Well after a couple of rather uneventful (but lengthy) flights we arrived in Bangkok at about 11pm local time and as expected we are dog tired.  As we are not planing on spending any time here there was initially some very short lived banter about just staying in the airport and catching an early flight out to Chiang Mai in the morning.  However, being the princess that I am though I threw caution to the winds and splurged the $28 for a room 10 minutes from the airport – $28 that included breakfast, and a free shuttle to/from the airport!!  Best decision ever – we are not fully rested ’cause we still need to get used to the *much* more firm Thai standard for mattresses, but it was not a night of being all scrunched up in an overly cold (the air conditioning in the airport is very cold) seat at the airport listening to the overhead announcements every 20 minutes so we take the good with the bad.

Today we start out fresh, a decent night sleep under out belts, and a 10am flight to Chiang Mai where the real relaxing will begin.   Khao Soi Gai and a Thai massage incoming……

Got all our shopping done (for me this amounted to very little, but the others did a diligent job of stimulating the local economy), had some nice slow days, and of course a lot of massages and now our time in Chiang Mai is drawing to a close.  Our flights out of here leave at around 10pm so we have a full day left for one last adventure.

Our new friends Tee and Captain Bob at Ginny Place/Ginny Cafe have told us about an adventure that is not on the obvious tourist list.  Mrs Columbus and I have done most of the typical tours here, so something ‘off the menu’ sounds like a lot of fun.  It seems that the mountain outside of the city (Doi Suthep) is riddled with ‘roads’ that are used mostly by the hill tribe people for farming.  Tee hooks us up with her friend Neing who has a Jeep and knows a bunch of these off road tracks so that we can go out for a day on the mountain and a new adventure.  This kind of trip is not in any of the travel books, or brochures so I am hoping to see a lot of things most people don’t see, and to have a great experience.

Our day starts off with a big shuffle – we have to check out of our hotel, and our friends at Ginny’s have graciously offered to let us store our bags there while we are out on the mountain, so Neing picks us up at 9:30 and we truck all our stuff over for storage, and then it is off to the great beyond.

Russ has wanted to Zorb since the last time he was with us in Thailand so our first stop is at the X-Center about 30 mins outside of Chiang Mai where they have all sorts of extreme sports – Zorbing included.  Zorbing was something that started in New Zealand and consists of one or more people strapped inside of what is basically like a giant beach ball, the ball rolls down a hill and the occupants tumble their way down, often ending in a pond of water.  Brooklyn steps up to the challenge and her and Russ decide to go together while Mrs Columbus and I document the process for posterity.

The Zorb ball is at least 8 feet or more in diameter and after getting all strapped in, they push you down a ramp to get you started and gravity does the rest.  The Zorb run here ends in a small pond and then the occupants are supposed to unstrap themselves and walk inside like hamsters to get the ball to return to the shore where you get out – well from the outsiders perspective this is the most entertaining part of the ride because the ‘hamsters’ inside this ball are not all that co-ordinated, but after a little flailing around and almost falling out into the lake a couple of times they manage to get back to the shore.

From the X-Center we move on to begin our off-road adventure.  We don’t really have a fixed route other than we need to be back for dinner and to catch our flights so we tell Neing that we are all his, and to just make it up as we go along.  We drive up into the Mae Rim valley and past a small village where we can see some crops and agricultural projects on the hills alongside the road, and this is where our adventure really begins.

We turn off the main highway to head up to one of the many Hmong villages in the area.  The Hmong are originally refuges mostly form Burma or Laos and have been ‘residents’ inside Thailand for a few generations.  More recently the families have been able to get status in Thailand (basically a Thai ID card) but this has not always been the case.  As I understand it, any land that is on a slope of 30 degrees or more is owned by the government but that the hilltribe people are allowed to build their villages and farms there, but not own the land.

As we leave the main road and start off into these side valleys it is amazing to see what they are growing on these steep slopes, and even more amazed to realize that all the work is done by hand – even the clearing and tilling of the soil!

We have gone a little way off the highway and while the road is a fairly twisty, it does not seem all that off-road to us, and when we mention something to that effect Neing laughs and tells us that we will be off-road soon.  We go a few more kilometers down the road and sure enough the pavement ends abruptly and the road quickly turns into a dirt track.

We are up on the side of the mountain and the ‘road’ drops off fairly steeply on one side and is hillside on the other and we are basically just following a trail that winds along the side of the mountain.  Clearly the rains find the road as a good path to follow as well because there are deep ruts and places where the run-off drains through that would make this quite challenging for Mrs Columbus to get her mini-van through.  We bounce and jostle our way through the jungle and Neing laughs and tells us this is like an elephant ride (which is also not very smooth going) and we decide that his Jeep is like a red elephant, but as long as the 4 ‘feet’ are on the ground we are ok.

