The road from Chiang Mai to Chiang Rai is 150 km. It takes over three hours to drive between the two cities because there is lots of construction, slowdowns for small towns, and windy hilly roads. The scenery is amazing especially at points as the road winds through the northern Thai mountains.
While in Chang Rai we visited Wat Rong Khun, known as the White Temple. What was once an older temple complex was restored by a famous Thia artist, Chalermachi Kostitpipat at his own expense, with the help of volunteers. Reportedly he believes it will be his road to immortality and sees it to spread an understanding of Buddhism. He has created a very ornate, intricate and sparkly temple complex. It is very eclectic with a combination of more traditional Buddhist artwork documenting the cycle of life in mural and sculptures. The inside of the temple is painted with a psychedelic colour backdrop and many references to Buddhism but also to pop culture (unfortunately no pictures inside the temple meaning thus no pictures of the Star Wars and Marvel figures painted on the temple walls). In temple site has several buildings and lots of self-promotional and galleries selling the artist work. On the first day we were not able to visit as we neglected to wear appropriate clothing but chose to go back the next day given outward appearances.
We enjoyed visiting the Khun Korn waterfall. The 3km jungle hike to it felt much more like a true hike than some of the other nature walks we have been on in Thailand national parks. The waterfall was majestic and is the highest one around. No one was brave enough to enter the cold water despite the heat.
Visiting the Blue Temple was also amazing, it was a really intricate beautiful temple that was painted an iridescent blue color. It has majestic sculptures guarding its entrance and numerous shrines. This temple allows photos to be taken inside.
The Hill Tribe Museum of Northern Thailand was very interesting but also quite dated. We learned a lot about the local the history and culture of the local hilltribes during the 20 min slide show at the beginning of the museum and then toured through several rooms displaying traditional costumes, housing and cooking utensils. There was a focus on marriage traditions and a discussion about the introduction of birth control (Condom Café was downstairs from the museum) and some of the educational programs that had helped bring immunizations to these communities. After our visit to this museum Sophie was particularly concerned about how these communities are more isolated from the rest of the Thai population, questioning whether they have access to education, health care and voting.
Our visit to several local Hill tribe villages (Akha, Lahu and China) on our trek with a local guide the following day was reassuring. We saw the kids had access to school, people had motorcycles, telephones, and other signs of modern technology. They also were not wearing traditional costumes in the villages we visited during our mountain trek. When we visited the tourist site run by the Union of Hill tribes, “The Long Neck Village”, you see these women and Akha women wearing their traditional dress. There is a stiff entrance fee and then you are allowed, even encouraged to take pictures with the women as they as showing you their traditional costumes and weaving, some of their wares are clearly made in China.
Another stop on our tour was a small community that had an elephant attraction where people could choose to ride elephants, and feed elephants. I had misunderstood the outline of the tour and thought we were visiting one of the local elephant sanctuaries. We were all a little bit sad to see both elephants tied up on short chains wearing heavy riding saddles, which we know is not good for their health. Our guide who is well informed about the community shared that although the community brings the elephants in during the morning until the early afternoon for tourist visits, they take them to the local jungle for the late afternoon evening and overnight, so they are on longer chains and have more opportunity t roam and eat in their natural environment. We have repeatedly heard how hard the elephants can be on their environments as they consume 10% of their entire weight in a day, only sleeping about four hours a night. It was an opportunity to the Elephants up close and to feed them bananas, but we much preferred the environment for them in the Friends of Wildlife centre near Hua Hin.
On this tour, we appreciated both our guide and driver, Alastair commented they are probably the only Thai drivers that we have met that follow the speed limit, going on to say, “They drive slower than I do on our back roads, and I am cautious”. Our guide had good English, and we were able to ask him all sorts of questions about life in Thailand, he clearly enjoyed have a more personal conversation and was happy to tell us as about the local politics and social structure. He took us to visit his girlfriend’s family organic farm and restaurant and introduced us to got his lovely nieces. Both he and his girlfriend are very interested in medicinal plants and Thai cooking.
Throughout our jungle trek, he showed us numerous different plants and Thai cooking ingredients growing in the wild, including lemongrass, Thai basil, Hot flowers, Kaffir limes, Galanga herbs, used in Tom Yum and the different uses for banana leaves. Our trek took us to a beautiful waterfall, and we all enjoyed cooling off. We walked about 5 1/2 km, this felt much further than it would at home because of the intense heat. We had the pleasure of visiting three of the mountain villages. These villages we would never have visited on our own as it would’ve been hard to find our way and move it to felt pertinent walking so close to the homes. Luckily, our guide seemed to know everyone, he tried to teach us some different words in the local dialect and thanked everyone for allowing us to visit. Along the way, we tasted some beautiful fresh lychee. The young girls were anxious to pick more when they could see how much Alastair enjoyed them. Of course, this was a great opportunity for their mother/grandmother to sell us her wares.
