I’m not going to lie, I’ve been very on board with the idea of going back to Chiang Mai since I left last time in 2018? Something about the town captures everything I love about Thailand. It’s a solid home for one of my fave dishes in the world and it’s simply more laid back than Bangkok and so much of the core of the town is easily walkable. Honestly if there was scuba diving I could easily spend a whole 3 week trip in and around it. First though, I had to get there.

I’d decided to take the train, and while I’d considered the sleeper I’d hemmed and hawed too long as they were all sold out unless I left Bangkok immediately or stayed extra time which (in order to not duplicate any legs) I wanted to stick to my timetable. Instead I hopped the daytime ‘express’ train.

As mentioned last post the Thai Railways have closed old Hua Lamphong and moved all northerly trains out to a sparkly new station by the northern bus station/big weekend market. I started my day (prophetically) having a luxuriously long hot shower not knowing how it would be in my next place (not great) then stuffed myself at breakfast not know what the food situation would be since I had heard dining cars had become more rare since I last did this. Thankfully since it was saturday my cab transfer was quick and painless other than my grab driver stopping for a pee at a service station.

The station itself was sparkling clean & modern and completely devoid of soul. Boarding was now strictly controlled time wise and while probably an improvement it was definitely less exciting. I was also kind of surprised despite the warnings as the train was now only 3 cars and definitely more old fashioned than the last ones I was on. I’m wondering if the Thai State Railways budget crisis is very bad and they’re unable to maintain their fancier japanese cars. It’s mostly shocking because this train was FULL, to the point where the seat next to emptied out a couple times but would always be filled by someone else at the same station. It seems beyond argument that they could have filled another carriage at least.

Having done this journey again I likely won’t do it next time (unless I can snag the 1st class sleeper just to try it) but it was a nice relaxed journey through the countryside. A lady came by with snacks regularly and offered us the chance to buy lunch (which inexplicably didn’t come until 2:30ish) which turned out to be shockingly delicious stir fry. For an ‘express’ train it makes a lot of stops as well. Honestly you think for the main route between the two biggest cities and with a healthy tourist usage of it they could do better. That said there were signs in the first couple hours out of Bangkok that they’re working on elevating the train to get it moving faster than it can past level crossings so here’s hoping. Given the current state I wouldn’t expect it to be done in the next decade though.

The journey was lovely and relaxing but at the relatively pokey pace and all the stops it was 10+ hours before we arrived. Again, it’s worth doing once for the experience but I’ll probably hop a cheap flight next time.

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Chiang Mai instantly filled my senses once I’d grabbed a Grab Driver (thai uber) and started my way to my hotel through the busy saturday evening. The bars and restaurants were hopping and various night markets were absolutely thronging with people from all over the world. I was eager to get out and find a Khao Soi and a beer or something but first things first… find the dang guest house.

Unlike my last time my driver actually knew where it was! Part of that is grab is of course using GPS but he  said he knew the best way and sure enough we were there with a minimum of pain. You see, the core of old town Chang Mai is a moated and previously walled inner town. It’s a network of narrow alleys and only a few broader streets intersecting occasionally one-way feeders. Sadly I’d been unable to snag a reservation at my much loved previous guest house but I ended up in something nearby that had friendly staff and comfortable rooms. I miss you and your glorious shower Sri-Pat.

After checking in and unpacking a bit since I’d be here a while… I went to find a Khao Soi at the saturday walking street/night market. If you’ve never been to a true asian Night Market and/or don’t know what they are just picture a ginormous outdoor food court. Instead of food trucks (though there are a couple mini ones/vw vans) there are stall after all of food options crammed into every space. Fresh produce, sweets and desserts and curry, noodles and dumplings all over the place. Walking street means that they’ve shut down the area to traffic as well and this generally means a ton of handicrafts etc, but more about that later. 

The important thing is that I’d found a glorious bowl of Khao Soi from a lady almost ready to shut down for the night. It was spicy, creamy, succulent… I’d been waiting 8ish years for this moment and I needed to savour it. Unfortunately since it’s a northern thai specialty we don’t see good ones in north america much and if you see it on a menu in Winnipeg it’s probably the laotian version which is vastly inferior/a completely different dish. The true glorioso is a curry broth, relatively thick with coconut and based on a combo of red thai curry paste and yellow curry powder/turmeric. This is served over cooked egg noodles and then topped with fried egg noodles for a texture contrast. You can then also add lime, fried onions/shallots, fresh shallot, pickled veg etc. If I ever win the megabucks I’m hiring someone from Chiang Mai to come open a Khao Soi shop in Winnipeg.

