We woke up the next morning still feeling the effects of our night out in the Capitol. Luckily we escaped the Bangkok hunger games and looked forward to starting our next adventure in Chiang Mai. We had an early flight so we took breakfast to go and headed to the airport. In our cab ride, we listened to an interesting array of American music covers-think Kids Bop but for adults and rampant on radio stations throughout the country.
After landing and checking into the hotel, we decided to explore the city. To get the true local experience, we decided to travel like Thais- on motor bikes. At only $5 to rent per day, we were sold. To start, we traveled to the top of a massive mountain to visit the Doi Suthep temple and take in the views of Chiang Mai.
What better way to experience the streets of Chiang Mai than to be tossed in the middle of everything on a motor bike? Imagine 5th avenue during rush hour but instead of buses and taxis, tuk tuks and mopeds. After getting acclimated to the driving etiquette and avoiding a few close calls with oncoming traffic, we flew through downtown and climbed up the steep mountain with its razor sharp turns. The temple was beautiful and granted us excellent views from atop it's tall peak.
After our time at Doi Suthep, we decided that we had pushed our luck far enough and opted to explore the rest of the city by foot. After a quick lunch outside, we headed downtown. The streets of Chiang Mai are packed with tasty food vendors, welcoming open-air bars and tons of different shops and activities. Now keep in mind that at this point of the trip, we only had about 3 hours of bed sleep in 72 hours so we were beginning to feel the effects. With massage parlors on every corner, our bodies practically begged us to go. We went with a recommendation to check out Green Bamboo which was packed when we arrived and unable to accommodate us for a few hours. We thought this was a good sign considering how aggressive most of the other massage places are.
With time to kill we trudged our tired bodies down the street and luckily stumbled upon Maipai, a local smoothie bar. We met the owner, Clive, an ex-banker who recently moved here from London to export local herbs. Maipai is great for some insightful conversation and delicious, natural smoothies- definitely check them out if you're in Chiang Mai.
The massage was exactly what we needed. They were able to fit us in that night, but due to space restraints, Joel, Corey and I all shared a room- I had something different in mind when I pictured my first couples massage. No massage would be complete without a trip to a fish foot spa, so we made sure to stop at Dr. Fish on the way home. This has been a bucket list item for quite some time so I'm glad we got a chance to cross it off.
After a quick shower and change we ended our night with dinner at Good View on the river. Our lack of sleep was quickly catching up with us as we struggled to stay awake and simple tasks like adding money for the bill became next to impossible. After a long, adventurous day, we couldn't have been happier to hit the bed for our first real night's sleep in days.
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