Category: roadtrip

Samoeng loop- Queen Sirikit Botanical Gardens

What week in Chiang Mai would be complete without a road trip out to the jungle and an opportunity to sing to honor the Late King of Thailand.  We travelled around the Samoeng Loop with a wonderful stop at the Queen Sirikit Botanical Gardens.  We finished the week singing at a “We Love the King” event that I will share in another post.

Samoeng loop

The Samoeng loop is a 100 km road trip that starts in Chiang Mai, then heads north towards the little town of Mae Sa.  The loop turns to the west into the mountains and loops through the Samoeng forest which is also fertile agricultural land.  At the town of Samoeng it turns back to the east and ends up back in Chiang Mai.  It’s the things to see and do along the way that turned a “short” drive into a full day.  We rented a car for the day and upgraded to a mid size Suzuki to easily take 3 of us for the trip.  Our new friend Jeanne (Leaving Eastern North Carolina) had taken a quick trip through this area and wanted to come along to see the Botanical Garden

Mae Sa Waterfall

We headed about 7:30 on a Monday morning and left Chiang Mai easily as most of the traffic was heading into the city.  We turned off the highway at Mae Sa and arrived at the waterfall around 8:15 am.  The man at the ticket booth didn’t have enough change for our entrance fee so he said just pay when we came out.  He had no change because we were the only people in the whole park!  There are 10 waterfalls along the Sa, (Mae is the word for river) that drains the mountain area and eventually flows into Mae Ping that flows through Chiang Mai.  If it had been later in the day and hot, we could have swum at level 5.  It was a large pool and had a nice sandy bottom.  Thank you to Theblondtravels.com for the parking suggestion.

The park was quite well-developed.  There were lots of picnic tables and cement paths.  A wooden bridge allowed you to cross over the water to explore both sides with a large gazebo along waterfall 6.  It was not what you would call accessible though because there were many large steps that would not accommodate strollers or wheelchairs, or even walkers.  We heard lots of birds and found a couple of large spiders in their webs.

The quietness after the energy of the city was a much appreciated change of pace.  It was cool and shady with just the sound of the water pouring over the falls.  We only saw the first 6 waterfalls as we wanted to stop at a few other places along the route.  There was another car entering the park as we left but we were able to put together our 330 baht fee ($13.00 for 3 of us) so we didn’t need change.

Queen Sirikit Botanical Garden

We carried on down the twisty roads past several elephant camps and tourist resorts, snake farms, insect displays and an orchid farm.  The road itself was pretty quiet but the most tour vans were at the zip line place.  I have ridden a zip line once as part of a tour in Mexico, but I wouldn’t spend a day in Thailand doing that when there is so many other things to explore.  Each traveller has their own goals though.

Our destination was the Queen Sirikit Botanical Garden where it cost another 300 baht for the 3 of us as farangs, which was well worth it.  Jeanne is over 60 so she was free.  It was an unexpected treasure as it is a very large park with several sections to visit. The Botanical Garden opened in 1992 to protect and preserve natural Thai plants and named after Her Majesty the Queen Sirikit in 1994.   I copied from the website the purpose of the Gardens.

The aim of QSBG and its satellite gardens are:

  • to gather fundamental knowledge of Thai plants
  • to conserve their genetic diversity, and
  • to strengthen studies and research on Thai flora.

Canopy Walk and Greenhouses

We spent about 2 hours there but could easily have taken all day if I had been able to read every plant label as well as visit the Natural History Museum.   We did spend time on the Canopy Walk.  It is a walkway that’s built above the top of the trees for about 400 m through the forest and is an opportunity to look down on the trees and butterflies from above to get a sense of the canopy ecosystem.  There were a few sections with glass floors and walls and the rest was metal mesh.  It also provided for wonderful views of the mountains in the distance.

