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<\/a>\nWe had been a bit nervous, because some videos we had watched on this hike indicated that it was quite punishing.\u00a0 But the first bit, from the trailhead up to the monastery, was fine.<\/p>\n
We decided to at least hike up to the road, instead of walking over to the main entrance.<\/p>\n Whoo boy – the hike up to the road was near vertical, and when we came out, we realized there was a LOT more near vertical between us and the temple on top of the mountain.<\/p>\n So we hailed a passing songthaew, which appeared to be well used to this eventuality.<\/p>\n And as the truck switchbacked up, and up, and up, and up,\u00a0and up,<\/em> we became less and less concerned that we had somehow wimped out, and more and more grateful that we had decided not to spend the entire day hauling ourselves up the side of a a mountain.<\/p>\n Besides, it’s not like we were done climbing.\u00a0 Disembarking at the entrance to Doi Suthep, we were confronted with one or two stairs to climb to get to the temple.<\/p>\n I managed to give myself two jump scares in quick succession in one of the smaller rooms around the temple complex.<\/p>\n Something we’d seen at quite a few temples was lifelike figures of famous monks.\u00a0 Including some relatively recent ones with modern-looking glasses.\u00a0 This was a pretty common thing.<\/p>\n But I missed the one near the entrance to this room until after I walked in, so I turned, and immediately\u00a0started<\/em>, because there was a figure of a monk sitting to the left of the entrance.<\/p>\n OK, that’s funny.<\/p>\n Then the monk\u00a0moved<\/em> and I jumped\u00a0again,\u00a0<\/em>because it turns out this was a real person, and not a figure.<\/p>\n The main stupa at Doi Sutep is at the very highest point, and is itself pretty darned impressive.<\/p>\n And then we had to do the stairs the OTHER way.<\/p>\n For the afternoon, we wanted to try one more thing that tourists in Thailand do, and that’s get a Thai massage.\u00a0 There are massage places\u00a0everywhere<\/em> in the tourist areas of Thailand.\u00a0 I cannot stress just how common they are – typically 2 or 3 per block.<\/p>\n So picking one in particular can be difficult, but fortunately we had gotten a recommendation from some of our friends from the elephant sanctuary trip the day before.\u00a0 When we arrived, there was scheduling availability for each of us to get a foot and leg rub together, so that’s what we did.<\/p>\n And here’s the thing… I don’t think I did this right.\u00a0 I had never gotten a professional massage before, and so I just assumed that the masseur knew what they were doing, and if things started to hurt, they were supposed to.<\/p>\n Things started to hurt.\u00a0 Specifically, when he started digging into the balls of my feet there was a lot of pain.\u00a0 Not the fun pain, not the “oh you bastard, keep doing that,” pain, just… pain.<\/p>\n But I thought that was normal, so I bit my lip and powered through.<\/p>\n It wasn’t fun, and I didn’t feel better at the end.<\/p>\n And from talking to Leigh afterwards, I realized that isn’t what’s\u00a0supposed<\/em> to happen.\u00a0 I should have said something when the pain got bad, and asked the masseur to slow down, or do something else.<\/p>\n But I didn’t, so I spent the next couple hours limping around the hipster neighborhood of Nimmanhaemin.<\/p>\n Now to be clear – it’s a fun neighborhood.\u00a0 We saw some cool jewelry stores, had some (sadly underwhelming) craft beer, ate some chocolate, got fooled by some AI generated slop on a playlist (ugh), and generally enjoyed the atmosphere.<\/p>\n One last meal – what to do? We had been told that one thing that it is good to try in Thailand is Burmese food, since it’s so hard to get in North America.\u00a0 On the one hand, we were actually an exception to that rule, since we were fortunate enough to live near a good Burmese restaurant in Michigan for quite some time.<\/p>\n On the other hand, we lived near a good Burmese restaurant in Michigan for quite some time, so we knew how delicious Burmese food is.\u00a0 Pickled tea leaves, here we come!<\/p>\n We wandered back to our hotel, and went for one last walk around.\u00a0 Chiang Mai is great, and probably our favorite place we stayed in the whole trip. 5\/5 would tourist again.<\/p>\n On our last day in Chiang Mai, we decided to go for a walk.\u00a0 Specifically, we decided to make our way up a hiking trail, colloquially referred to as “the monk’s trail”, since it leads first to a monastery, and … Continue reading <\/a>
\nSome neat birds, a few waterfalls, and we arrived at Wat Pha Lat, which was a lovely secluded spot to rest for a while.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a>
\nAnd at this point, we were faced with a choice – there was a road that passed nearby, on which we could probably get a ride to the temple at the top of the hill.\u00a0 Or we could keep hiking.<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nLike Tiger Cave, though, the view was worth it.
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\nOne songthaew later, and we were back in town.\u00a0 Only two more meals left in Chiang Mai – what to do? How about some Thai style fried chicken?<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nYes please.\u00a0 It was so good we forgot to take a picture of it before it was gone, that’s how good it was.<\/p>\n<\/a>(At least there was SOME food left when we remembered to snap the picture?)<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"