We took a rest in this northern triangle between Thailand, Burma and Laos. The area is known as The Golden Triangle and it is one of two major illicit opium producing areas in Asia. Since 1920, this area is, along with Afghanistan and Pakistan, the largest producer of heroin, while in the 21 century, Afghanistan took the lead. Bounded by the Ruak river on the border with Burma and the Mekong River on the border with Laos, this is the home of rice fields, hills and mountains, the highest peak of Thailand (Doi Inthanon, 2565 m) and dense jungle, elephants, snakes, malaria and many minorities who've made a life here. Time here runs much slower.
Here we stayed in Thailand's second largest city of Chiang Mai, one of the famous former smuggling cities. Middle-aged men still talk about how opium was consumed here. But no it stopped. Today Chiang Mai is a relaxed place for any traveler wanting to get some fresh air and relax (see pictures below).
Be sure to pay attention to the changing of styles of various temples, shrines and buildings depending on the region of Thailand. Each has some of the characteristics of the neighbouring country.
Here we stayed in Thailand's second largest city of Chiang Mai, one of the famous former smuggling cities. Middle-aged men still talk about how opium was consumed here. But no it stopped. Today Chiang Mai is a relaxed place for any traveler wanting to get some fresh air and relax (see pictures below).
Be sure to pay attention to the changing of styles of various temples, shrines and buildings depending on the region of Thailand. Each has some of the characteristics of the neighbouring country.
One thing we noticed in general in Thailand is that the locals are very careful where they put their feet. In all the holy places you have to enter without shoes, because the foot is considered the dirtiest part of the body, especially the shoes. That is why you should never try to stand on someone’s things or step over one's stuff because it's bad karma. This one time in the train my backpack laces where on the floor and a woman didn’t want to step over it until I removed it, keeping all the people behind her who wanted to get out of the train.
"Chat with a monk", a really nice offer in temples and not to be missed! Buddhist monks will be happy to talk about themselves and their religion so they can learn English. We were lucky enough to have a talk with the Buddhist teacher. He told us how important the act of passing through the monkhood of every young male Thai is. Some do it just for a week, shave their heads, pray and learn about it. However, he said the choice is theirs. He himself was a monk for over 20 years. The monkhood is essential to accomplish because they earn "merit" so their mother can freely pass into the next world, "heaven", or other life.
The street market in Chiang Mai, excellent sushi with soy and wasabi sauce on each step (see picture below).
The street market in Chiang Mai, excellent sushi with soy and wasabi sauce on each step (see picture below).
One interesting feature of the so-called Thai custom is "saving face”. For them to raise voice or losing control and yell is considered a disgrace. They’d rather laugh it off. Also, if something shameful happens to someone, everyone will get around and laugh. But they will not make fun of the person, everyone will “laugh the situation off” to "save his face".
In our guesthouse with our hosts we ate snacks and fish sticks (almost everything in Thailand has a fish flavour) and drank Japanese potato brandy and Sang Som Thai rum (see picture above).
And as I have already mentioned the rasta subculture in all blog posts..Of course, our host is a guitarist in the local roots reggae band that played in the local Roots Reggae bar (see picture above).
After a short break we rented a bike for 6 days and headed down the road with the help of the Golden Triangles Riders map through the jungle and the highest peak of Thailand, the cities of Mae Chaem, Mae Hong Son and Pai, more than 3000 curves, and as we went to a lot of side streets and hilltribes and minority communities of Thailand, we made over 900 kilometres.
After a short break we rented a bike for 6 days and headed down the road with the help of the Golden Triangles Riders map through the jungle and the highest peak of Thailand, the cities of Mae Chaem, Mae Hong Son and Pai, more than 3000 curves, and as we went to a lot of side streets and hilltribes and minority communities of Thailand, we made over 900 kilometres.
For motorbike hire you only need money and a passport, drivers licence is never needed although I drove bikes here with over 100 cc without a permit. The fee per day in Chiang Mai is around 200 baht, while in Pai around100 baht (2.5 Euro). Gasoline is about 1 Euro. The usually keep your passport but we had no problems. The spirit of the people here is good and the smile you get is honest. At least from our experience.
Here below are pictures of our bike and the route..the "The Mae Hong Son Loop".. :)
Here below are pictures of our bike and the route..the "The Mae Hong Son Loop".. :)
Life along the river (see picture above).
The Buddhist monks, on the way to the highest peak of Doi Inthanon (see picture above). However, they went by car, as there is a road to the summit.
The street market in Mae Hong Son (see picture above).
Mae Hong Son (see picture above).
The border with Burma (see picture above). One important piece of information! In the last few days in Bangkok I watched CNN about a kind of malaria that was “born” here few weeks earlier and it is very dangerous and resistant to existing medication. So check the conditions if you are travelling to this region.
