Disclaimer- we realized we forgot to post the second half of our time in Chiang Mai before we went to Laos (woops!). Considering how many amazing things we did, we're not sure how we forgot! Anyway...
In the morning we relaxed until our shared van picked us up in the afternoon to drive us down the windy road from Pai back to Chiang Mai. After 3 hours of windy roads and an hour stuck in traffic we made it to our next Airbnb which was on the northeast side of Chiang Mai in a more residential neighborhood (options were limited during this time due to the lantern festival, so we were just happy to have found something in walking distance to the river!). We unloaded our things and took a quick Grab into Old Town to head to an Irish Bar for Trivia (yep, the same one we watched election results at). The top floor of the bar was packed with teams and for this trivia we had to write down all answers on a sheet, turn it in, and points were then written on a white board for all teams to see the standings after each round. It was a fun time doing trivia with Mike again like we do back home, and we ended up doing better than we thought, ranking 5th out of 13 teams that were mostly much larger than ours.
The next morning we got up and took a Grab to the start of the Monk's Trail that leads to Wat Pha Lat temple. We hiked up a short jungle trail and arrived at the beautiful and secluded temple in the forest. The story goes that in 1355 a white elephant belonging to King Kuena took a break to rest on the future site of Wat Pha Lat before dying at the future site of Wat Phra That Doi Suthep. The king ordered temples constructed on both sites, and the hidden jungle temple became a rest stop for monks making the pilgrimage to the larger temple (hence the name Monk's trail). The temple structures were older and some were covered with vines and vegetation. It was different than other Wats we had seen due to its position within the jungle, and it also provided nice views of Chiang Mai from high above. We all agreed it was one of our favorite temples! We considered continuing up the Monk's Trail to Wat Phra That Doi Suthep, but it was hot and we were all getting hungry, so we opted to head back to the city. We tried to go back to Khao Soi Maesai, but it was unfortunately closed. We walked around to a few more places, and finally found lunch after discovering that many restaurants were closed for the Loy Krathong and Yi Peng Festivals that were starting on this day. Even though most things were closed, we did enjoy walking around Old Town and the surrounding areas because the city was decked out for the festivals - there were colorful lanterns hanging on nearly all of the buildings, and especially the temples. For lunch, we ended up getting really good Pad Thai from a local stall near our apartment run by two wonderful ladies who didn't speak a lick of English.
In the evening we ventured out to the eastern side of the Ping River to experience the Loy Krathong festival. The Loy Krathong festival is one of the biggest festivals in Thailand and is held annually on the full moon night of the twelfth month of the Thai lunar calendar to honor the Goddess of Water. It is customary to release krathongs (floating baskets) across small and large bodies of water. The krathongs are usually made of banana tree stems and leaves, and are beautifully crafted, often with flowers and other offerings, as well as lit candles and incense sticks. It is believed that as the krathong drifts away, it carries your sorrow and misfortune with it, and it is a time to make wishes for good fortune in the new year. We each purchased our own Loy Krathong boat at a stall we liked and then walked to the other side of the river to see the rest of the festival activities. There was a parade taking place showing different village and regional traditional clothing, songs, and dances. The streets were also full of vendors on each side selling food, souvenirs, and even small live aquatic life. We ate our usually variety of snacks from different vendors and then went down to the riverbank to send our krathongs into the water and make our wishes. We each lit our candles and incense, and one by one made our wish, and released the krathongs down the river to join the thousands of others that were slowly making their way downstream. We stuck around longer to continue observing the lively festivities, and because we thought there was supposed to be a fireworks show; we never ended up seeing the official show (if there was one), but plenty of locals were shooting them off around the river. We eventually headed back, in part because the local fireworks were SO loud and jarring that we were starting to get headaches!
The next day was Melissa's birthday and we had a full day of activities planned! We woke up early and headed to Old Town to meet at the office for our cooking class at Thai Farm Cooking School. There were 12 of us in the class, and we piled into a van and drove to a local market on the outskirts of the city. Our guide walked us to different stalls and showed us various ingredients that are used in traditional Thai cooking (we also had the realization of how difficult some would be to find in the US!). After a brief tour around the market, we headed to the farm where the cooking would take place. First we donned our aprons and large sun hats and walked around the gardens to see, smell, and learn about more fresh ingredients that we would be using in our meals such as kaffir lime, baby eggplants, lemongrass, and more.
