After leaving Honolulu, we had a short few hour layover in Tokyo, Japan before flying to Bangkok Thailand. This was a red eye flight, so between the time change and late flight we had some pretty bad jet lag the evening after we arrive in Chiang Mai. From Bangkok we took a short flight up to Chiange Mai. Oliver and I crashed as soon as we stopped moving and it was very hard to wake up!
We dragged ourselves out to dinner despite the terrible jet lag. Although Aaron and Carson couldn't resist a little cat nap while we waited for our food at Dash Thai.
After a good nights rest, we had a private driver with a pick-up truck and a modified covering on the back. It was open both at the windows and the back as you see here. We all hugged the front of the truck as we climbed up into the mountains hoping we wouldn't slide out the back!
Our 1st stop with our private driver was the base of Doi Suthep Pui National Park. This was right off the main road leading up to the mountains. A short hike revealed a mostly dried up river (as the area has been lacking rain for almost the last year) and this neat cave area where a little shrine to Buddha is set up (also a place where people can leave offerings to monks for good luck).
After the short hike, we stopped at this 600 year old meditation temple, Wat Pha Lat farther up the mountain. This was our favorite temple as it was quiet and not touristy at all. This allowed our private driver, Sakorn, to teach us about what life is like for monks while pointing out architectural details.
Ringing the bell for good luck
Although we didn't want to really stop at a touristy temple, we decided to brave the crowds to climb the 309 steps to the top to Wat Phra That Doi Suthep. Again the architecture was pretty amazing especially covered in the gold plating!
After climbing all those stairs we were very hungry so we stopped at a little village for some homemade Thai food (pad thai and fried rice).
Next stop was the Baan Khun Chang Kian Highland Agriculture Research Center where the local university studies growth of all types of foods and coffee. The coffee was grown, harvested, and roasted here making this the freshest coffee we had on our entire trip through SE Asia! The boys had hot chocolate which wasn't as good.
Next stop right down the road from the research center was the Mhong Hill Tribe village,
Ban Khun Chang Khian Christendom
Our driver taught us how people live their day to day lives in the small village. Neat fact about Thailand's Hill Tribe Villages, they all have their own languages. Although some of the language is similar most of it is so different that they cannot understand one another!
The tribe still uses very primitive tools to pound/grind grains and corn to make their food.
The boys here are in front of a little 'convenience store' someone runs out of their house.
As we walked through the local Hill Tribe Village we stumbled upon a local school. Carson and Oliver had fun playing with the local kids although the local kids did not know what to think about us in their space!
The view toward Chiang Mai from the mountains. As you can see it was pretty smoky from farmers burning their rice fields in preparation for planting. We expected the smoke to bother us but it wasn't bad enough that we had any respiratory problems (although we do not seem prone to respiratory problems anyway).
After driving down the mountain back toward Chiang Mai city center, we made our last stop at the Wat Umong (the Tunnel Temple). Aptly named for its tunnels with shrines placed throughout.
This is a 400+ year old Buddha graveyard where broken statues or shrines are placed so as not to be disrespectful towards Buddha. The Tunnel Temple is right behind it.
After our full day, we were all pretty exhausted. So for dinner we settled for some American food before going to bed early!
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