Day 19
Flying to Pai...we wish. That only takes 20 mins. We had the pleasure of enduring another 3 hours on a bus on some of the windiest roads in the world. Tim and Steph had warned us. That doesn't help you retain your breakfast, not that we lost it, it just wasn't where it should been after the trip.
We arrived in Pai and ended up after a detour at the place we booked (who couldn't have us one of the other guests got ill and had to go to hospital) at the Breeze of Pai. The second place we have ended up at through no planned effort that Tim and Steph stayed at.
We headed out for dinner and about half way there the power goes out. Lucky we had brought our head lamp. We arrived at the pizza place the guide recommends. Which was eerily dark (like everywhere else but they seemed to be a little more stingy with the candles) and had only one other diner. We were cautious an just ordered a cheese, basil and tomato pizza. It was really good, nice thin base and holy basil tastes quite good even if it isn't authentic.
We walked back and had a drink at a bar along the way. Now unfortunately Steph Pai is probably fantastic in high season but in low season most places are closed (the vegetarian resturant included) and the only travellers left seem to be posers. The hot season is low season because the slash and burn argiculture leaves a haze that covers the entire valley obscuring the hills and the rice paddies and jungle are dry. I can see the beauty that would be here though.
We arrived in Pai and ended up after a detour at the place we booked (who couldn't have us one of the other guests got ill and had to go to hospital) at the Breeze of Pai. The second place we have ended up at through no planned effort that Tim and Steph stayed at.
We headed out for dinner and about half way there the power goes out. Lucky we had brought our head lamp. We arrived at the pizza place the guide recommends. Which was eerily dark (like everywhere else but they seemed to be a little more stingy with the candles) and had only one other diner. We were cautious an just ordered a cheese, basil and tomato pizza. It was really good, nice thin base and holy basil tastes quite good even if it isn't authentic.
We walked back and had a drink at a bar along the way. Now unfortunately Steph Pai is probably fantastic in high season but in low season most places are closed (the vegetarian resturant included) and the only travellers left seem to be posers. The hot season is low season because the slash and burn argiculture leaves a haze that covers the entire valley obscuring the hills and the rice paddies and jungle are dry. I can see the beauty that would be here though.
Day 18
ZORB BALL!!!!!!!
We got strapped into a 4m plastic ball by our hands feet and torso and were rolled down a 100m hill into a lake. Once your in the water you get to untie yourself. It is really hard to navigate the ball once its in water, its like a hamster in a wheel, round and round but you go nowhere. Added to this is it gets slippery inside when its wet and there is a fairly large hole you have to dodge as you spin around.
We also watched the bungee jumping, an decided (full of adrenaline post zorbing) that we would have to jump when we get back to Chiang Mai. Don't know how long that conviction will last.
When we got back to our guesthouse, we decided to give the monk chanting another go, so we got in a saengtaw (like a taxi but with a ute and you sit on bench seats running parallel with the tray) after much confusion explained we were heading to Wat Chedi Luang. We ended up on the other side of town at the flower market. Hopefully Luang in Thai means flower or the taxi driver spoke less Thai than we do.
Once we eventually found a new saengtaw driver who could read our actual destination in Thai script (not all can) we found ourselves outside the temple. We headed over to the chanting area but nobody was there so we decided to walk around to the monk chanting and see if we could ask a Monk if there was any chanting this evening. Fortunately we found Phra Tea, the monk we had spent time with the previous week watering the garden. He took us over to the primary school area of the temple grounds, explaining that because they had 70 novice monks for the next 15 days at this temple they were having the evening chanting inside so the novice monks weren't too distracted.