Next it was finally time for the cooking! We had five categories of dish to make (soup, noodle, curry, stir fry, and dessert) and there were three options we could choose from each category. We each tried to cook different dishes so that we could each try and share as many of them as possible. The first dish we cooked up was a soup, Tom Yum (Melissa), Tom Kha (Mike), and Tom Zab (Carson). All were delicious and we enjoyed how little chopping was needed to make the soup (though eating around all of the lemongrass and other inedible things was challenging). Next, we made the noodle dishes. Mel made spring rolls and Carson and Mike both made Pad Thai. The spring roll filling was easy to make, and the hardest part was rolling them to a consistent size. Mike and Carson were a bit more frazzled cooking the Pad Thai due to how quickly it cooks at high heat, but after an intense three minutes (Mel felt like she was watching them on Top Chef) the Pad Thais were complete and tasted way better than anything we had tried to make in the states. Next, we made our curry pastes - green curry for Mike and Carson, and Khao Soi for Melissa. To make the paste we were each given our own mortar and pestle to smash all the spices and liquid until a paste was formed. What a work out! Once the paste was completed we took our paste and curry ingredients to our work stations to make our meals. We were a little unsure if we boiled our ingredients long enough and if we added too many or too few spicy peppers, but it turned out just fine. Mike and Carson could have boiled their baby eggplants a little longer, but the curries were very tasty. Mel's Khao Soi was also delicious, and rivaled the Khao Soi they had eaten at restaurants. Post-curry, we took a short break, and our head chef brought us plates of refreshing papaya salad to eat and explained how it was made. We were a little sad we weren't able to make it ourselves, but were glad we still got the recipe! By this point we were pretty full and getting nervous about fitting in two more dishes, but we moved on to the stir fries. Mike made a cashew stir fry, Melissa made a stir fry with basil, and Carson made a sweet and sour stir fry. They were all very good, but after a few bites we opted to bring these back with us for another time so we would have room for dessert. For dessert, Mike made mango butterfly pea sticky rice, Melissa made mango pandan sticky rice, and Carson made bananas in coconut milk. Carson was the only one in the whole class who chose his dessert so he was the last to cook and got a private lesson. The mango sticky rice dishes were a great sweet treat to end the day, but in the end it was actually Carson's banana in coconut milk that had everyone in awe with its sweet and rich flavor. We had such a great time at the cooking class and we were all excited to have learned new dishes to cook and bring back to the states since they also provided us a detailed electronic recipe book of all the meals.
On our way back from the cooking class, we got dropped off close to our Airbnb so we could quickly jump into a Grab and head northeast of the city to Doi Saket Lakes for the Yi Peng Lantern Festival. The Yi Peng festival coincides with the celebrations for Loy Krathong, and Yi Peng is an especially big celebration in northern Thailand; however, unlike releasing floats into the water as in Loy Krathong, Yi Ping involves lighting lanterns and releasing them into the sky. We learned, however, that a few years ago the city of Chiang Mai made it illegal to release sky lanterns within the city since they can be really dangerous and start fires if they get caught on buildings or electric poles. Of course, some people still do it, but the majority of the lantern releases occur in the countryside. There is an "official" Yi Peng lantern release event, but it is very expensive and is clearly catered to tourists, so we didn't want to attend. Instead, we heard from other travelers about the Doi Saket lakes area outside of Chiang Mai that has a more local celebration and lantern releases, so we opted to go there instead.
We hopped in a Grab, and after about 45 mins and some heavy traffic we made it to the small town and lake in the late afternoon and already saw paper lanterns floating into the sky. There were also Loy Krathong floats in the lake, and multi-colored lanterns hanging everywhere. The festival felt like a small town fair event with stands for food, drinks, games, rides, and a stage for singing/dancing competitions. There was a decent mix of both locals and tourists, and we walked around the festival for a bit soaking it in and talking photos. Finally, after the sun went down, we bought some lanterns to light ourselves. The lanterns are made of bamboo and rice paper, and the candle wick is from the stem of a banana tree. We ventured down toward the lake in an area without any overhead hazards and carved out space for ourselves among the growing crowd. We took turns lighting our lanterns, which was harder than it looked; it takes a while for the wick to catch fire and then you have to hold it up as the hot air fills it enough that it will release far up into the sky and not into the crowd!! Once the lanterns were really tugging at our arms, we made a wish for the new year and released them into the sky with the hundreds of others dancing above us. We continued to look at the sky in awe and followed our lanterns' paths as long as possible. Watching hundreds of lanterns glow above us was one of the most beautiful sights we have seen. What was a little less serene were some of the other people in the crowd who clearly didn't know how to release the lanterns properly. We saw a few get caught in a tree and even one near a power pole, but the locals had tall recovery sticks ready to fish them out, and they even had their fire fighters on standby (though luckily they weren't needed).
After releasing our lanterns, we grabbed some beers and food from the vendors, and Carson played a festival game were he fished a number out of a small kiddie pool and won a pack of instant pork ramen (not very exciting). Then we ventured over to the stage and enjoyed the stage of singers and a local pageant that was going on. As we walked around the fair, there was one song that kept playing on repeat that would be stuck in our heads for weeks after (the lyrics were just: Loy Loy Krathong, Loy Loy Loyyy Krathongggg, but it was SO catchy). After we finished our drinks, we grabbed two more lanterns. Mike released his and we released ours together to end the night. We tried to order a Grab back to our apartment, but Grab wasn't working and the Songthaews were expense. Fortunately, after walking around for about 30 minutes, Melissa saw a Songthaew leaving that wasn't full and quickly asked how much, it was just 100 baht each so we jumped in and headed back to our Airbnb in the back of the truck. We made a pit stop at 7/11 to grab some toasties and called it a night.