Our next stop were the greenhouses where I was very impressed by my restraint in not spending all day photographing every interesting plant.  I really enjoyed the carnivorous plants building where there were so many pitcher plants.  The orchid building had such vivid colors and the jungle plants were impressive.  Many had labels to help identify those we actually see growing here.  There were also buildings of arid plants and medicinal herbs with all the displays so tastefully done.  It surprises me when we find such world-class facilities in a developing country.

Finding Lunch

It was about 11:30 when we left.  Instead of continuing on the main loop, we decided to extend our trip by heading north after the gardens.  The road was slightly narrower but paved and in good condition. There were less resorts and more agriculture. We saw coffee and tea growing as well a hydroponic lettuce growing without a greenhouse.  Terraced fields were on every hillside filled with a large variety of vegetables and some corn.  We didn’t see much rice growing as we moved higher up into the hills.

The first place we tried for lunch had a killer view, but was not open. It had tables and hot sauce bottles but when we found someone who knew a little English, it seemed there was no coffee or food.

It was located next to a campground.  We saw several other places with small dome tents set up on a flat space as well as small raised platforms and small camping cabins.  The trouble with car trips is the difficulty in snapping everything that captures your attention like you can when you are walking.

Lunch with a View

We drove on about 5 more minutes and found more views in a little eating place on the side of the road.  The food was delicious, the people were kind and the menu descriptions were in English and Thai.  They served the soup from the kitchen where we were, but the other meals were prepared in a bigger building about 200 m away and carried over to us.

Jeanne had pork and noodle soup where you had a choice of 6 different kinds of noodles.  I had pork and shittake mushrooms with thai basil served with rice.  Peter had fried rice with chicken.  We shared spring rolls and 2 large beer (620 ml).  Everything was delicious and we paid 300 baht which is less than $12.

Most Thai restaurants have a container of condiments on the table.  There is sugar for sweet, chili infused vinegar for sour, fish sauce for salty and chili powder or flakes for spicy.  This place had chili that was almost like a chipotle with a nice smokiness to it. You are given a fork and spoon but almost never a knife.  You use the fork to push the food onto the spoon so I spill so much less on myself here.  Chopsticks are only used for noodle dishes like Khao Soi, noodle soup, or Pad Thai.

Views on the way home

It was a direct ride home back through Sareong.  The amount of food grown here in small-scale farming is impressive especially as farmers do most of the work by hand without machinery.  Farm houses are small and on stilts for the rainy season.  We saw some small pickups for hauling produce but the roads were very quiet on this day.

We took advantage of the rental car to pick up a few groceries on our way home. Since our comfy plastic lawn chair needed replacing, it was much easier to bring it back in a car than a songtaew.

The sing for the king event was an amazing honour and will be the topic of a post of its own.

 

 

Road to Mae Hong Son-Part 3 The road back home

Our time on the road to Mae Hong Son gave us a great opportunity to get out and see the country.  Part 3, the road back home will share our experiences in Mae Hong Son at the evening market, as well as the trip home through Mae Sariang.

Romtai Guesthouse

We arrived at the hotel to discover again that emails were sent but not received.  This hotel was also booked up, however they sent us to a beautiful spot just around the corner from the lake.  The Romtai Guest House had a room with air conditioning for $22.32/night.  The room was big enough, clean and the bed not so hard as in Pai.  The shower was just in a corner of the bathroom again, but it felt like camping.  There was coffee and tea available in the “lobby” which was just an open area with a soccer game playing on the tv.  When the owner heard we were in Thailand until March she said, “You can stay here as long as you want.”

The things that set this place apart from just another guest house were the grounds that were Mexican resort-like.  There was a huge lily pond filled with fish and little paths led through the jungle to hidden cottages.  There was a large covered area with furniture and several lawns with flowering plants.  From the street, it looked like a regular low-budget motel, with towels drying on the railings and racks but inside was such a surprise. And less than $25/night!  The only con was it is much cooler in the mountains at night and I could have used another blanket on the bed.

