Post # 4 – Chaing Rai

Day 8 Days to go 1072 – It’s 7.46pm Wed 7/11/2011 and I am in downtown Chaing Rai. I’m on my iPod typing this as I have finally convinced the blog to upload my fav photos. It’ll take some time so I’m multi media-ing it. This morning started beautifully with Munee putting on a free breakfast, the THai lads working there giving me
Some intro Thai lessons, a handful of photos and two bottles water and I was on my way. The countryside here was beautiful: rice fields started to pop up, lots of farming land and street stalls along the way. My Thai word for today was sa-wat-dii kha or hello and it was fun calling it out to the locals with a big head nod and grin yay. It’s more hillier country as you head north but the road managed to wind its way through as opposed to over another yay. 65 km for the day and I arrived to find a cool hotel 200baht, laundry my very smelly gear 30baht, stock up on some supplies 170baht including the biggest wod of tofu I could find for a protein hit. The town looks really relaxed and I’ll enjoy checking it out more tonight and early tomorrow before heading off to Chaing Kong the border town with Laos. From there it’s a long boat ride to Luang Prabang along the Mekong. I thought this could be a cool way meet the river I ll be following for the next weeks-it’s a bonding thing. I met some lovely people today a girl from Sweden who showed me the hotel and a guy from chili both were very excited about my trip which was really fun to chat about with them. They had a few tips
On chili and Norway which really interesting. At a set of lights this fella pulled up alongside peddling one of those cycles where you lay back and peddle in a seated position. In that short time he told me he had cycles around Thailand during the floods and to be safe and to invest in side mirrors. he was this very tanned and wrinkled all smiles character who has reminded me to be very vigilant with the sunscreen and moisturizer. someone asked from an earlier blog what a buddhist prayer gesture was. Hands are in a praying position in front of your face with a short bow to the person. There’s a real strong Buddhist culture present and each of the towns are centered around their main wat or temple. Even the tiny villages pride themselves on their temple which is kept on as best state of ornate I’m sure they can manage. Given the amount of people that live humbly on their farming produce their hearts seem calm and happy. Of course the bigger towns and cities have their share of those living a western lifestyle but there seems a stronger sense of character amongst the more rural people at least what I’ve seen so far. That’s my favorite part of today exchanging sa wat dii kha’s with the roadside stall folk. Least favorite: mmmmmm waiting for the photos to upload into WordPress when I can here the night bazaar just around the corner. I’m on the lookout for some fruit on ice or another coconut ice-cream mmmmm why choose both sounds perfect. Costs 495 baht plus desert to come. Talk soon. X