When we started our trip, we decided that the plan was NOT to plan. And that’s exaclty why we visitid Chiang Rai. In the previous blog post we talk about how a few days ago we arrived in Chiang Rai, Thailand quite unexpecteadly. Click here to read it!
6th April 2019
Chiang Rai feels like home already
Good morning from Thailand!
Yesterday we went to 7/11 to buy something for breakfast, since we can pay with credit card there. But we found out too late that it was only possible to pay with card when buying 10€ or more. So we had to buy some extra food that was our breakfast for today.
As we always wake up early (and we don’t ever put an alarm!), we try to make use of the early morning working on some video editing. Sadly, today we realized that the videos of Kenya (Diani beach) and all of Zanzibar are not in our hard disk, and the SD cards had all been emptied already. It took us a while to recover from this, it’s really sad to lose videos of such beautiful places. At least we still have all the pictures, and the memories of course. We learnt the lesson, and from now on we’ll back up everything more often.
For the rest of the day, we enjoy the pool and stay in the hostel. The atmosphere in this accommodation is so lovely that we really feel like home. Will be sad to leave!
7th April 2019
A new routine during our week in Chiang Rai
Our life is starting to get a new routine while staying in Chiang Rai, and we’re loving it. When we wake up, the temperatures are still a bit chill. We eat breakfast by the pool, write some blogs and edit some videos. We finally feel like we’re getting things done!
Sometimes, while travelling for a long time, you really feel like you need a break from visiting places and just need to stop in one place to get your energy back. And this has been just what we needed!
Our routine got even better when we realized that just around the corner there was a local little ice cream shop. The lady could not speak a word of English, but smiled at us letting us choose all the toppings we wanted to add. For not even a euro!
Ice cream in Chiang Rai
Now that we have our ice cream, we can go for a walk to the park by the river. We found some of those exercising machines that you sometimes see in parks, only those seemed a bit outdated and not so safe. We had fun playing around them!
And to end a really nice day, we had schnitzel and spaghetti. Now we can sleep good!
8th April 2019
The last day of our week in Chiang Rai
Today is the last day in Chiang Rai, and we left some of the best things for the last day. We rent a motorbike again and started driving after breakfast.
Renting a motorbike in Chiang Rai
Our first stop was the hot spring, at a temperature of 56 degrees. They say that the water has healing properties, but it was already warm enough outside, so we didn’t get in!
On the way to the hot spring, out of the blue, we saw a place with elephants by the road. We stopped and went to have a look, and found a really sad place with a dozen of elephants with a chain no their leg, locked in a very small place for them. They are used for touring tourists… terrible! Please, never support any touristic activities that involve using animals like this.
Something else surprised us on the way as well. Everywhere around us there were fields of pineapple plants! More specifically, tiny pineapples that only grow in this area of Thailand. We also saw later a few places with around 50 people peeling and cutting these little fruits that they sell later just ready to eat. So sweet and delicious!
Small pinapples from Chiang Rai
We headed to one of the waterfalls, but the road was too bad and we decided to go back and drive to a different one. When we arrived, there was just little stream because it was dry season. We followed it all the way up for around 1 km walk. There was a pretty cute place with some small pools where we could swim a bit and play around, making a dam ourselves and letting the water go all at once! Oh, we had fun!
Waterfall in Chiang Rai
Our last stop was the longneck village, where we were planning to have lunch. But when we arrived, we found a ticket office with a souvenir shop. The entrance ticket was 300 bath (8€) and comes with a map to visit the 5 different villages. What?
First of all, we didn’t have so much money with us (nothing is that expensive in Thailand!). But mostly, we didn’t like the idea of visiting those villages as if it was a zoo. We went there looking for just having lunch in a village hoping to see some people with the traditional “long neck” and maybe being able to have a chat with them, and we found a museum kind of place. So, we decided not to visit it.
Longneck village was a touristy trap
We headed back to Chiang Rai and on the way, we visited the Black temple, where we sneaked in by mistake! A big group of Chinese tourists where entering at the same time as us, so no one asked us for any ticket. Only when we left, we figured out there was an entrance fee! Oh well, I guess that’s going to be the budget for another ice cream…
Before heading home, we stopped at the Blue temple again to take some more nice pictures.
9th April 2019
Goodbye Thailand
Time to get going!
We had our last fruits for breakfast, and started packing our stuff. After a week staying in one place, we almost forgot how to pack!
But we still had time for just one last dip in the pool, enjoying this super nice homestay. The host cooked for us the last green thai curry and the owner drove us to the airport.
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