June 12
I arrived in Chiangmai about noon today and I am sorely unimpressed. After the past two weeks going through regular Thailand where I was just a curiosity, I am now in tourist city and I feel like I am just another mark for every hustler who makes his living off tourists. It was also depressing riding into Chiangmai because the "urban" area started about 20 kilometers from the center of town (lots of industry, gas stations, etc. - sort of like Highway 99 except not so busy). So that was a real ugly stretch to go through. The city center itself seems to be pretty compact.
There are hundreds of hotels and guesthouses and I looked at about 6 of them before I selected a hotel that charges about $17 (including breakfast). I could have gotten a room without air conditioning for about half that but I want to be comfortable, particularly since I am finding this whole scene a bit depressing. I tried to do some touring of the wats (there are 300 of them in the city) but every time I walked into one someone would come out of the woodwork to want to give me a "guided tour". So, in my irritated state, I would just leave. There is a fabulous temple up in the hills about 16 kilometers from town. Tomorrow morning I am going to bike up there and check it out. If I am not getting better vibes by tomorrow night I'll probably just head out of Chiangmai. I am thinking I would like to stay in one of the national parks and experience some nature.
I stopped by the elephant school (and elephant hospital) on the way into Chiangmai. I didn't ride on one because I would have had to wait until 10:00 and it would have been too hot to ride the final 60 kilometers into Chiangmai. They were impressive looking beasts though - and that basket on their backs looked awfully precarious.
June 13
I am getting a much more favorable impression of Chiangmai after a day here. This morning I biked up to a temple called Doi Suthep which was a 13 kilometer climb into the mountains just outside of town (literally, you start the climb as soon as you hit the edge of town). It was really wonderful - a good road, cool, cloudy weather and some utterly spectacular views of Chiangmai. At the top there was this magnificent temple that could only be gotten to by ascending a 308 step staircase - the hand-railing was a giant serpent about 8 feet around that went down both sides of the entire stairway. I walked around the temple for about half an hour and as I was leaving I saw a sign that said I was supposed to take my shoes off. What a dork. Anyway it was a great ride down.
It is a big adrenaline rush trying to cycle in Chiangmai. The guidebook said that it is a great bicycling town, but it is obvious the author hasn't cycled here. It's great if you know exactly where you are going and can keep up a steady 35 kph speed. The old city is about 1 mile square surrounded by a moat. On each side of the moat is a three-lane road with a steady non-stop flow of cars, trucks, mopeds and motorcycles. As far as I can tell there are only two stop lights on this entire stretch of road. It is almost impossible to cross and yet you have to do it to get into the old city. It does keep the old city a lot quieter. Nobody could possibly have invaded, even if they didn't have a moat, because they would have been stopped by the traffic.
Despite the people trying to get you to take their taxi or sell you something, the people are quite friendly. There is an enormous English speaking community here and everything is written in English as well as Thai. There are a few English language bookstores - one of them was excellent, but he wouldn't buy my books because I wrote in them in ink. He was really offended and sneered at me "I don’t know how anybody could do this to a book!"
The tigers in Thailand are like the rhinoceros in Africa. There are only a few left and they are only in a few national parks. I am sure I will not be going anywhere where there will be danger from tigers. There are a lot of fabulous places within 50 or 60 miles of Chiangmai - several national parks (including the largest mountain in Thailand (about 8,500 feet high). I have decided to take day trips to these places, stay there overnight, and then come back to Chiangmai for a day, and then try another one. Tomorrow I am heading north to a place called Chiang Dao that is famous for mountain scenery and a series of caves. If I like that I may, after a day in Chiangmai, go to Doi Inthanon (the national park that has the tallest mountain in it). If I feel really comfortable in the national parks I might stay a couple of nights. Everything is up in the air after that.
It's not quite as hot here as it was further south. I am reasonably comfortable walking all around the town - which is what I really like to do when I am in the city. I am going to leave here and walk over to the cinemas to see what's playing. I biked by one of them and they were playing "Gladiator". That has been showing at every single theater that I have seen in Thailand. I hope that there is another movie.
June 14
I am in Chiang Dao, a village about 80 kilometers north of Chiangmai. I was surprised to find an internet cafe here (there couldn't be more than a couple of hundred people in the town), but here I am. I rented a nice "bungalow" in a place about 7 kilometers into the hills near the village. The proprietor there speaks English and the other residents are all foreigners. No air conditioning but it does have a strong fan.
I went to the Chiang Dao caves and was suitably impressed. I had to hire a guide who carried a torch (for $1.50) because they said it was too dangerous to go in by yourself because there were too many "contuctions". And you know what, they were right! There were contuctions every where you turned. The stalactite and stalagmites were extraordinary - they had names for many of them. There were bats all over the ceiling and you could feel them flying by. In a few places the smell of bat shit was overpowering. The guide took me to the edge of this black hole, picked up a rock and tossed it in. You couldn't hear it hit bottom! There were also all sorts of Buddhist monuments throughout the cave, including what looked like a tomb. At one point the guide started tapping a stalactite and it reverberated like an organ. It must have been hollow. I took a bunch of pictures and am real curious what they will look like.
It feels nice to get out in nature a little bit. I might spend some time at some of the other national parks, but I still haven't decided my itinerary for the next few weeks. I am sort of leaning against going to the northeast and will probably head down the peninsula south of Bangkok. Anyway, I’m still thinking about it.
The place I am staying is in the middle of a nature reserve famous for its birds. I think you would really like it, although I haven't really seen all that many birds. I often hear them chirping but there don't seem to be many that stand out. There are a few mosquitos here, the first I've really experienced on the trip.