Remarkably the hilltribes use this as their regular road system and as we are going along we see a regular pick-up truck loaded full with fresh lettuce, and are more than a little shocked to see people on motor scooters making their way along these roads over terrain that I would not even think about taking any sort of non 4wd over.  I guess however they are ‘paved’ in places so maybe I am just too spoiled by our roads 😉

There are some fantastic vistas looking out over the valleys and the city and we stop a few places along the track just to take in the view and the fresh mountain air. We absolutely feel privileged  to be able to take this all in even if the bouncing from rut to rut in the Jeep is a little bone-jarring at times.  For me this is a great time though as it reminds me of the off-roading that we used to do in high school with whoever was lucky enough to have a 4 wheel drive.

Along the way we stop at a few Hmong villages and at one spot we get to walk through a primary school that has been sponsored by the King of Thailand (the hilltribe schools are not part of the regular Thai school system).  We check out a few classrooms and see some of the children playing, but they are a little shy around us until Neing convinces a few of them to interact with us.  They are able to talk to us a little in english and ask us where we are from – after telling them that we are Canadians a few of them run off to the map to see where that is and they quickly pick it off the map without any prompting – very impressive.

The hilltribe in this village grows coffee (among other things) on the side of the mountain, so Mrs Columbus decides that she needs a fix and we stop for a cup of fresh ground coffee and some tea.  In this Thai version of Starbucks there is no barista and fancy machine though, and the lady hand grinds the beans in a manual grinder and makes it completely fresh to order.  Mrs Columbus secures herself some of the fresh beans to take home with the hopes that with her electric grinder and coffee pot she chan make something similar – although not quite a strong as it seems that here most of their coffee is served more like espresso than the coffee we are used to.

We get back out on the trail and head down the mountain to end up at a small lake that has been created behind a dam.  The lake is close to the city and quite popular with the local people to come out with their families for a picnic or some swimming.  The lake is surrounded by small bamboo huts that you can sit in and relax or have a meal, and there are small food stands that will bring you food if you did not bring something with you.  We relax and look out over the lake while having a late lunch before heading back into the city.

As we make our way back into the city Neing takes us to a local market so we can look for a last couple of items that Brooklyn and Russ are looking for, and we are lucky to find a street food vendor selling Pa Tong Go (chinese doughnuts) and Pandanus custard for dipping.  On first blush we would have likely just walked past these, by we have had them at our favorite Thai place back home so we know what to expect and are well rewarded 🙂

The adventure has been fantastic and will go down in my top 10 list for things I have done over here.  I have to give Mrs Columbus an extra ‘great adventurer’ tag for being such a good sport 🙂

A very patient Neing takes us to a few more markets to find one last elusive item, and then we stop to pick up our laundry and it is back to Ginny Cafe for our last dinner in Chiang Mai before we head off to the airport.  Neing graciously agrees to wait around while we have dinner to give us a ride to the airport, and Tee and her staff set us up with yet another tasty meal.  We say our goodbyes to our new friends Tee, Captain Bob and Neing as we did the day before with Riam and Sopa and head off to catch our flight.  We will miss Chiang Mai and the wonderful people we have met here.

Mrs Columbus is returning to Bangkok and then back to Seattle to round up some of the other little ducks, but the rest of us are going on for a few days in the south on Phuket, so more to come on this journey still 🙂

Not a lot to report recently as we have not booked any organized activities for the weekend in preparation for the Saturday and Sunday night street markets.  There will be  fair amount of walking ahead and we don’t want to be out adventuring all day at the expense of being too tired to shopt later!

The Saturday market is just outside the old city wall and runs down a street that they block off for about 8-10 blocks.  They close the street to cars and motorbikes in the afternoon while the people set up their ‘shops’ and the activity starts around 5pm.  For the entire distance of the market the street is lined on both sides (and sometimes down the center) with people selling food, shirts, pants, and various trinkets.  In some places the market spills into the side streets and at intersections they use the extra space to sometimes put out a few chairs for people to sit and eat.  Mrs Columbus and the teenagers are doing their best to jump start a Thai stimulus package and are soon carrying several bags of local goods.  We stopped at a few places along the way for some street food but unfortunately we are all full by the time we find the fried insect vendor so I guess that will have to wait for another time.

