Chiang Mai (Day 147) — Harmon Family

Chiang Mai was full of hidden beauty — and a lifetime supply of crazy kid activities! We also had some of the best food of the trip.

TEMPLES

The temples were colorful, sparkling, and very renovated – a big contrast with Bagan.

There were also some mystical temples hidden in the woods.

Every morning around sunrise, monks descend from their monasteries to collect morning offerings of rice from people in the town. We woke up a few times to give alms and receive a blessing.

Thai monks are revered, and some temples had super lifelike wax statues of famous departed monks. (This is a wax statue - not a person.)

*****

HIDDEN BEAUTY… ACROSS FROM THE MCDONALD’S

Chiang Mai was our 3rd very long stop city (after Cape Town and Sydney). We spent 12 nights total, split between “Old Chiang Mai” and a peaceful area outside of town. Overall, we preferred being outside of town. “Old Chiang Mai” definitely needs to be in quotation marks since a surprising amount of it was cheap 1980’s low rise construction - including a McDonald’s…. Still, there were sprinklings of of beauty all over Chiang Mai if you looked.

Local artisans would weave bracelets and toys out of flowers as we watched.

We stumbled across a contemporary art museum, a hidden garden restaurant, a quirky hill tribe influenced clothing store, and more.

One day, Hazel and Ashley woke up early to learn the art of Thai flower arranging, which is done by placing cut blossoms in water in a large vase.

And the food! It was among the best on our trip. And definitely the most beautiful.

We loved the colors of natural butterfly pea tea. (FYI - Not butterfly pee!) It is normally bright blue, but it turns purple if you add lemon juice.

One restaurant offered rice in 5 colors (all done with natural ingredients, of course!).

We took some amazing cooking classes.

*****

MARKETS

Chiang Mai is full of traditional markets, with stalls going on as far as the eye can see.

The flower market had piles and piles of orchids.

There were tasty treats on display – like a pile of fried grasshoppers!

Or would you prefer fried scorpions on a stick?

We welcomed the Year of the Rat in the Chinatown section of Chiang Mai.

We came home late from the night market on a Party Tuk Tuk with neon blue interior lights. It was way too small for the 5 of us (and obviously had no seat belts), but it was a fun way to end the night!

*****

RICE PLANTING

The cultivation of rice was central to many ancient cultures in Asia. We loved learning about the traditional methods for planting and harvesting rice.

We took baby rice plants from a nursery area and planted them in the rice paddy, where they would grow for another 3 months. The rice paddies had surprisingly deep water and mud. You had to walk carefully!

Hazel was planting rice like a pro.

But then…

We fished her out, and she got cleaned up and was ready to keep going!

One of the most fun steps was rice winnowing. You separate the good rice fromthe unneeded husks by throwing them both up from a bamboo tray.

Many farmers still use water buffalo to till the fields, etc. We were excited to get to meet and clean a few water buffalo. They are huge – almost 1,000 pounds!

*****

ORGANIC TEA PLANTATION

Tea is probably Hazel’s favorite drink, so we were excited to tour the only organic tea plantation in Thailand!

We learned so much about picking tea. The key is to pick the very new leaves. Surprisingly, black tea and green tea are made from the same plant. The main difference is in how many leaves you pick. Green tea is made from the new leaf tip plus 1 leaf. Black tea is made from the tip plus 2 more leaves and the stem.

We also learned that picking tea leaves is hard! We had about 10 people in our group, and the one professional tea picker outpicked all of us put together.

They make English breakfast and Earl Grey and other types of tea from the same black tea leaves. The main difference is in how long they are fermented.

*****

KID CRAZINESS

Probably the best thing about Chiang Mai was the nearly infinite supply of crazy kid activities.

Do you want the ULTIMATE in recycling? How about an afternoon at a place that makes paper out of elephant poo? PooPoo Paper Park was a big hit with the kids. You can learn all the steps in making paper out of poo. Then you even get to make your own books, greeting cards, and hats — all out of poo poo paper!

Here is how you make paper out of elephant poo:

First you boil the poo. (We all agreed we did not want that job!) After you boil the bad parts away, it is basically just clean grass bits. You make the fibers into balls and let them dry in the sun. And, of course, you are encouraged to play with the cleaned up poo balls! Not that bad really…

Later, you put the balls in water and smash them to make a thin sheet. Then you put the poo pulp on a screen and let it dry in the sun.

It was incredibly creative, entrepreneurial (no cost raw materials!), and socially responsible. Our kids loved it so much that we visited 3 times….

*****

BABY TIGERS

Next we went to a place you could hang out with real baby tigers! They had 4 bengal tigers that were each around 4 months old. Two were running around and playing.

Two were asleep, sort of like a household cat (or an Africa lion which sleeps most of the day, too).

We felt reasonably safe because we had 3 trainers in the room with us. (But we have read about things going crazy wrong with adult tigers. We would avoid those!)

*****

EVEN CRAZIER

Then Hazel and Jamie went to see some truly scary animals – crocodiles! We went to place where you ride in a river full of crocodiles. We counted at least 50 crocodiles in an area much smaller than a football field. The crocs lunged ferociously at our boat! We were happy that the boat had a high railing…

The questionable animal visits continued with a visit to see a Snake Show!

A lot of this trip is about overcoming your fears and getting out of your comfort zone…. How many 8-year-olds have touched a real cobra with their bare hands?

But we left kissing the snakes on the lips to the professionals…

*****

GOLDEN TRIANGLE

Later, we went north to the Golden Triangle, where rural parts of Thailand, Myanmar and Laos meet. We mostly learned about Elephants (see other post), but we had some other fun times also.

On our journey there, we stopped at the White Temple. Not exactly a normal Buddhist temple, it is the creation of a contemporary artist and is full of pop culture references and macabre humor. It is part contemporary art, part wacky roadside attraction, and part actual Buddhist temple.

Huey felt like this was the best Buddhist temple EVER since it included images of Batman, Star Wars, the International Space Station, and much more. All things he doesn’t really know much about since he does not do much screen time. But he still knows they are all awesome! Surprisingly, this temple had about as many people praying in it as other temples in Thailand.

Toward the end of our stay, the kids met two French girls and became friends. (Other kids have been a rare treat on the trip, since most kids only travel at school vacation times.) On our last night, the kids all stayed up late playing hide and seek in the hotel. There aren’t a lot of great pictures, but, in many ways, simple moments like this have been some of the best parts of the trip. There is nothing like the excitement of being a kid and staying up late playing with new friends on a warm night.

Another evening, we had a chance for a special after dinner treat — we set up and launched a paper hot air balloon (biodegradable of course!). It flew up into the night sky and disappeared. A magical way to end the night!