We encountered a 50 km remote village in the heart of the jungle, in the valley behind hills, around a small lake is this little piece of heaven (see pictures above). Chinese people live here and they grown tea. Whatever you do here has to do with tea tasting.
The road through the jungle after the daily downpours (see picture above).
The jungle goes to sleep (see picture above).
Pai (see picture above), one of the few places in the world for a real hippie or a rastaman. Here we slept in these bamboo huts enjoying the comforts of a guitar-drum circle with all the goods from this country. Here time disappears. Almost all people we met live here in these homes for at least a few months. And they all went "to travel a bit around Thailand." Each week one Argentinian rastaman is cooking over a fire for all the neighbours, some are playing guitar and drums, and are enjoying life.
Without any special plan and almost by accident, with a little miracle we found our friends Ana and Matija who traveled with their bike. They traveled around Burma a few weeks and then headed into northern Thailand (see picture below).
One interesting thing is this little grill that we tried in the little village of Mae Chaem. The "restaurant" gave us this metal grill full with coal. On the top part you grill meat, squid, bacon, lard, intestines, lung and something extraordinary from which I had diarrhoea the other day. In this grill at the sides you put also water in which the noodles are cooked with vegetables (see pictures below).
North of Thailand is home to countless minority communities, “hilltribes" or tribal communities. Most of these tribes have electricity and basic living conditions, including cars and motorcycles. But they have come from Tibet, China, Laos, Burma, or have been here for a long time in the jungles of Thailand. Their status is sometimes not resolved, they do not have always permits, papers or identity cards, their children can’t attend school, they are not recognized, and have no health insurance. It all boils down to the fact that “they” are trying to resolve their status. At least so it seems, so they say.
The main hilltribes that you can meet are the Akha, Lahu, Karen, Hmong/Miao, Mien/Yao and Lisu. You will never be sure which hilltribe is which, most people do not know other languages but you will almost certainly get a smile.
Also, the north of Thailand is popular for tourist tours. Almost everybody wants to sell elephant riding, visits to the hilltribes, sleeping in one and trekking through the jungle. Probably a large number of tourists does not want to engage in self-initiated adventures, so they pay for this bullshit. Do not get me wrong. I believe that if you engage in a few-days deep jungle trekking, you need to take care and get a good guide. However, most of these one/two day tours are walking an hour, an hour canoe or bamboo-rafts on the river, one hour in a hilltribe village who are sick of seeing tourists every day, one hour elephant riding and one hour of shopping for souvenirs. Try to check in advance where the tour goes and what is the exact program.
With our bike we passed countless places without the tourist docks, visited over 15 hilltribes, saw over 10 different waterfalls, jungles, at least 5 places elephant riding, villages and rivers, and all that for a price which is 5 times cheaper.
The situation that pissed me off is the treatment of hilltribes by the Kingdom of Thailand. On the tourist route on the map are three villages of the Karen hilltribe (Burmese origin). They are also called "longnecks" known for their long necks and metal rings around them. We wanted to visit one of these places. We carried souvenirs from Croatia and some other small items as gifts. But at the entrance to the village one official Thai person was trying to charge us a fee. The person presented a paper that describes all about the problem of the Burmese, the war, the slaughter and exile. It’s a sad story so I said I will give the money to the people in the village myself. He did not agree. We had to leave. On the way back one nice person appeared, a young Burmese girl who was born and lives in London. Here she volunteers as a teacher in the so-called “refugee camp”. When we asked what it was, she clarified the situation and said she is very glad that we did not pay anything at the entrance to the village. Unfortunately none of the money that tourists give is going to the hilltribes. It goes straight to the government. Actually, all of them live in the refugee camp in appalling conditions. The children go to a school outside the fenced camp kept by the military. Neither she who is Burmese can get inside. All the villages that were built around it, were built in better conditions and several Burmese hilltribes are forced to live there and wear these rings around the neck for the tourists who come. In this region they actually don’t wear the rings anymore and most of them wear clip-on rings. This is all one big lie, and these poor women are like in a zoo in front of the cameras of tourists who return home and think they have discovered the wilderness.
The little kid with the bananas at the picture below. We bought the best creamy bananas, a whole bundle of over 10 bananas of least 4 kilograms, all for 12 Euro cents. Anyway, the bananas here have black seeds the size of a pea, but the bananas melt in your mouth.
The hilltribe mechanic of the Hmong hilltribe, repaired our bike. The brakes stopped working 100 meters before a steep descent. The replacement of some original Honda parts and brake pads was 2 Euros (see picture below).
Without any special plan and almost by accident, with a little miracle we found our friends Ana and Matija who traveled with their bike. They traveled around Burma a few weeks and then headed into northern Thailand (see picture below).
