November 3rd: Chiang Mai day 3

So we arrived in Chang Mai in the evening of the first. It was a super quick flight (about 1:20 long). The flight was the first time we really saw how bad the flooding was. Looking out the window on the way north was awe shocking. It looked like there was a sea of ice with tiny little cracks in it. It was all water with little rows of foliage sticking out here and there as far as the eye could see. It was amazing, in the true sense of the word.

I immediately liked Chang Mai better. Flying in was beautiful with mountains surrounding field after field of rice crops. It was beautiful.

The place where we're are staying sent someone to pick us up. The vehicle we were picked up in is called a "song thaew", which I think literally translates to "two rows". Its a pickup truck with 2 benches in the bed with a cover on it. Turns out that how most people get around up here (Chang Mai). It was actually a blast. We had been siting on the airplane all stuffy and left over sweaty from our trek to the airport in Bangkok, and now we got to soak in the open breeze. Open breeze that didn't reek of pollution (it reeked a little bit of car exhaust but we were in the back of a truck in some traffic-what do you expect :).

The guest house we're staying at is called The Secret Garden. We have our own little house on the beautiful property. I'd say there are about 10 other lodgings as well as the owners house. It's beautiful. It kid of reminds me of the place we stayed in Maui, full of lush beautiful gardens with orchids and other flowers everywhere. The couple who owns the place are really nice as well. It's a German man and a Thai woman, both very helpful. We settled in that first night and went to bed early again (we've been getting up at 6:00 am every day!). The next day we explored Chang Mai.

The Secret Garden is about 3km out of the city so we rode the "bus" (another song thaew) in and went from there. We walked around and visited more Wats, all of them old and beautiful. The last one we went to was Wat Phra Singh where there was a Buddhist monk sitting in between 2 human replica statues of his predecessors. The sincerest of his stillness was beautiful. The only difference between him and the statues was he was not bronze.
We finished of yesterday with a brief trip into the Warorot Market which holds all kinds of goodies. And then grabbed the bus back home to the 7/11 where our hosts pick us up to drive us the remainder in. All we have to so is call them from the pay-phone and they come get us. Only problem is we couldn't figure out the pay phone. As soon as a white person walked by we asked for help. Thankfully she was the english speaking type of white person. She was from eastern Canada but has been living in Thailand for at least 30+ years. She called our guest house from her cell phone and spoke in Thai to the owner. It was pretty bad-ass. Her Thai was amazing. And thanks to her we made it home in time to shower and still make it to family dinner!

Now to today. We're having a slow morning since we're not in any rush to get out early today. We'll be going to the night bizarre so we'll be out late. But we're going to start back at Warorot market and give it the proper time it deserves then head to the aquarium for a break from the heat and sun. Then we'll hit the bizarre.

Hopefully you were able to put up with my marathon post! Here's some picture for you're patience!