The next day was Melissa's birthday and we celebrated by going to an elephant sanctuary called Chiang Chill. We had originally booked a tour at a different elephant sanctuary during our initial Chiang Mai visit, but they cancelled because they had been severely affected by the flooding that had come through Chiang Mai in October (and sadly they even lost a few elephants). Fortunately we were able to find another sanctuary with ethical practices to visit instead. We were picked up from our apartment in a van, and after about an hour drive up the twisty roads into the mountains we arrived at the drop off point and then walked about 15 minutes to the sanctuary. The area of the sanctuary was beautiful on it's own with the dense jungle and mountains surrounding a valley with a river running through it. At the sanctuary, we gathered as a group of 8 and headed into the jungle to hike around looking for the elephants. This sanctuary has four female adult elephants that were rescued from practices like logging and other unethical practices; they are brought to the sanctuary and allowed to roam throughout the large area and recover, but they can never go back into the true wild due to their history and inability to survive there.
We started our hike and were told by our guide that seeing the elephants in the jungle wasn't a guarantee, and just depends on luck since they don't track them or lure them in. We got lucky though, and saw our first elephant almost immediately at the fence line connecting the sanctuary property to a neighboring farm; the elephant was causing mischief and trying to break the fence, thinking there was some better food in the farmers field, but the elephant's handler was helping to turn it around and we kept our distance. We turned around and continued hiking back only to encounter two more elephants nearby (a mother and daughter pair) and eventually another showed up so we saw all four in the forest in a 30 minute period which is quite rare. Per our guide, most people see one or two on the hiking portion so we felt lucky. We enjoyed watching the elephants and taking pictures of them as the moved through the forests and ate tons of plants. We had to get out of their way a couple times to keep our distance as they moved past us to find more food. These elephants are Asian Elephants and are about the size of a small U-Haul; it was incredible to see how massive they are in the forest! We continued our hike back to the main buildings of the sanctuary for a buffet lunch. After lunch, we helped prepare some food for the elephants by chopping bananas and sugar cane with a manchette. We then loaded feeding tubes with our food and waited for the elephants to come down to the river for their daily snack. It was fun watching the elephants up close eating what we prepared for them and watching some try and steal food from each other. The elephants definitely had different personalities and watching them for a while you could really start to see it. It was a great day and we headed back to Chiang Mai to rest up before heading back out into Old Town for the Sunday Night Market. We grabbed some drinks, food, and gifts to celebrate an end to one of Melissa's most memorable birthdays.
The next day was our last with Mike since he was flying out that night. We checked out of the Airbnb and went to the hostel just south of Old Town where Mel and Carson were going to stay for two more nights while they rested and planned the next portion of the trip. After checking in, we purchased our slow boat ticket and transportation to get into Laos so it didn't sell out. Afterwards, we went to a coffee shop where we played cards and relaxed. Then we got one final round of massages and in the evening, we grabbed Chinese dumplings at our favorite place that was next to our first Airbnb and went to our night market (Anusarn) one last time for dinner with Mike. We hung out a little longer at the hostel before we said our goodbyes to Mike as he headed off to the airport. We were thankful that Mike was able to come be apart of our trip and spend so much time with us! Especially in a location known for it's delicious food since Mike is Melissa's foodie soulmate.
The next day we had a variety of random items we wanted to accomplish. We stopped at a photography shop near our hostel and got passport/visa photos taken since we needed them for our Laos and Vietnam visas. After getting our photos taken in a musty back room, we went to the same coffee shop as yesterday to plan the next part of our trip (Laos) and future timing for the rest of the SE Asia countries. After a couple hours grinding out work, we wanted to have lunch at one of our favorite places so we got Khao Soi at Khao Soi Maesai one last time. We went back to the hostel to relax and do some more work before heading to dinner at a popular restaurant where Melissa got a massive bowl of Tom Yum Soup and Carson got Massaman curry.
Our journey into Laos started in the morning from Chiang Mai where a van picked us up at the hostel and drove to Chiang Rai, another larger city in the north of Thailand closer to the Lao border. We stopped for lunch in Chiang Rai and got to visit the famous White Temple. The White Temple was more modern than other temples we had visited and had interesting and intricate sculptures like dragons and hands. We briefly walked around the complex which was surprisingly big and then hopped back in the van. We continued to drive until we were near the border where we stopped so people could get visa photos and exchange Thai baht for Lao kip. Once everyone was organized we headed to the Thai border patrol where we checked out of Thailand, and took a bus over the Friendship Bridge to Laos.
We had an incredible three weeks in Northern Thailand, and it was a great slow start to our time in this part of Southeast Asia. As great as Indonesia was, the food in Thailand was leagues above it, and we ate some of the best food of our lives for ~$2-$3 a meal. Being able to experience the city during the Loy Krathong and Yi Peng festivals was even more special, and doing it all with Mike was just the icing on the cake!
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