Wat Jong Kam

The lake near our guesthouse was apparently used to bathe elephants in the olddays.  Now it just provides a gathering place for the Sunday market, as well as great reflections of the Wat Jong Kam.  There is a strong Burmese influence here since the border to Myanmar is quite close and the spires on the wat reflected this.  The teak construction in the coffee bar also helped to remind us where we were in the world.

Mae Hong Son Sunday Market

We sat up on the second floor of the Coffee Bar and watched the market unfold below us.  There were numbers on the pavement for each cart.  Some sale items came in cars, or push carts, but most arrived in side carts on scooters.  People seem to buy at the market like the place is a big salad bar.  They get a stick of meat here, a bag of soup there, a banana leaf pouch of I don’t know what’s in them yet, a fruit drink somewhere else.  There were some tourists in the area, but this town is much less popular than Pai, so we saw mostly locals doing their shopping. Most shoppers were on foot, but some use drive through and pull right up to a stall.   On the website, I included a separate page of photos under the Travel menu on the ways we have seen families travel so far.

Time to Wonder

As we sat in the same spot for breakfast the next morning, looking out at the quiet empty street, I  so glad we decided to come and spend enough time in Thailand to really wonder.  What are in those banana leaf packets?  Are those brown cubes roasting over the charcoal really sticky rice?  How do families manage to live with so little?  How do parents look so calm while riding down the road with their 2 children wedged on the bike between them.  We find when we just travel quickly through a place the questions are all about us.  Where will we sleep tonight?  Where will we go next?  Having time to wonder makes this trip so enriching.

View point surprise

The first viewpoint of the day was well worth the stop.  The hills are so green and lush now that the rainy season has ended.  It rained one day the first week we were here but we haven’t seen another drop since.  This spot had cement viewing steps with  a Burmese style roof.  The coffee shop here had pots of strawberries is racks and a cement fire pit in the middle of the floor to boil water for tea.

Pete ordered a banana smoothie.  I didn’t want anything, but he brought over a little teapot with 2 tiny cups and a small bowl of roasted chickpeas to nibble.  He said they offer that to everyone.  His smoothie came with a plate of cut up banana topped with a sweet syrup and garnished with a flower.  What a special place to sit and appreciate the care that had gone into our order.

Namtok Mae Surin National Park

There were many other beautiful views for the next hour or so, but no places to stop along the road for pictures. After heading south from the viewpoint we turned  at Khun Yuam and headed east then north back into the hills towards the National Park.

Along the road we saw many farming areas where the women were sitting on the ground or around tables sorting some kind of small crop.  We saw very small houses on stilts that looked like the change house at the hot springs.  Sometimes a scooter was parked underneath.  There were some farm trucks (over)loaded with products on the roads.  One was loaded with kids.

 

 

About 12 km up the hilly, twisty road, we arrived at Bua Tong or Wild Sunflower fields.  The hills were just covered with these bushes that were covered with yellow flowers.  They were more the size of small daisies than what I think of as sunflowers. They were past their prime but November is when they begin blooming and the locals celebrate with a festival.  There was a viewpoint here, but it was busy and we didn’t know how much longer it would take us to get to the National Park and the waterfall at the top.

We saw a few large plants covered in red flowers.  Pete asked me what they were and I replied with, “How the heck should I know.”  In the parking lot at the park we saw one of the big plants with red flowers.  I was very surprised to find it was a wild poinsettia.  There was a nice blue hydrangea too.  Neither seemed very Thai. 

Mae Surin Waterfall

It wasn’t much farther and after paying the tourist entry of 200 baht each, (not much by our standards, but almost as much as our hotel room) we drove down a very narrow one way road to the parking lot.  After a short walk up the path, we saw the Mae Surin (Mae meaning river) waterfall.  AT 85 m it is the highest waterfall in Thailand.  The viewpoint is right across the valley from the top of the falls, so it was a great spot.  The sharpened bamboo posts and barb wire certainly reminded you not to go beyond the fence.  There is a trail to the bottom but we didn’t have time to take it down.

