72: Doi Suthep Trip
Friday, January 27th, 2006Went on a Day Trip to Doi Suthep, the nearest mountain to Chiang Mai, on the 27th of January.
Doi Suthep is the location is the location of Wat Prathat Doi Suthep, the Royal Palace and naturally also some Hilltribe Villages.
Wat Phrathat Doi Suthep is one of the most important Temples in Thailand.
“According to this legend, a Buddha relic, which some say glowed, magically replicated just before it was about to be enshrined in the big chedi at Wat Suan Dok. The “cloned” relic was placed on the back of a sacred white elephant, which was allowed to roam where-ever it wanted. The elephant eventually climbed to the top of Suthep Mountain, trumpeted three times, turned around three times, knelt down and died. This was taken as a sign that this was the spot where the relic wanted to be, so King Ku Na built the original of the chedi on Doi Suthep at the end of 14th century” (From: Thailand for Visitors)
I left in the morning around 8am and drove up to Doi Suthep with my motorbike. The road was windy and steep at times and although it was nice and sunny the morning chill was still noticeable especially when driving on a motorbike in T-Shirt. Eventually I decided to put my windproof on since it got too cold which helped (the first time I had to use this in Thailand).
The trip up the hil to the Temple took about 40 minutes and I passed a lot of Monks in their Orange Robes on the way the hill. I reckon they came from the town agfter colecting their daily alms (food) from teh local markets. They usually hit the markets around 6am (they get up at 4am) and it must take them quite a while to walk up the hill again if it took me around 40 minutes to drive!
I reached the Temple around 8:40am, later than I had planned (I didn’t manage to get up early enough;-). It was just about early enough to miss the crowds though the place was far from empty when I got there. The Temple itself split into two parts, an outer area with a potentially nice view over Chiang Mai and an older inner area which housed the Chedi and a few small other buildings around it. There is a Monestry up there too and a Buddhist Center which are on the perimiter of the Temple.
The View from the Temple over Chiang Mai below was supposed to be excellent on a clear day but sadly it was not a clear day at all as you can see in one of the pictures of Doi Suthep. Still it was an interesting visit with a few nice sights. Once I had seen enough of the Temple I had a quick Coffee and Waffle which was available in the outer Temple Area and then left the Temple to drive further up the Hill to the Royal Palace and a Village.
I passed the Royal Palace without stopping since I was keen to see the Hmong Village further up.
I knew beforehand that it was going to be a very touristy place since it is advertised everywhere and probably the most accessible Hmong Village from Chiang Mai.
Sure enough Doi Pui Village was exactly that. A bery busy area of shops squeezed into a modernised Village. Plenty of Clothes and Accesories Stalls, a few food stalls.
I walked past them and a little it uphill which lead me into a little Garden Area around a Waterfall which was clearly design for tourists (entrance 10Baht, 15p). There was not much else to see so I went in and looked around a bit. Nice, but nothing too special and a terribly pathetic waterfall 😀 See the pictures..
There was also an old Woman asking for change who reminded me of a famous postcard.. you will proably know what i mean..
I kept walking uphill after the Garden into an older part of the village and eventually reached some interesting steps further up the mountain. For lack of better opportunities I decided to walk up. After a few minutes of walking up the oldish looking cement stairs I decided that steep stairs like this which a long! (never ending) and going into the Hills must mean another Monestry at the end. I was right 🙂 I reached to top after a good while and found an open area with green grass, two or three building (one of which looking rather uncharacteristic for Thai Buildings and more like Bavarian Forest House maybe?) and an open-air Buddha Temple.
Doi Pui Village Pics are here..
After a quick lunch of a Tofu and Vegetable Stir-Fry in a cheap Eatery where I had a little chat with some locals whom I joined on their table I went back on my motorbike and decided to drive a bit further up the mountain to another (hopefully less-touristy) village which according to the sign was about 7km away.
The drive went through a Forest Road which was Asphlat in a more or less acceptable state 😉
After about 15 mins I reached the end of the road and another sign which seemed to indicate 700m to the village. I was ready to jump off the bike and walk to the Hmong Village thinking it was nearby but Luckily two Forest Worker passed and after checking with them they told me it was still 5km away.. ok so back on my bike.. The only problem was the asphalt road had stopped here and I was now driving on a dirt track. Initially it was not too bad though mostly downhill
but soon the road worsened and I found myself on a track that barely resemebled a road anymore with deep gaps requireing to drive slalom all the time and it would be fairer to call the road a rock track rather than dirt track considering the milltions of large and small stone on the road.
I was confident that it was the right road though and I could see car tracks and even make out prefered motorbike tracks and there had been no junction anywhere since the last sign so I continued in slowmotion down the track hoping my breaks would not give up or a stone puncture a tyre..
It was fun going down that track with my little Scooter but at some point I wondered if I would ever be able to drive back up this road again 🙂
After an 30-40 minutes of carefully driving down that road I reached some civilisation again. I was not yet at the village but a little Farm it seemed which did had a sign offering Fresh Coffee! Excellent 🙂
It was an open air type “cafe” in hill-tribe village style with two old people sitting under the roof offering coffee and even some food too.
I had a cup but had to make do with coffee whitener and regretted not drinking the coffee black in the end..
A few minutes later back on the bike and another 15 mins maybe I had reached a village. I say “a” village because I am not sure if it was the vilage that was sign posted since just before this village was another sign that mentioned another name.
Never mind I walked around the village for a while. Typical hill-tribe houses though only a few on stilts. I fail to remember if the Hmong village I saw before had Stilt-Houses or not. I know for sure that Lahu and Karen Tribes have Stilt-Houses but Hmong escapes my memory at the moment.
Either way I only saw a few people but most of the wore traditional, tribe specific clothes. Some were weaving wool but did not want to be photographed. An old couple neither who played with a baby boy but I came across a family working outside their house who were quite friendly when I approached them and seemed equally interested in me as I was in them. Pictures.
About an hour later I decided to try that road back up the hill and much to myu surprise it was much easier driving uphill than downhill despite the very poor state of the road. I reckon it took me about half the time to drive back on that awful road and it took me to drive down to the village and luckily my motorbike survived the whole trip 🙂
saschas