This was one of those situations where having someone who knew what was going on helped. Phra Tea not only got permission for both of us to observe the chanting but he somehow convinced the master monk to allow us to join in!!! As long as Emily didn't go near any of the novice monks. Just can't trust her these days ;-). We also weren't allowed to take any photos or move around. They put one of the temple monks in charge of us called Supat, who was a senior monk of 24 years from a minority Hilltribe in Northern Thailand. Thai was his second language and English was his third language but he understood sarcasm very well. I think he was trying to recruit me. Fortunately in Buddhism if you become a monk it's only for as long as you want to be one. Much more community friendly. There are about 460,000 Monks in Thailand. They don't have much trouble recruiting it seems.
So we sit down at the back of the hall and the 70 odd novice students and a few senior monks begin their eveing prayers followed by chanting in Pali. Pali is the language that existed at the time of Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha) and hence is held sacred. This went on for about 30 minutes and you could see that the novices were like any bunch of 8-19 year olds getting restless. Many before the evening started had quite cleverly drunk more water than the average bladder could hold so they had an excuse to go outside during the evening. To great effect as half the group seemed to be outside at one stage. There were also the fine tenors among the group who sang so loudly and so out of tune that it was amazing there monkhood didn't end that night. On day two!
The other bizarre part of the evening was the amount of photos senior monks took of Em and I. You'd think we were rock stars or something. Actually after a while I did have to put my sunnies on the flashes were getting so bright. Obviously tourists don't turn up to chanting and meditation very often. And we weren't allowed to take photos so as not to distract the novive monks. Yeah right.
Part two of the initial evening course was meditation. This was probably the only time all 70 students were able to maintain some composure. As explained earlier Vipassana meditation is the main meditative practice and this went for about ten minutes, as the students were not up to concentrating for any longer on day two. They start their day at 4.30am and finish at 10pm at night so it's a bit of a shock to the system to start with. Vipassana meditation is hard at the best of times because of the mind's ability to wander but these kids had to meditate on a concrete floor with no cushion in sight. Em and I had issues for the 40 minutes we were there let alon the 3 1/2 hours they had to do at night. Afterwards Supat took us outside with the rest of the novice monks to have a drink and chat. I think he was really interested to practice his English that he got our email address.
Once we had finished up we did what all good Buddhists monks do and went to Mike's Original Burger Stand in the centre of town. Reputedly the best burger joint outside of the US by expats. It's slogan above the sign is 'Converting Vegetarians (since 1979).' Jono had the double cheeseburger called the double double with fries and a chocalate shake. Em had the triple cheeseburger meal with extra large fries and coke...just kidding she had a chocalate shake though.And she said it was really good. But the best news for those heading to Chiang Mai is that the double double cheeseburger was probably the best burger I've ever eaten. Even beats the burger I had at Lake St Clair after eating packaged food for 5 days on the Overland Track.
It was incredible, and they even let you put your own mixture of sauces and mustard on. Genius. Onion rings were really good too.
What a fine day...Zorbing, chanting and burgers read gorging.
We got strapped into a 4m plastic ball by our hands feet and torso and were rolled down a 100m hill into a lake. Once your in the water you get to untie yourself. It is really hard to navigate the ball once its in water, its like a hamster in a wheel, round and round but you go nowhere. Added to this is it gets slippery inside when its wet and there is a fairly large hole you have to dodge as you spin around.
We also watched the bungee jumping, an decided (full of adrenaline post zorbing) that we would have to jump when we get back to Chiang Mai. Don't know how long that conviction will last.
When we got back to our guesthouse, we decided to give the monk chanting another go, so we got in a saengtaw (like a taxi but with a ute and you sit on bench seats running parallel with the tray) after much confusion explained we were heading to Wat Chedi Luang. We ended up on the other side of town at the flower market. Hopefully Luang in Thai means flower or the taxi driver spoke less Thai than we do.
Once we eventually found a new saengtaw driver who could read our actual destination in Thai script (not all can) we found ourselves outside the temple. We headed over to the chanting area but nobody was there so we decided to walk around to the monk chanting and see if we could ask a Monk if there was any chanting this evening. Fortunately we found Phra Tea, the monk we had spent time with the previous week watering the garden. He took us over to the primary school area of the temple grounds, explaining that because they had 70 novice monks for the next 15 days at this temple they were having the evening chanting inside so the novice monks weren't too distracted.
