Out of all the places in Thailand, Chiang Mai & Pai were by far my favorite. I spent a large portion of my trip at these locations and learned a tremendous amount about them in a short span of time. Chiang Mai can be reached via one hour plane ride from Bangkok, or via an overnight train (12 hours long but easily worth it).
The city itself is located in the Northeast of Thailand, close to the border of Burma. It is known for its famous temples, culture, food, adventurous treks, and most notably, elephants.
I stayed in a place called the Green Tiger House, located in a section of Chiang Mai called “The Old City.” This portion of the city was partitioned off in a square by the remains of the historical walls and moat. From here, you have access to every part of town and are only a five minute Tuk-Tuk drive away from the infamous night bazaar.
Wat Doi Suthep
This famous temple is located about an hour north of the city. Quick history lesson: A white elephant carrying Buddha’s remains died on the way up, marking the area as sacred temple grounds. The drive up is breathtaking as you can overlook the entire city when you reach the summit. When I visited, we drove motorcycles up the winding road to get there and had one hell of an experience! Blog Post – Doi Suthep
Elephants
Hands down my most memorable experience in Thailand involved elephants. There are countless elephant reserves scattered throughout the outskirts of the city to pick from so choose carefully.
Some ethical advice: The elephants are not supposed to be ridden and many tourist places will sucker you into doing a day trip where you ride on the elephants back. Although it looks fun, this is extremely crippling to the elephants spine and they are often mishandled, beaten, and forced to obey commands. This is done so that tourist can mount them and follow a set path through the jungle. I recommend Happy Elephant Home or Elephant Nature Park, which are sanctuaries that take care of abused and distressed elephants and raise them outside of captivity in a caring environment. This should cost around 1500 Baht a day (~43 dollars), but take my word for it. It is well worth the investment!
Blog Post – Elephant Experience
Treks
As for excursions, there are many 1,2 and 3 day treks into the jungle. You can book these at all major tour hubs as well as through your hostel/guesthouse. Here you will meet the indigenous hill tribe people, swim in waterfalls, go on bamboo rafts, and hike through dense jungle. A day trek costs about 600 baht. Put your modern gadgets away, stay in a local hut, eat amazing food, dance around a campfire, trek through cascading waterfalls, and be like Mowgli in the jungle!
Night Market
Make sure when you visit Chiang Mai, you stay through the weekend. Every weekend, half the city shuts down for the walking street market. Endless merchant stalls ranging from Tibetan goods to delicious local foods can be found. If you can imagine it, it exists here in the market. Once you start sampling all the Thai street foods, you won’t be able to stop.
There is a famous local restaurant called Cooking Love where you must go if you are in Chiang Mai. It is family-run and the hospitality that the local culture is known for shined through here. The owner sat with us and told us the story of how she sold a necklace in order to begin making enough money to build her restaurant. Throughout her journey, she was driven by the desire to make people happy though cooking delicious food (and delicious it was). The kitchen is outside so you can watch your food while it is being prepared. The owner ended up giving us four dishes of food and desert for free. What an amazing place!
Nightlife
There are endless bars and karaoke joints in Chiang Mai. Nimmanhaemin Road is where the students hang out, Loi Kroh is the sex tourist area (stay away unless you want to get hassled by hookers), and then there are the clubs. In my opinion, these were the most fun. We got bottle service at a place called Mandalay Bar for 14 US dollars and saw a live band play, a ladyboy sing, and a fantastic DJ perform. We loved this place so much, we even stopped by here again on our way back from Pai to Bangkok.
Discovery – Under the Kad Suan Kaew mall, a Thai place with crazy DJs and house music.
Monkey Club – Local Thai place, great music, packed on the weekends.
The Garage – A secret party location even the local police don’t know about. It is almost like an underground warehouse party, but with a legit bar inside an actual garage. We had an after party here with the Thai locals and it was wild! Ask around to find the location, most Tuk-Tuk drivers will take you if you give them a good tip.
These are my top insights into Chiang Mai. It would take me days to write about everything, so I will tell you to start with these main activities. The rest will present itself as you go about and meet other travelers. Hope this helps. Enjoy your Chiang Mai adventure.
Cheers!