 

On to Mae Sariang

The rest of the ride was uneventful.  We stopped for a quick lunch in a restaurant back in Khun Yuam.  I had a noodle soup and Pete pointed on the menu to a meat and rice dish that didn’t really taste great to him.  He only ate a little.  We arrived at the Good View Guest house  about sunset and our emailed reservation for room 10 actually worked.  (about $37) The whole building is teak and looks out on the Sariang River.  We even had a balcony with folding shutter doors to open to the view.  Unfortunately there were no screens so we didn’t want to leave them open.

It was good we had a room with a private bathroom as something Pete ate was not good for him.  We don’t know if it was the pork lunch, the ice in the smoothie or something he touched along the way.  He was sick all night.  The hotel offered tea and toast for breakfast which stayed put so Pete was able to drive us back to Chiang Mai the next day.  The rental car was safely returned to the airport and we took a $4.00 private taxi van back to our apartment.

He laid low for a couple of days but everything is fine now.  We feel pretty lucky that we have eaten mostly what we wanted and made it 5 weeks before Thai bacteria overwhelmed our Canadian stomachs.

Road to Mae Hong Son-Part 2 of the Mae Hong Son loop

Morning in Pai

Diamond de Pai hotel

Morning in Pai arrived completely overcast with low fog.  So much for our plans of vistas and viewpoints.  Although Pai has probably hundreds of restaurants, we started with our Fodors Guide book.  Walking is the easiest way to find small places, especially when the streets are too narrow for parking.  The All About Coffee showed as permanently closed on Google Maps.  We walked to our second choice, the Om Garden Cafe but it had a chalkboard sign telling us it was closed for the week.

Travel is all about exploring and making things work.  The TTK restaurant and guesthouse was the answer to our breakfast needs.  They had real brewed coffee instead of the instant that we often get.  The “American breakfast” had bacon, ham and little sausages that were like little hot dogs.  The best part were the warm, crusty multi-grain buns.  Bread is not a Thai food.  We’ve found a french bakery that makes nice rustic loaves that they will even toast and serve with wonderful raspberry jam.  The grocery store bread is just fine for sandwiches but these buns were exceptional.

There is hot springs just south of Pai, next to the Memorial Bridge.  The Japanese used logs and elephants to build a wooden bridge over the Pai River during the war to move supplies to Burma (Myanmar).  As they retreated, they burned the bridge behind them.  The Thais rebuilt the bridge using iron from a Chiang Mai bridge that was being rebuilt.  The 1946 bridge has since been rebuilt of concrete right next to the old one but you can still walk across the original structure.

Thom’s Elephant Camp

We saw the entrance to the hot springs, but carried on down the road to Thom’s Elephant Camp.  We did this with mixed feelings.  While it is exciting to see an Asian elephant up close, they are generally not treated as the wild animals that they are.  Elephants have been used for centuries as work animals in Thailand, especially in the logging industry.  Teak trees were cut down and hauled to the river by these animals.  As machinery has taken over, the animals are expensive for their owners to feed if they are not working.  Many are now used to entertain tourists wanting rides, to swim with the elephants, or feed the elephants.

At Thom’s, the elephants are taken to the mountains at night to feed and bath in natural surroundings.  They are brought into a confined space during the day where you can buy baskets of bananas to feed to them.  You can purchase a ride or bathe with them in the river.  We decided that we would feed the elephant bananas.  By getting close to the enormous animal we had a chance to get to learn a bit more about them, without taking too much advantage of them.  Although most of the “domesticated” elephants have a mahout that bonds with them and manages their care, they use shouted commands and a pole with a sharp pick on the end.  They hit the elephants on their heads and legs to get them to obey.

OT was gentle and enjoyed the bananas.  He also had bamboo leaves to eat.  When the bananas were gone, he would blow air in our direction and snort for more.  The dexterity of his trunk was quite amazing.  He could easily pick up leaves or bananas from the ground.  When we put a banana behind out back, he would reach around to retrieve it.  I enjoyed watching a young animal lover feed this giant with calmness and joy.  After spending an hour or so close up with OT, we didn’t miss having a ride. Before we came it was the only way we thought we could interact with the animal.