We had a little discussion about planning something and Russ wanted to do some mountain biking, but given the amount of mountain biking I already do at home I figured that I was on vacation and should take a break!  Mrs Columbus quickly agreed and we let Russ book something on his own for Sunday morning/afternoon while the rest of us decided that we would hold down the fort while he was gone.

We have discovered a media room here at the hotel that contains some rather comfortable oversized bean-bag chairs, so holding down the fort mostly consists of us catching up on emails and what is going on back home, while making sure that the bean-bags do not sprout legs and try to escape – needless to say we are very diligent about our responsibility and not a single one is able to make it’s escape.

After Russ returns we make our way over to Sopa’s for a massage to shake off the days hard work and to prepare ourselves for the market.  During our massage it decides to start raining but we will not be deterred from our goal of visiting the Sunday market so the troops decide to pop into the 7-11 and see what they have for rain gear:

I decide that I am better off either searching for an umbrella or just getting wet, so me and the Teletubbies head out for the market. The Sunday market is the big brother of the Saturday market and while similar in that it runs down a closed street, it is easily twice the size and according to people we have talked to is constantly growing farther and farther down the side streets all the time.

The market is a Chiang Mai highlight and is popular with both the locals and tourists and when the weather co-operates it is just a sea of people moving slowly up and down the streets looking at the stuff being offered for sale.  Because of the rain though the place is only about 1/2 as busy as we have seen it during previous trips so that is a mixed blessing – we have to contend with a bit of rain, but it is easier to move around.  After getting mostly damp, but not soaked I manage to find a lady selling umbrella’s for a paltry $3 and can now use my camera again, and also keep the rain off my noggin.

After a bit more street food and some more wandering through the market, I decide that I have seen enough wooden frogs, keychains, and t-shirts and decide to trek back to the hotel, leaving Mrs Columbus and the rest of the crew in charge of the search for some treasure that we did not spot at one of the first 500 vendors’ stalls.

We are in full on vacation mode now – with most of the must see things crossed off our list already (or completed on previous visits) there is no rush to try and complete 100 activities in 10 days 🙂

Now that we have moved to a hotel that has beds that were made after the stone age and contain actual springs and padding in the mattress vs the sheet of 3/4″ plywood that I think we were sleeping on at the last place, we are able to get a decent sleep, and given no fixed schedule are able to sleep in a bit in the morning while catching up with the world back home a bit.

Our days are usually a standard routine of walking around some part of the city for a while, followed by dinner and a massage – altho not always in that order, because you like to mix it up a bit!

Yesterday we walked down along the river for a bit, and then circled back through the Warorot market – this is one of the local markets in the city (likely the biggest) and is where the local people would come to buy clothing, fresh food items, etc.  It is gigantic, but all packed into a few square city blocks, so little shops and market stalls a couple of meters wide packed together.  Basically complete chaos if you ask me, but in the Thai fashion it seems to work very efficiently.

We will be going to the Saturday and Sunday night markets this weekend which are basically where they close off sections of the old city for blocks and blocks and let merchants set up little ‘stalls’ to sell their goods.  Much of the stuff is handmade and it attracts locals and tourists so it is mostly not the typical ‘tourist’ junk that is for sale, but actual things you might buy and keep.  Along with the goods there is of course a great variety of street food so I think our dinner plans for the next few days are set 🙂

We have been in Chiang Mai for 3 days now – or is it 4 – well who knows, and at this point we are barely keeping track of time 🙂

Yesterday we went back up to Maetang Elephant park for the elephant / ox cart / bamboo raft tour – we have done this before, but it is one of those things Russ was not with us for, and it was enjoyable enough for us to do it again.  There has been a fair amount of development up in the valley where the elephant park is, and there are a couple of new resorts that look like they would be very peaceful to just lose yourself for a few days – we have made a mental note for next time 🙂

We round out the afternoon with a trip up to Doi Suthep to see the temple and take in the view over the valley and the city below.

Brooklyn and Russ went to cooking school this morning, and between the two of them I am looking forward to them both being able to put together a very tasty dinner when we get home 🙂

Aside from that, not much to report.  We have just been walking around the old city and enjoying the slower pace we have set in Chiang Mai and are becoming a fairly regular fixture at Ginny Cafe, our go-to place for casual meals now.

Tonight we are going to take in a Khantoke Dinner, which will feature traditional Thai dancing, and a buffet of Thai dished from various regions around the country.  It will certainly be a little ‘touristy’ but Mrs Columbus has been wanting to see some traditional dancing for a while now, and I of course like to see food……