Hunger sated I defaulted to some people watching and found there was a new? Nightly food plaza/night market right near my hotel near the somewhat trashy square of teenybopper/reggae bars that were really hopping. I ate half a banana crepe but eventually succumbed to the idea of watching a few mins of tv before bed as I’d booked some whitewater rafting for the morning.7

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As is the usual my rafting trip involved pick up from the hotel and thankfully they were near the start of the interval they’d provided. I’d just had a chance to hit a local bakery for a muffin and 7-11 for a juice before we were on our way, one couple was already on board and we picked up a second older couple at a larger hotel out in the suburbs on the way out of town. They were of course American. I’m not sure why you come to Chiang Mai if you don’t want to stay at least somewhat near what makes it fun even if not right in old town proper. I’d soon find out that this was going to be the least of my problems with them that day.

The river site was a surprisingly long way out of town from what I’d seen in the description and along the same road to most of the elephant sanctuaries/camps. In fact we got to see a fair number of elephants elephanting at that time in the morning. Given the amount of time it took to get there I was surprised we hadn’t gotten an earlier start. Still when we arrived we got a quick safety briefly then they sat us down to a home cooked curry lunch. The french couple and I dove in to delicious ginger chicken and vegetable, potato and chicken yellow curry and coconut rice with a bunch of freshly picked bananas for dessert… And the americans pulled out some wrapped sandwiches they’d brought with them. To make things worse they then proceeded to start spraying bug spray on themselves while standing near the buffet table. Completely obtuse.

As we did our first briefing we got to listen to her repeated ignore what the guide said about the river being quite low and insisting he tell her what class the rapids we would be doing were. Putting aside the fact that this woman who clearly hadn’t been rafting before would have absolute no concept of a class 3 vs. a class 4… He’d clearly said already our final briefing by the boats would cover the state of the river.  When we did finally get to the actual river briefing she kept talking over him and annoying the crap out of the other 3 of us. So of course I was chosen to go in her boat…

I’m fairly certain this was because the guide knew they’d both be useless paddling and sure enough one of my strokes would over paddle the boat against two from her and her hubby. In the end our in boat guide and I mostly steered with him having to do more paddling than I’m sure he’s used to. The river was indeed low but also still showed the massive damage from a freak flood that had hit last fall. I’d actually end up seeing footage from the flood at the elephant sanctuary the next day. For our journey it was fairly serene with a fairly gentle stretch of 5 km or so to start, some actual rapids with a few decent drops for a short-ish middle section then an extra gentle float to the finish amongst some people doing bamboo raft floats. It was truly a beautiful spot and I’m sad I still haven’t gotten around to picking up a goPro for this sort of thing. Pleasantly surprising however was the fact that one of the team had photographer duties and sent the photos to us free of charge.

Even nicer were the various groups of elephants we passed bathing in the lower river. As much as I’m sure they weren’t from the greatest of the attractions (more on that later) it was still lovely to see them splashing in the water as we floated by. My guide kept asking me why I was travelling alone and in the end became convinced that I’d have a thai girlfriend before I go home.

Overall it wasn’t the most exciting rafting of my life but still a gorgeous day out despite the two annoyances from Chicago. She spent the entire trip down either overreacting or repeatedly telling her husband he was doing the various commands from the boat captain wrong. I honestly wished the boat captain would just tell the joyless harridan to sit in the middle and ride. Hilariously as we finished and they provided us with a packet of oreos, a soda and some freshly sliced pineapple she started nattering at her husband about make sure you don’t use the ice (and he made some comment to the guide about ‘is it safe FOR AMERICANS.’) And at this point she pulled out a can of tuna and some crackers that looked like she’d brought them from home. Definitely one of those people who just refuses to actually eat anything outside their hotel or maybe a KFC or McDonalds. Why some people come overseas to not actually experience the country they’re visiting is beyond me. Needless to say I devoured my pineapple and let myself be naughty and have the coke as well.

Back in town we ran into a bit of a roadblock that turned out to be because the King was in town (though I didn’t learn this until the next day) but I eventually grabbed a disappointingly lukewarm shower before heading out for the big deal sunday night walking street in old town. This was a next level night market. Very little food on the main drag here, most of the temples and other courtyards were jammed with amazing food stalls and a kilometer and a half or so of the main drag (spilling into every side street) was stall after stall of handicrafts, clothing, souvenirs and nonsense. Even arriving a bit later (I’d rested my feet for a bit) it was packed to the gills and took me nearly an hour to squeeze one end to the other. I picked up a very silly shirt, sampled another Khao Soi, a mango smoothie, a korean fried chicken bao and some other goodies and eventually stumbled home later than I probably should have given the early start the next morning.