Elephant Sanctuaries

There are a couple of elephant nature parks near Chiang Mai that do tours where you see elephants interacting in their natural environment.  We even met a lady at the Remembrance Day British Legion dinner who fund-raised to set up an elephant sanctuary that is only for elephants, not tourists.  She provides for vets to care for sick or injured animals and provides a salary to the mahouts while the animals are in care and not working.  Elephant Jungle Sanctuary and Elephant Nature Park are 2 examples of parks where elephants are not exploited.

As luck would have it, the skies cleared and the sun came out. We decided to skip the hot springs and carried on through an agricultural area.  It was quite beautiful and nice to get out into the country.  Every few km there were little machines.  At first I thought they were ATM’s, but they were actually little gas pumps.  I don’t know how you paid since most people use cash for everything here but they were just set along the road.

Mor Pang Waterfall

The back road led us back to Pai. We followed a road on our new paper map to a waterfall.  It wasn’t that far away, but it was certainly secluded.  It really felt like being in the jungle, from what I’ve imagined from the movies.  There were actually 2 falls, but the best were the signs.  There are many places where I would like the job of fixing a little grammar or spelling to make the message more clear.  I do appreciate that there are English messages, but sometimes I am more confused that when I began.  Notice the rule that says, “Ban controversy.”

The next set of curves and hills required some good driving.  I’m glad I was in the front seat of a car and not in the back seat of a tour van.  We saw a couple of people every day stopped by the side of the road with motion sickness.  We took a side road into Sia Ngam Hot Spring.  It is similar to the Liard River Hot Springs in northern British Columbia.  There are toilets and a pathway with some other improvements in progress.  It cost us 20 baht or about 75 cents each to get in.  The water was pretty warm for here.  It was more like a warmish bath than a hot tub.

The location was beautiful.  The tree vines hang down and everything is lush and green.  There were lots of young travellers there but many Chinese families as well.  There was a little thatched hut for changing that looked very much like the family homes that we saw in the farming areas.

One of the hillsides was planted with corn.  This is not a native plant to Thailand and farmers are offered incentives to plant it for feed.  It is also a popular food in the market but required straw laid along the slopes to prevent erosion where the trees used to be. It produces a lot of waste that  contributes to the terrible air quality in Northern Thailand when it is burned in March

There were several tour vans in the parking lot and lots of scooters.  The road into the hot springs had some grades close to 20%.  We saw a few scooters where the passengers had to get off because the bike just couldn’t get up the hill otherwise.  For us in the car, there were a few times where it looked like we were going to take off since you couldn’t see the rest of the road below the crest of the hill.   There were very steep cement gutters along the road that were about 18 inches deep with straight sides.  I was a bit worried what would happen if we slipped into one of them moving aside to make room for other vehicles, but it was all ok.

There were a couple of viewpoints on the rest of the journey to Mae Hong Son.  The first had wonderful views of the area. There were a collection of children in traditional costumes that would pose for a picture for a few baht.  I found a bag in the market made of quilted fabric in bright colors.  It fits my extra camera lens and cost about $6.  This style of bag is made in one of the northern villages.

Our last stop on the road was at the Coffee View Point.  It was a perfect location.  The views over the mountains were spectacular.  There was a bamboo deck and furniture created out of natural wood pieces.  I had an iced green tea without sugar.  It was very green.  It has milk in it but it tasted a bitter like coffee.  The regular Thai Tea is made with instant tea, powdered milk, powdered creamer, and sugar.  Then it is poured over ice and liquid milk, or sometimes sweetened condensed milk is poured over the top.  The result is quite orange, but it tastes like tea and lots of other good things.  I have started asking for it without sugar.  It’s rich enough.