This was one of those situations where having someone who knew what was going on helped. Phra Tea not only got permission for both of us to observe the chanting but he somehow convinced the master monk to allow us to join in!!! As long as Emily didn't go near any of the novice monks. Just can't trust her these days ;-). We also weren't allowed to take any photos or move around. They put one of the temple monks in charge of us called Supat, who was a senior monk of 24 years from a minority Hilltribe in Northern Thailand. Thai was his second language and English was his third language but he understood sarcasm very well. I think he was trying to recruit me. Fortunately in Buddhism if you become a monk it's only for as long as you want to be one. Much more community friendly. There are about 460,000 Monks in Thailand. They don't have much trouble recruiting it seems.
So we sit down at the back of the hall and the 70 odd novice students and a few senior monks begin their eveing prayers followed by chanting in Pali. Pali is the language that existed at the time of Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha) and hence is held sacred. This went on for about 30 minutes and you could see that the novices were like any bunch of 8-19 year olds getting restless. Many before the evening started had quite cleverly drunk more water than the average bladder could hold so they had an excuse to go outside during the evening. To great effect as half the group seemed to be outside at one stage. There were also the fine tenors among the group who sang so loudly and so out of tune that it was amazing there monkhood didn't end that night. On day two!
The other bizarre part of the evening was the amount of photos senior monks took of Em and I. You'd think we were rock stars or something. Actually after a while I did have to put my sunnies on the flashes were getting so bright. Obviously tourists don't turn up to chanting and meditation very often. And we weren't allowed to take photos so as not to distract the novive monks. Yeah right.
Part two of the initial evening course was meditation. This was probably the only time all 70 students were able to maintain some composure. As explained earlier Vipassana meditation is the main meditative practice and this went for about ten minutes, as the students were not up to concentrating for any longer on day two. They start their day at 4.30am and finish at 10pm at night so it's a bit of a shock to the system to start with. Vipassana meditation is hard at the best of times because of the mind's ability to wander but these kids had to meditate on a concrete floor with no cushion in sight. Em and I had issues for the 40 minutes we were there let alon the 3 1/2 hours they had to do at night. Afterwards Supat took us outside with the rest of the novice monks to have a drink and chat. I think he was really interested to practice his English that he got our email address.
Once we had finished up we did what all good Buddhists monks do and went to Mike's Original Burger Stand in the centre of town. Reputedly the best burger joint outside of the US by expats. It's slogan above the sign is 'Converting Vegetarians (since 1979).' Jono had the double cheeseburger called the double double with fries and a chocalate shake. Em had the triple cheeseburger meal with extra large fries and coke...just kidding she had a chocalate shake though.And she said it was really good. But the best news for those heading to Chiang Mai is that the double double cheeseburger was probably the best burger I've ever eaten. Even beats the burger I had at Lake St Clair after eating packaged food for 5 days on the Overland Track.
It was incredible, and they even let you put your own mixture of sauces and mustard on. Genius. Onion rings were really good too.
What a fine day...Zorbing, chanting and burgers read gorging.
Day 17 back in Chiang Mai
We explored the Sunday night market and Emily bought a cool pair of 50/50 shoes painted by local artist. We also sampled super super sweet and coloured snow cones served in a bowl... hm mm. The night market was much more interesting than the Chiang Mai night bazaar or the Phuket markets which had row after row of the same cheap badly made stuff. This market had some interesting hand made stuff and lots of more authentic thai crafts, there were also lots of Thai people there which is always a good sign. They even had sushi stalls with sushi at 10B per piece- interesting stuff like pickles, seaweed and unidentified fish products. It extends for one major street and has at least four side streets that have joined the band wagon, we walked for 3 hours and didn't cover it all.
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