Mary and George's Midlife Adventure: Chiang Dao

April is the hottest month in Thailand. Schools close from mid-March to mid-May. We decided to travel to a place that might be cooler. At first, we thought Nepal, but then settled on Northern Thailand -- Chiang Dao, in particular. It's about an hour north of Chiang Mai in the mountains. In fact, the town sits in the shadow of Doi Chiang Dao -- at 7,200 feet, the third tallest mountain in Thailand.

The Resort

We chose Chiangkham Luang Resort http://www.chiangkhamluang.com/#/Home and reserved a room for two weeks. What a good decision! It's a quiet, beautiful place with great views and a wonderful restaurant.

Our cabin:

The restaurant.

Much of the grounds is wooded,

and the rest is beautifully landscaped.

Even the bugs are interesting.

The Town

The resort is a couple of miles from the town and there is an interesting and colorful route through a rural area and then some suburbs of the town before one emerges on the main road into town. Mary walked a little ways with George a few times, but it was always hot out there during the day and she would retreat back to our lovely cabin. George persevered.

Here is what we think is a termite mound.

As he approached town, George saw a large Buddha on a hill and a water buffalo grazing down below.

The Ping River flows alongside Chiang Dao and George went to check it out. It has some platforms on both shores for folks to rest in the shade. And, with school out, there were children inner tubing in the river.

There is also a temple on the river shore.

According to Wikipedia, in Thailand, white elephants (albino elephants that are also known as Pink Elephants) are sacred and a symbol of royal power; all those discovered are presented to the king (usually this is ceremonial — they are not taken into captivity) and the more white elephants the king has, the greater his standing. The current king owns ten — considered a great achievement, and probably due to modern communications.

The naga protecting the Buddha:

Here were some sights on the way back to the resort:

And after a good long walk, it's great to have a nice dinner of spinach lasagna and duck a l'orange on the balcony with the sun setting behind Doi Chiang Dao.

Pha Dang National Park

We got international driving licenses before we left the US as a contingency but never planned to drive in Thailand, figuring our safety and that of the Thais would not be enhanced by our driving in an environment where we can't read the signs and people drive on the left. So far, that hasn't been a serious impediment: we walk alot, friends drive us, and we use tuk-tuks and songthaews. This resort is a little isolated so, on one of his trips to town, George hooked up with a songthaew driver and exchanged phone numbers trying to explain that he might call the driver if we needed a ride one day.

The hot season is also the low season for this resort. Things have been pretty quiet here, which has been just fine by us. The resort owner is Worawit, a retired Thai National Park Service official and a very thoughtful host. He offered to take us to a waterfall in a national park and wait while we explored. We demurred for a respectable amount of time and then accepted.

There is a beautiful waterfall in the park, and it is named for Her Royal Highness, the Princess Mother, Sri Sung Wan, the mother of the King.

Worawit arranged for a park ranger to guide us on a walk through the national park. We saw figs and jungle bananas.

Worawit also arranged for A, below, and another young Park ranger to guide us on a hike up the mountain. They made wonderful bamboo walking sticks for us. We couldn't have managed the steep climb without them - both the guides and the walking sticks!

There had been a fire in the forest recently. The leaf below shows the effect. The two rangers guiding us had helped to put it out.

Songkran

Thais celebrate the New Year in mid-April. This is a multi-day affair and features lots of water being thrown on people. According to Wikipedia, "The throwing of water originated as a way to pay respect to people, by capturing the water after it had been poured over the Buddhas for cleansing and then using this 'blessed' water to give good fortune to elders and family by gently pouring it on the shoulder. Among young people the holiday evolved to include dousing strangers with water to relieve the heat, since April is the hottest month in Thailand (temperatures can rise to over 100°F or 40°C on some days). This has further evolved into water fights and splashing water over people riding in vehicles."

According to Bangkok.com, traditionally, Thais perform the Rod Nam Dum Hua ritual on the first day of Songkran, which is officially National Elderly Day. During the ritual, young people pour fragrant water into the elders' palms as a gesture of humility and to ask for their blessings. The second day of Songkran is National Family Day. It is traditional for Thais to go back to their family homes to celebrate with family and friends. Families wake up early and give alms to the monks, then spend quality family time together. Devout Buddhists pour fragrant water over Buddha statues both at the temple and at home and engage in Buddhist ceremonies and merit-making activities throughout the holidays.

George walked into Songkran when he went to town on Saturday, April 13.

There are water guns, but mostly there are big buckets of water on the sides of the road and in the back of pick-up trucks and lots of splashing back and forth between those on the roadside and those in the trucks, but also between trucks. Folks on motorbikes get it too. According to Bangkok.com, Thais don't just throw water on each other for fun. The real meaning behind the splashes is to symbolically wash off all misfortunes in the past year, thus welcoming the new year with a fresh new start.