One interesting thing is this little grill that we tried in the little village of Mae Chaem. The "restaurant" gave us this metal grill full with coal. On the top part you grill meat, squid, bacon, lard, intestines, lung and something extraordinary from which I had diarrhoea the other day. In this grill at the sides you put also water in which the noodles are cooked with vegetables (see pictures below).
North of Thailand is home to countless minority communities, “hilltribes" or tribal communities. Most of these tribes have electricity and basic living conditions, including cars and motorcycles. But they have come from Tibet, China, Laos, Burma, or have been here for a long time in the jungles of Thailand. Their status is sometimes not resolved, they do not have always permits, papers or identity cards, their children can’t attend school, they are not recognized, and have no health insurance. It all boils down to the fact that “they” are trying to resolve their status. At least so it seems, so they say.
The main hilltribes that you can meet are the Akha, Lahu, Karen, Hmong/Miao, Mien/Yao and Lisu. You will never be sure which hilltribe is which, most people do not know other languages but you will almost certainly get a smile.
Also, the north of Thailand is popular for tourist tours. Almost everybody wants to sell elephant riding, visits to the hilltribes, sleeping in one and trekking through the jungle. Probably a large number of tourists does not want to engage in self-initiated adventures, so they pay for this bullshit. Do not get me wrong. I believe that if you engage in a few-days deep jungle trekking, you need to take care and get a good guide. However, most of these one/two day tours are walking an hour, an hour canoe or bamboo-rafts on the river, one hour in a hilltribe village who are sick of seeing tourists every day, one hour elephant riding and one hour of shopping for souvenirs. Try to check in advance where the tour goes and what is the exact program.
With our bike we passed countless places without the tourist docks, visited over 15 hilltribes, saw over 10 different waterfalls, jungles, at least 5 places elephant riding, villages and rivers, and all that for a price which is 5 times cheaper.
The situation that pissed me off is the treatment of hilltribes by the Kingdom of Thailand. On the tourist route on the map are three villages of the Karen hilltribe (Burmese origin). They are also called "longnecks" known for their long necks and metal rings around them. We wanted to visit one of these places. We carried souvenirs from Croatia and some other small items as gifts. But at the entrance to the village one official Thai person was trying to charge us a fee. The person presented a paper that describes all about the problem of the Burmese, the war, the slaughter and exile. It’s a sad story so I said I will give the money to the people in the village myself. He did not agree. We had to leave. On the way back one nice person appeared, a young Burmese girl who was born and lives in London. Here she volunteers as a teacher in the so-called “refugee camp”. When we asked what it was, she clarified the situation and said she is very glad that we did not pay anything at the entrance to the village. Unfortunately none of the money that tourists give is going to the hilltribes. It goes straight to the government. Actually, all of them live in the refugee camp in appalling conditions. The children go to a school outside the fenced camp kept by the military. Neither she who is Burmese can get inside. All the villages that were built around it, were built in better conditions and several Burmese hilltribes are forced to live there and wear these rings around the neck for the tourists who come. In this region they actually don’t wear the rings anymore and most of them wear clip-on rings. This is all one big lie, and these poor women are like in a zoo in front of the cameras of tourists who return home and think they have discovered the wilderness.
The little kid with the bananas at the picture below. We bought the best creamy bananas, a whole bundle of over 10 bananas of least 4 kilograms, all for 12 Euro cents. Anyway, the bananas here have black seeds the size of a pea, but the bananas melt in your mouth.
The hilltribe mechanic of the Hmong hilltribe, repaired our bike. The brakes stopped working 100 meters before a steep descent. The replacement of some original Honda parts and brake pads was 2 Euros (see picture below).
Gas stations are frequent on the road, but as soon as you get off the road, gas stations start to look like this. In each village, for a slightly higher price, the gasoline is poured from barrels of families living along the road (see picture below).
Some more pictures from the road and northern Thailand are given below..
Something like a tuk-tuk but without an engine (see picture above). :)
We were invited to a "restaurant" in a hilltribe. I went to pee on the toilet and as you can see they are a bit smaller than western people. :)
The jungle, the jungle (see picture above).
The best ice cream ever. Coconut, beans, sweet potatoes and lime (see picture above).
Mmmmhhh, we ate grasshoppers and other bugs, whatever they offered (see picture above).
Great food on the streets of Mae Hong Son (see picture above). We came to a festival for the end of the Buddhist year. There were a drunken locals, local traditional music, excellent food, and finally insects. Throughout Thailand you can find insects to eat but it’s mostly a tourist thing. But here, for this festival and in the northeast region of Isaan everybody eats them. :)
Noodles in banana leaves in Pai (see picture above).
Tea in a small Chinese village on the border with Burma (see picture above).
Our small grill with Ana and Matija in Mae Chaem (see picture above).
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