There was a market at the top, as expected.  Deliveries to each stall were made in one truck to the top of the mountain.  All the products were unloaded and organized together by a crew of people.  They really worked well together.  It makes you wonder about the “village crafts” but it is free enterprise taking advantage of the tourist industry.

The last 15 km took about 30 minutes with all the curves and we were ready to be done for the day.  I will continue with our time in Mae Hong Son another day.

 

 

 

Finally packed and to the airport in San Francisco

Car lights on the bridge at twilight

Car lights on the bridge at twilight

This blog describes our last day on our road trip to the airport. My next one will share what I thought I knew about sleeping on a plane, and the truth.

Roadtrip map

Packing 

I thought that packing everything a couple of weeks ago, then driving to California would make the day of leaving simple and stress free.  While I felt less anxious on the days leading up to our departure, the day of our flight was another matter.

We had each packed a large, wheeled duffel bag.  They are a great size for holding the clothes, shoes and extras we thought we wanted for 5 months of living…things like umbrellas, cards, extra camera supplies and a roll of toilet paper, which did in fact need on our first night in our hotel.  The downside of these bags is that they are heavy due to the hardware of the handle and wheels.  We were close for weight at home but had added and deleted a few things on our way.  Without a scale, it was difficult to come with an exact measure for the airport weight.

We also had Pete’s golf clubs in their hard case.  His shoulder and knee have been feeling much better and he found a golf course and driving range near to our location in Chiang Mai.  He was looking forward to a winter of practice.  He was also looking forward to a winter of playing his guitar while I was learning to better photo edit.  We had checked on line, and the airline stated that both the golf clubs and the guitar would count as checked luggage.  Since Air China allowed 2 free checked bags per person, that was a possibility, as long as we weren’t overweight on our other bags.

Guitar on a Plane

I also looked at stories online about how other musicians manage their guitars on flights.  Sandwiched on a luggage cart is not really how you want it to travel.  Most said that they took it as a carry on, kept the guitar in a soft case, then spoke nicely to someone on the plane about storing it in a coat closet or overhead bin. At the very least, it could be gate checked with the strollers and car seats.  If that was possible, then we had space for the extra weight in another checked bag.  If it wasn’t then we needed a carry on size bag for the things that might make our bags overweight.

Who would think so much energy could go into solving such a minor problem?  In the end, we took along a carry-on size bag that was needed for the 3 kg we were over in our other bags.  We checked it with the duffel bags and the golf clubs in the cargo and took our day packs and the guitar onto the plane.  For both flights, the stewardesses were more than happy to find a safe place for the instrument to travel in the passenger part of the plane.  The only preparation needed was to loosen the strings and Peter wrapped a yoga mat around it inside the bag for extra protection.

Golden Gate National Recreation Area

Once everything was loaded we began our final drive to the airport.  Our flight was at 1:30 am but we wanted to spend a few hour in San Francisco first.  Melissa took us on a quieter back road to the Bay area.  We joined the 101 and turned west toward the Point Bonita lighthouse.

Pt. Bonita lighthouse

Pt. Bonita lighthouse

The first few viewpoints were packed with people late on this Saturday afternoon but it didn’t matter as the views from just above the lighthouse were spectacular.  You could see back to the bridge and the city, the coastline south and west of the city, as well as the lighthouse.  The light is functioning and it is still used by ships to find their way into the harbor through the fog.

 

City view from the lighthouse

City view from the lighthouse

 

The fog was rolling in along the horizon as we watched the sun begin to set into the clouds.  We returned on another road back to the Golden Gate Bridge and drove over it.  Knowing the engineering that went into its construction and the number of men who died building it , I am always in awe whenever I get close to it.  We found Melissa’s top secret parking place and walked under the bridge for a few more photos of the area at twilight.  The fog made the far side disappear at times. There were surfers in the waves that curl around the rocks and the bridge. It had cooled from 25 degrees in Stockton to 16 degrees in SFO, but the wind didn’t feel as cold as usual there.  It was a perfect end to our road trip to the airport.

And it's foggy again

And it’s foggy again