After being in Cambodia and Vietnam, arriving in Thailand felt luxurious. We were amazed at the freeways, and the really nice pedestrian backpacker area downtown. Stores looked like stores, instead of the living rooms of tiny houses, there are sidewalks with room to walk on them, and most people drive cars instead of motos. The food is recognizable, and many people speak at least a little bit of English. Thailand is "easy".
We spent our day in Bangkok eating all the delicious treats from the sidewalk carts - fruit bowls with muesli, rice balls filled with coconut custard, roasted corn on the cob, and of course pad thai. There are also a ton of markets and fun shopping to do. Along with the great people watching, it felt like we were at a fair!
The next day we boarded our train that was going to take us to a little city in the mountains called Chiang Mai. The ride is about 16 hours long, so we opted for the sleeper car. Most Thai people pay for the third class seats, which are basically like on a bus, but in our car the seats turned in to beds - I felt very privileged! The train was fun, Jordi and I sat facing each other with a huge open window that you could stick your head out, and see the people next door sticking their heads out as well :) We passed through the beautiful green countryside full of rice fields and distant mountains. When it got dark people started coming up the isle selling various dinner foods. Around 8, a guy came around and changed everybody's seats into beds. Although luxury compared to people in 3rd class, the train is not exactly clean or beautiful. But it was functional, and after dusting the insect wings off our beds we eventually fell asleep. Our train rolled in around 6:30 AM (we left at 2:30 PM), and we found ourselves in Chiang Mai.
We got to our hotel and took cold showers (after 16 hours on a train, hot water would have been nice, but oh well) and went on the search for breakfast. Many hippies and health nuts have paved the way in Chiang Mai, and you can get better food here than in Santa Cruz or Encinitas, it's amazing! Every other store is a bookstore, and every other restaurant offers whole wheat toast, soy milk, vegan curries, or all fruit smoothies. I was in heaven ;)
Our hotel had a pool, so we definitely took advantage of that, which was really nice! After our day exploring Chiang Mai and hanging by the pool, we spent one night at our hotel before going off on our Trekking Adventure through the jungle.....
We spent our day in Bangkok eating all the delicious treats from the sidewalk carts - fruit bowls with muesli, rice balls filled with coconut custard, roasted corn on the cob, and of course pad thai. There are also a ton of markets and fun shopping to do. Along with the great people watching, it felt like we were at a fair!
The next day we boarded our train that was going to take us to a little city in the mountains called Chiang Mai. The ride is about 16 hours long, so we opted for the sleeper car. Most Thai people pay for the third class seats, which are basically like on a bus, but in our car the seats turned in to beds - I felt very privileged! The train was fun, Jordi and I sat facing each other with a huge open window that you could stick your head out, and see the people next door sticking their heads out as well :) We passed through the beautiful green countryside full of rice fields and distant mountains. When it got dark people started coming up the isle selling various dinner foods. Around 8, a guy came around and changed everybody's seats into beds. Although luxury compared to people in 3rd class, the train is not exactly clean or beautiful. But it was functional, and after dusting the insect wings off our beds we eventually fell asleep. Our train rolled in around 6:30 AM (we left at 2:30 PM), and we found ourselves in Chiang Mai.
We got to our hotel and took cold showers (after 16 hours on a train, hot water would have been nice, but oh well) and went on the search for breakfast. Many hippies and health nuts have paved the way in Chiang Mai, and you can get better food here than in Santa Cruz or Encinitas, it's amazing! Every other store is a bookstore, and every other restaurant offers whole wheat toast, soy milk, vegan curries, or all fruit smoothies. I was in heaven ;)
Our hotel had a pool, so we definitely took advantage of that, which was really nice! After our day exploring Chiang Mai and hanging by the pool, we spent one night at our hotel before going off on our Trekking Adventure through the jungle.....
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