June 16
Sorry I wasn't able to e-mail you yesterday. It rained pretty heavily where I was and that caused a power failure which lasted several hours. It hit just as I was reading your letter at the internet cafe. I started out yesterday morning heading north toward a town called Fang, but I turned back after 30 kilometers because I realized it was too far to go in such difficult mountainous terrain and because I was starting to feel a little spooked by the area (I am in an area known as the Golden Triangle, where most of the world's opium is grown). It could be dangerous to get off the beaten path up here and there were a number of police roadblocks checking vehicles for drug smuggling. Anyway, I turned around after 30 kilometers and went back to the bungalows I was staying at in the jungle to spend another night there.
The area around Chiang Dao is quite interesting. Besides the Chiang Dao cave and the wildlife sanctuary there is a fabulous monastery deep in the forest that required climbing 500 steps to get to. Plus, I got to spend a good part of the day talking to the owner (I fixed her bike for her) and the other guests (an American couple - the woman was a horse acupuncturist and a young Dutch couple). The owner, a Chinese-Thai woman named Malee was a real treat. She spoke excellent English, was very friendly, and had a wry sense of humor. She had been married to a German man and they had run these bungalows together until he was murdered three years ago while traveling in China. After his death, she kept the business and was a real dynamo working around the house. I went along with her when she went shopping for dinner and got my first chance to see a real Thai market from the "inside".
We all stayed up real late talking on both nights I was there. It was a real trip because at night the jungle was just throbbing with life. Animals were running all over the roof (Malee said they were gecko lizards - which I see all the time, including inside several of my hotel rooms - and rats). Also, there were bats flying around inside her house and all around our heads when we were sitting outside. Earlier in the day, when I was working on her bike I felt something on my foot and there was a worm about 10 inches long and about 2 inches around walking across it. I nearly jumped out of my socks, but Malee said it was harmless. Her dogs cornered a snake in a tree but we were not able to see it (she said the dogs had caught cobras there in the past). Anyway the two days were really pleasant as I got to talk to some really nice and interesting people.
The American couple recommended a guest house here in Chiangmai and I took them up on it and am staying there for the next couple of nights (450 baht a night - about $12). I may run into them again as they kept their room rented while they are driving up north. On the 80 kilometer ride back into Chiangmai I was attacked by a dog who bit me in the shoe when I kicked him in the face in self-defense. Luckily it didn't puncture the shoe anywhere. I don't think he actually bit hard, I think I just kicked him in the teeth. Thank god these dogs are all pretty puny - no pitbulls or dobermans here. When I walked up to the monastery I had to walk through about 10 dogs who were sleeping at the bottom of the stairs. They went wild when I woke them, but only for about 10 seconds. A lot of dogs live in the monasteries because people drop them off there when they want to get rid of them and the monks take care of them.
I haven't decided what I am going to do for my birthday. I started having a lot of pain in the tendon at the back of my right foot on the ride this morning. If that hasn't started getting better I am probably going to spend the day in Chiangmai. I am a lot more comfortable here now that I feel like I know the city a bit. It is kind of strange, because if I had not met you back in 1993 there is a good chance I would have ended up living here. I then plan to go to the national park at Doi Inthanon. It looks like there is a road to the top (it is, at over 8,000 feet, the highest mountain in Thailand). It is one of the top destinations for birdwatchers in Asia. I would love to climb it on my bike and stay at one of the national park bungalows.
June 16
I'm going to spend the rest of today just chilling out in Chiangmai. I went for a long bike ride to some of the areas of the city that I haven't seen. The University is huge and gorgeous. I wouldn't mind going there - so much green space, so many playing fields for every sport - it was great. I also went up to one of the well-known wats on the edge of the city. There supposedly is a lock of Buddha's hair in the temple there. There were a lot of monks there (I found out today that there are 32,000 monasteries in Thailand and 460,000 monks). I'm finding out that Chiangmai is a pretty good biking town after all. You just need to know which roads to avoid. There is a bike club that does Sunday morning rides and I just might stay an extra day and tag along with them. I might get some good info and where to go next.
June 16 – Mark
I have several important questions that I need answered ASAP. Where did you stay in Chiangmai? Didn't you get sick of all those noodles and rice? Are all white people fat, clumsy, greasy giants or is that just the white people in Thailand? Did it make you queasy when you saw all these middle aged white men with their nubile young Thai girlfriends? How come internet cafes in Thailand are cheaper, quicker and more ubiquitous than they are in the US? What was the name of the elephant you rode on? Please give me answers to these and any other questions as soon as humanly possible.
June 16 – Marlene
I am having a great experience in Thailand. The Buddhist culture here is even more special than I had anticipated. Despite a layer of chaos (especially when it comes to the traffic) there is a real gentility to the Thai people. I have yet to see an expression of anger since I have been here. It is really wonderful to experience. I have been stopping at the wats (the Buddhist monasteries) at least once a day. While there I sit under the Bo tree (Buddha became enlightened while sitting under a Bo tree and so every Buddhist monastery in the world has a Bo tree somewhere on its grounds). My bike meditates while I just relax and enjoy the tranquility. The cycling has also been good. The roads are wide and smooth and there is never any problem finding food and water. The hotels are cheap and good ($10 a night usually gets me a room with air conditioning and satellite tv!). The markets that every town has are a marvel, with an incredible variety of foods. The only down side is the heat which makes it extremely uncomfortable to ride past 11:00 in the morning. I try to get off by 6:00 (where I pass all the monks making their alms rounds) and get in my 50 or 60 miles by 11:00 or noon.
Right now I am in Chiangmai, which is a delightful city of about 150,000 in northern Thailand (in the Golden Triangle). There is a large expatriate community (Americans and Europeans) here and so there is every western convenience you could want (I have been indulging in Pizza Hut as I am getting a little tired of rice and noodles - even if they often are quite delicious).