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Monday I had an earlier wakeup for Elephant sanctuary day. After failing last time this time out I’d managed to book one of the tours through Elephant Nature Park the animal sanctuary founded by the woman who seems to have started this movement towards ethical animal parks in Thailand. Basically she’s spearheaded various projects to give new homes to former logging camp elephants, lobbied to end elephant riding and generally has just been an advocate for these ridiculous adorable giants. The trip I’d booked was a small group tour where the first part of the day we went out to the home of a family that owned some previous working elephants and now did a cooperative program with the larger park where we’d help take care of them for a day as they went about their routine. This mostly involved prepping the food and feeding them, walking through the forest with them as they foraged for roughage and watching as they tossed dirt on themselves to ward off flies or scratched itches on trees. The Mahouts who take care of them clearly adore them and though they were previously working elephants their only commands these days are basically to stay together and not wander off where they might end up hurt.

After lunch we walked back down to the farm and said our goodbyes to the guides, the elephants and adorable Ipi and Yai the dogs then transferred over to the main park which is much more hands off due to larger group sizes and the massive variety of elephant temperaments. Many of these elephants were rescued from worse situations and need more care and they often bring new animals in. It was nice to know that my (fairly considerable) sum of money was going solely towards animal care/rescue. ENP also runs a fairly massive dog rescue (dogs and dog beds are everywhere), has volunteer programs, a cat sanctuary and space for cows and other farm animals that need help. Unfortunately they got absolutely slammed by that flood in october ‘24 and what was once a grassy meadow is now all stripped earth. There were large mounds of sand and earth in various places and it seems like they’re trying to build up a new safety berm against the river before the rainy season arrives again.

I was sad to say goodbye but it had been a long day and was a longer ride back due to yet another traffic jam (This is where I learned about the king as someone said it was probably his motorcade as he’d been unable to get to his hostel for 3 hours the day before.) Thankfully I got dropped off second so I got to avoid some of it. Shower + another round of Khao Soi and some dumplings followed then I ended up randomly joining a crowd of thankfully non-teenybopper brits at a pub and drank some cider while watching soccer (I got roundly booed for being an arsenal fan but as the games on were mostly second tier teams only one guy was super invested)

If it’s not clear above I adored every minute I spent on the ENP tour and would endorse any of their tours for ethical Elephant interactions if you’re in Chiang Mai. They also have a tour where you go visit some elephants up in the highlands and that’s probably what I’d do next time.

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This was my last full day in Chiang Mai so I was staying in town and revisiting some old haunts and trying out some new ones. I wandered around the moat for a while, tried to find a pie shop that must have closed down recently and wandered into one of the more baffling displays of my life… groups of chinese tourists giving money to various street ‘performers’ who’s entire schtick was scaring flocks of pigeons into the air? Can someone explain this to me? I’ve definitely seen chinese tourists fascinated by pigeons before but this was next level.

I eventually meandered my way through some more residential side streets to a burmese place recommended by a friend called Cherry Burmese. It’s easy to forget as you sit here that historically Chiang Mai was one of the edges of the golden triangle of opium/heroin product (now mostly confined to Myanmar I gather) and is only a few hours from the border. As a result there are a number of Burmese restaurants in the area and just as I did last time I had a delicious meal at this place to take advantage of seeing a cuisine I don’t get to sample very often. It’s unsurprisingly about what you’d expect given Myanmar’s geography a hearty mix of thai/se asian with indian subcontinent flairs. (or at least what I’ve sampled is.)

The rest of the afternoon was more wandering in the sun, a few lazy park bench with a book sessions and then off to my cooking class for the evening. If you’ve been reading these forever you may know I’ve done one in Chiang Mai before, but what the heck, it’s ~$40, you get a hell of a meal at the end and you make some new friends for the evening. I mostly hung out with a young brit couple and some floridians about my age and we made Lahb, various curries, pad thai and deep fried bananas. It was an excellent end to this round in Chiang Mai.

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All in all I was pleasantly surprised. Chiang Mai remains lovely and while I’d say there’s definitely an increase in the amount of drunken young backpackers/some encroachment of more american fast food on the fringes it wasn’t overwhelmingly so. I’m also definitely here at one of the busiest times of the year for that as many of the gap year brits in particular aim to be up north first then head down to the full moon party on Koh Phangan in a couple weeks time (I’ll be fleeing the island before that arrives thankfully.) I was mostly just happy to see that my memories remained true and Chiang Mai will continue to be one of my fave places to spend some time.