Wat Phra Singh, the Night Market and the Food….omg, the food!

Wat Phra Singh. We just sort of stumbled upon it. It’s the first one we’ve visited and it’s hard to imagine just how old these structures are, and how beautiful.

The streets. Narrow and busy but oh so interesting. You’ve got to keep your eyeballs in front and also at the back of your head because there is no “flat” sidewalk type terrain on which to walk. Cars drive within a few feet of us leaving little room for comfort. What itty bitty sidewalk there is is shared with trees, hydro poles, parked vehicles of all descriptions. We established a strategy for crossing the road—look for a gap and run like heck!

All roads lead to food. Food! It’s literally on every corner—deliciously yummy Khao soi (a northern Thai noodle dish), fermented sausage, padthai, curries that look and smell scrumptious.

The Night Market. It’s truly amazing and you’d better prepare to shop (and eat). This is where you see Thai silk, sample deep fried scorpions, watch some young Thai men dressed in drag, find singing bowls….and eat more food.

Enough words. Pictures are better

The looooooong flight(s), sharing the “wrong” side of the road, Jet. Lag—Bring on Chiang Mai! What shall we do with our six weeks?

20 hours in-flight wears a little thin but EVA Air was great (highly recommended!). Our flight booking included a “Seafood” meal option which of course we chose. Good choice! Shrimp & scallop pasta, seafood quiche, and lovely salmon salad sandwiches. We ate well. We felt like we scored big when the third seat went unoccupied for the 15 hour flight from Toronto to Taipei. We departed in the middle of the night and never saw daylight till Taipei. When the plane landed we curiously noted an absence of that standard “applause” for a safe-landing—which we’ve never understood anyways—a smooth safe landing is kind of an expectation of ours rather than an applause-worthy bonus.

Our first night accommodation is in the Old City part of Chiang Mai and just 4km from the airport so we decided to unbox and reassemble our bikes then negotiate the traffic on our own, skipping the whole taxi biz. With our tired, fuzzy-brains (no brains!), we rolled out two hours later, riding on the left side of the road here in Thailand and it’s a hairy situation for our right-brained selves. There is no 1m rule here, there’s no bike lane, and there’s a lot of traffic. Crosswalks? Ha! They mean nothing.

We somehow made it to our AirBnB in one piece. Our grand plans to nap then go out for an evening explore have been overridden by intense jet lag. We are exactly 12 hours time difference here—8am at home means 8pm here. Hoping to recalibrate our body clocks in the next two days, we will then pedal out for six weeks of unknowns—no reservations, no route maps, no expectations. Just a general direction toward Trat and some islands near Cambodia then Bangkok. We have no idea what each day will bring, it’s just part of the adventure!