SEA Trip Day 18 – Back In Thailand
We had a lovely early morning flight to Chiang Mai, so we packed up and departed with a bag of toast in one hand, a bag of bananas in the other, and sad empty stomachs waiting to be filled (so we could take our Malarone).
Side note – Northern Thailand is also a bit of a danger zone for malaria because of all the crossing from Laos. But it’s mostly just risk in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Also, these pills give you wild dreams. It’s kind of weird.
In any case, the flight was smooth, Luang Prabang is not as nice as Vientiane’s airport, and Amy’s dad met us at Chiang Mai Airport. (That was very disjointed, sorry drunk writing is not always the most coherent, but I try)
We started our great Chiang Mai adventure…with a trip to the mall. Airport Plaza (also known as Central Plaza I think?) is just off the airport (shocker) and quite similar to our American malls. It’s got your Starbucks and auntie Anne’s, Zara, and an entire floor of Japanese restaurants, most of which are sushi/shabu shabu buffets of some sort. It was kinda weird, but maybe Japanese food is just super popular. We grabbed a bite at Fuji (one of the few non buffet options, and a seemingly popular chain in Chiang Mai) and continued on to our hostel.
Amy’s dad had made reservations for us to grab dinner at The Good View with a man he had met golfing, so we didn’t have too much time to do anything. We decided to go run around the city then, and explore Warorat Market.
We started at Chinatown, where everything just kind of blends together, and flows into several different markets. Warorat is supposed to be a really big market, but its actually pretty hard to tell where it begins or ends. We wandered around the streets, looking at clothes and goods, picking up some dried mango and more mangosteens (plus dragon fruit and soursop!). We ran into an old man pushing around a cart of ice cream, and grabbed a couple of absolutely amazing ice cream sandwiches. He basically had a little bag where he opened two slices of green tea toast (into a little pocket) and put these mini scoops of coconut ice cream inside. It was delicious, so much better than CREAM, and cost only 10 baht. Easily my favorite snack of the trip.
After a couple hours of walking, we headed over to The Good View. This is a pretty popular restaurant right on the river (not on the city side, but across from Chinatown). With the sun setting and a riverside seat, we were pretty much happy just sitting and drinking for a little bit until nighttime completely fell. This place is actually a bit of a bar scene, and when nighttime hits, there’s live music and skimpy girls that pop in. There were way too many cocktails and smoothies and beers going around (they had those beer tube things that I’ve seen in Ohio!!) and we had a great time listening to P and Amy’s dad talk about life. P is actually originally from Seattle, but now retired in Thailand, with a Thai wife, and full of stories.
We hit a good three hours there, and came out satisfied with our food and drink intake, then headed to the night market. It was a little difficult going through the stalls, because we were so used to the super cheap prices in Laos and Cambodia, where you could easily kill prices by 50% (or more). Here, it was not so easy, and we didn’t end up buying too much. The stalls were all too similar, and we got a little bored so we wandered into Chiang Mai’s pub street, where it was overflowing with baldies, booze, and boobs. Not as bad as Pattaya, but bad enough that we decided it was time to go home and sleep off the alcohol.
PS – the title sucks but my brain isn’t working right now. Sorry. Not sorry.