Thailand is called the "Land of Smiles," and that certainly seemed to be an apt name during Songkran. George got a little wet on the first Songkran day he was in town, but the festival went through the 18th and on a later visit he was hit with a bucketful of water as he walked along the side of the main road with his attention on the stores alongside the road. But on a really hot day, it's not too bad to get soaked! When he got to the Ping River, George saw folks gearing up for a party.

There were a lot of people in the river and on both shores.

Vendors were out.

There were lots of games. One looked like a version of bocce or shuffleboard with guys throwing small metal spheres toward an orange marker on the ground.

Bets were placed on a dice game that seemed to be played like roulette.

And there were arcade-like games.

There are a number of Hill tribes in the mountainous North of Thailand and some representatives of those tribes came to the Songkran festival in Chiang Dao. One man approached George speaking English; he is from the Lisu tribe and learned English by being a tour guide for farang.

He facilitated some communication with a group of Lisu women and they said it would be OK to take their picture.

A woman from another tribe, the Akha, approached with trinkets for sale. She agreed to have her picture taken for 20 Baht.

There were a number of vehicles like this in town. George's assumption is that that is soap that washes the vehicle as buckets of water are thrown at it.

Songkran is a fun water festival but it is also a religious festival. George came upon a celebration at a temple on the walk back to the resort and was invited to join. It was a pretty simple temple.

There were offerings set outside the temple. George later noticed these at other temples and along roadsides around town.

He also noticed temples open that he hadn't seen open on earlier trips and festive decorations and sand sculptures at other temples around town.

Wildlife at the Resort

It is always interesting to walk around the resort grounds. Like the gas station in Khemmarat, there are exotic birds in huge cages. There are also some colorful domestic fowl.

And there are beautiful lizards and insects, especially butterflies, throughout the resort grounds.

A Clear Day

Although it is prohibited by the government, many farmers follow the ancient tradition of burning their fields before the rainy season. As a result, there is a lot of smoke in the air, and we had read in the Bangkok Post before we started our trip that smoke was a particular problem in Central Thailand (around Bangkok) and in Northern Thailand (which includes Chiang Dao). We were disappointed on our arrival to find that we could really only see Doi Chiang Dao as a silhouette, that the haze made it impossible to really see any details on the mountain from the resort. But there were some big winds on the evening of Monday, April 15, and when we got up the next morning we were so happy to see it was a clear day. George headed into town. He took a self-portrait with his cell phone to capture a picture with the mountain.

Notice the golden spire near the center of the picture at the bottom of the mountain -- just to the right of a tree. The second picture below shows a close-up of a golden chedi on the mountainside, which we saw much closer the next day.

Dinner that night on the terrace was a special treat, with the mountain in clear view and delicious food, as always, from the resort chef.

On and Beneath Doi Chiang Dao

On April 17, our gracious host Worawit again offered to take us to a popular spot, this time, Chiang Dao Cave. But he dropped us at the Tham Pha Phong Monastic Center and again arranged for a guide to take us on a hike that would end up at the Cave.

While we were waiting for him to make those arrangements, our attention was captured by a beautiful butterfly.

Readers of this blog may recall reading about a "naga," a very large snake that was said to have protected the meditating Buddha during a terrible storm. Most temples have naga figures that one sees as one approaches. There is golden chedi on the side of Doi Chiang Dao and the steps that lead from the Monastic Center to that chedi are guarded by the longest nagas we have seen so far.

It is a long walk up those steps. Buddhist sayings are nailed to trees along the way; contemplation of those messages can help keep one's mind off one's breathlessness.

And then we saw the chedi.

But no time to linger, as Songkran (yes, that's the name of the water festival), our guide, led us on.

After an hour and a half of hiking, we were hot, tired, and sweaty -- ready for some cool, easy cave exploring. It would be easy after our trek through mountainous terrain, we thought.

The caves are under the mountain and are regarded as holy meditation sites. There are religious shrines at various spots in the caves. Legend says the cave complex was the home of a hermit for a thousand years and that he was on such good terms with the deities that he convinced the angels to create seven magic wonders inside the caverns (including a stream flowing from the pedestal of a solid-gold Buddha, a mystical lake, and a sacred immortal elephant) but those wonders are said to be much deeper inside the mountain than tourists can go.

As we hired our guide and got underway, George discovered that it wouldn't be quite as easy as he thought. There were some very small passages between some of the caverns -- our guide kept saying "Watch your HEAD!"