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Day 6 - Phitsanulok to Chiang Mai
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After another less than wonderful night's sleep (this time on the night train), we arrived at 07:30 in Chiang Mai, entry point to the northern mountains and with more temples per metre sq than Bangkok apparently, over 300 in total.
From the station we got a tuk-tuk straight to our guest house...
...which comes complete with a pool, much to Katie's delight !!
When we got to the hostel we went straight to bed, for some much needed sleep, and after a walk down to a falafel place for some lunch we just chilled out, in amongst the odd rain shower.
I'm hoping to catch the England v Israel game later tonight but unfortunately all the bars seem to have "LIVE RUGBY TONIGHT" signs outside, little realising that this is about as appealing to me as "FREE KICK IN THE NUTS WITH EVERY BEER" !!
Saw that the Argies beat the French in the rugby earlier though, good work you Puma legends ! Sorry Froggies ! ;)
Just discovered to my horror that the England FOOTBALL game kicks off at 5pm UK time which is 11pm local time... I still fancy it but not sure I'll be awake after about 5 hours sleep in the last 3 nights ?!
After the last entry we popped out for a quick walk, and to find some dinner. We found this LOVELY little place in the middle of nowhere which had no other customers, but excellent food, plus the friendliest service we've ever received !
Northern Thai food is noticeably different to the type you find outside Thailand, I had a chicken curry which was hot but in a different way to normal. It was like a really subtle heat that warmed your whole mouth at once ?! It was lush.
Katie loved her prawn & fruit salad, and her vegetables in oyster sauce, and we shared some prawn fried rice, mmmm.... We pushed the boat out and had desert this time, a weird Chinese jelly with syrup served with ice (10B) and a small banana in coconut milk (15B), so 2 x deserts for less than 50p !
(Note that I'm wearing my Liverpool shirt in anticipation of the game against Israel !)
We managed to find the game being shown in a bar right next to our guest house, which was perfect. It started at 11pm but I didn't want to miss it. We walked in, no-one was watching the tv so asked if they would mind turning over for the footie. Just as the teams walk out 2 English guys (let's call them "Ray" and "Raul") start complaining because they wanted to watch the rugby. Luckily more people in the bar wanted to watch the football, so that's exactly what we did ! Job done ;)
I thought we played really well, it was good to see Big Emile back, even if a) he lost that bet for me last year and b) he couldn't hit a barn door from 2 paces. Clearly he brings out the best in Owen and the Israelis couldn't handle his strength. Seems weird to pick a striker who can't score, but he definitely did well for the team. I also thought Barry was excellent, Stevie G drove us forward like he does Liverpool (for once !), Joey Cole did well, so did SWP, and our defence had nothing to do and thankfully nor did our keeper. Good result, we could have beaten them 8-0.
The bar we watched the game in was absolutely FULL of weirdos, Katie thought that we had unwittingly become "nutter magnets" ! There was a very weird old French guy in front of us who kept talking rubbish to us while I was trying to watch, then in came a psycopathic English guy who kept talking to himself, and finally they were joined by this Danish guy who ordered a half bottle of whisky and kept telling us that he "loved to party" !! It was a real freak-fest, but it proved quite entertaining. We did get the hell out of there as soon as the whistle went though.
I guess that any foreigners who come to live in Chiang Mai full time must be a bit weird ? There is a lot of opium over here which is easily available (apparently), and I was reading in the paper that Thailand has a real problem with methamphetamine also. You do see the odd person sniffing stuff out of bags on street corners, and there are definitely some pretty 'wired' people walking around...
After the game finished we ended the night at 1am and set the alarm for 10am to catch up on our beauty sleep.
We both really like Chiang Mai, it has a VERY relaxed atmosphere and a nice vibe to it. Great food, nice bars, lots of temples, only 1.6m people, and loads to do.
We've decided not to do a hike until we get to Laos, despite all the treks offered here (normally 3 day ones), but we're hoping to have our first Thai massage (no extras !) tomorrow, and Katie would like to find a cooking course if we have time...
Ok, night night, don't let the bed bugs bite !!
Al & Katie xx
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