One temple, two temples, three temples, four…..

Welcome to the temple capital of Thailand. Chiang Mai has over 300 temples, with the oldest dating back to the 13th century. It has the highest concentration of wats in any province in Thailand. And everywhere you look there’s a temple, some in better states than others, but very cool.

Once again, we stayed in an apartment – giving us more room to move and flexibility around meals. However, it’s a bit weird – when you get to these apartments (It was the same in Jomtien), there are big signs saying “Tourists/travellers this is not a hotel, it is illegal for daily or weekly rental”. Which is odd considering they’re listed on accommodation booking apps!! It turns out that air bnb type arrangements are illegal in Thailand. If you are doing short term rental (less than a month), you have to have a hotel license. So, the apartment complexes put up these signs to cover their asses and technically, it turns out that you could turn up and not be allowed to stay at the apartment. It doesn’t mention anything about this when you book. And based on the people we saw coming and going from the apartments, at least half are renting to tourists on a short-term basis!!

 

After a day of rest, ‘coz you know it’s hard work sitting by the pool, we headed to the Phae Gate and entry into the ‘Old Town’. We wandered the old streets before heading to Wat Phan Tao, a teak temple near Wat Chedi Luang. The main Viharn (assembly hall) of Wat Phan Tao was originally a royal palace during the reign of King Mahotara Prateth and was built around 1846-1854. It was refurbished and converted into a monastery in 1876, while the temple site itself dates back to the late 14th century.  A great start to temple-hopping.

 

Heading next door to Wat Chedi Luang, they started building the temple in the late 1300’s, with the main pagoda being added in the 15th century. The Wat was damaged by an earthquake in 1545. It once stood 82 meters tall and was the tallest building in Lanna at the time. It housed the Emerald Buddha from 1468 to 1552 and the city pillar (Sao Inthakil) was moved there in 1800. Despite being partially ruined, it was a very impressive temple. The wider site is also home to the Mahamakut Buddhist University campus, so there were lots of monks-in-training wandering about 😃.

 

Trap was almost templed out already, so we took a wee diversion to the Three Kings Monument – with statues of King Mengrai, the founder of Chiang Mai and his two friends, King Ramkamhaeng of Sukothai and King Ngam Muang of Payao. They are believed to have worked together to build the city. Finishing the day at Wat Chiang Man, the oldest temple in Chiang Mai. Wat Chiang Man was built in 1296 by King Mengrai, the founder of Chiang Mai. The temple is famous for its Lanna-style chedi supported by rows of elephant-shaped buttresses. The beautiful Lanna-style ordination hall enshrines an ancient Buddha image named Phra Kaew Khao, revered by Chiang Mai locals. Another beautiful building inside and out

 

And that was well and truly Trap templed out!!!

 

It was then on to the fun stuff – SHOPPING 🛍️

 

Man, I looooove the Chiang Mai markets. The street markets basically started about 500m from our apartment on the same street and led towards 3 night markets crammed with clothes, arts & crafts and food. You can grab a cocktail at a very reasonable price and wander around the stalls. It’s probably a great marketing ploy allowing tourists to wander shops with alcohol in hand…

I did have a little blow out, but in my defence, we sent a pile of stuff home from Bangkok, so we had the space and weight allowance and I have been soooo good on this trip, very restrained and I’ll get a lot of use out of them… OK I’m justifying a bit as Trap puts his head in his hands. Our plan of having lighter cases to travel with just went out the window, but what can you do? 🤷 🛍️🛍️🛍️🛍️🛍️

 

We met a nice American couple staying at the same apartment while having a drink at the canal night market and ended up having a drink with them the next night at the Shangri-La which was next door to our apartment.

 

After a lovely stay in Chiang Mai, we jumped on the plane to Krabi and on to Koh Lanta – just what we were looking for to recover from the shopping 😁.

 

We stayed in a hotel just back from the beach but with easy access. The beach front was lovely with lots of bars and restaurants dotted along it. Not much in the way of shopping where we were (Trap sighed with relief), but was great for relaxing – swimming in the sea, sunbathing and watching sunsets. The resort next door put on a pretty good fire show – see video below (unfortunately I had to remove the actual music that went with it as they were commercial songs and YouTube wouldn’t accept the video for copyright reasons).

 

Well that’s all for now, I’ll leave you with a couple of interesting facts: Thailand is the only Southeast Asian nation never colonized by Europeans, it is home to over 35,000 temples, it’s the birthplace of Red Bull, and is home to the world's smallest mammal (Bumblebee Bat).

 

Till next time, ดูแล dūlæ (take care).

 

J&T xx