Lanna 101: new magazine about Northern Thailand (Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, Pai, etc)

If you travel to Thailand or Bangkok, you will probably already know about Bangkok 101 magazine, which is the best-selling lifestyle, travel and 'what's on' type magazine about the great many goings on in that city.

Now comes Lanna 101: your definitive guide to northern Thailand.

It covers the region from Sukhothai north (one of the dramatic ancient capitals, roughly 350km northwards of Bangkok is considered northern Thailand).  So Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai (which turns 750 next year), Pai (Thai tourists' favourite winter retreat), Mae Hong Son (interesting border city), the intriguing The Golden Triangle (where Laos and Burma meet Thailand on the Mekong River),  Loei (near Isaan and the Mekong), and one of my personal favourite cities Nan (an up and coming Pai, full of coffee shops, hanging flower baskets, and a well-preserved Lanna culture).

So what is Lanna? Essentially it was the Kingdom of One Million Rice Fields which spread from what is now eastern Burma down through this region in the 12-18th centuries under the guidance of founder King Mengrai ... well, he wasn't around for all of those 500 years, of course, but you understand what I mean.

The first issue of the magazine is on sale at the news stands NOW, but you can also jump online at www.lanna101.com to see the best of travel, accommodation, arts, community, wellness, nightlife, etc, etc, etc.

It's bloody brilliant. I know, because I edited it, jing jing.

Amazing Thailand is Going Green ... who's responsible?

Thailand is going green. Don’t worry it’s got nothing to do with radioactive fallout from Japan or some mysterious tropical ailment. Rather, it’s the concerted sustainable tourism direction the industry is now taking throughout Amazing Thailand ...

At the recent Thailand Travel Mart Plus 2011 forum, the theme was ‘Caring for the Earth’ and eco travel was pushed to the top of the agenda.

In his keynote address, Tourism Authority of Thailand Governor Suraphon Svetasreni addressed the topic:

“The need to reconcile the economic and ecological impact of travel and tourism is critical to the Balanced Strategy that we are pursuing as part of of our tourism development policies. There is no doubt that so many millions of foreign and domestic tourists lead to high emissions of greenhouse gases and other forms of environmental impact. Hence it is the responsibility of the entire industry to help mitigate this impact.”

TAT has long been championing this direction, by introducing the 7 Greens Concept in 2008, with an aim of promoting environmentally friendly tourism, plus introducing the Green Leaf Certification system, something along the lines of a hotel star-rating system for green travel.

Northern Thailand in particular offers an abundance of ecologically pristine areas, especially Mae Hong Son province, arguably one of the most beautiful parts of Thailand. Its major centre, Pai, (which I’ve blogged about before here) celebrates its 100^th anniversary this year. If you love mountain trekking, river rafting, etc, this is the place the head for.

For more information on Thailand Goes Green, see www.tourismthailand.org/greet

Northern Thailand blanketed in snow ...

Road inside Chiang Mai University campus

I was greeted by an amazing sight in Chiang Mai this morning ... snow!!!

I couldn't believe my eyes. Snow at this time of year -- April. Hold on, I thought. I'm now back in Thailand. It should be around 40 degrees celsius at this time leading up to the Songkhran festival, where the nation douses each other in water to cool off and have a few laughs in the name of New Year.

As far as the eye can see, Chiang Mai has been transformed into a Christmas card scene. Doi Suthep -- a wonderful wall of white with the golden temple on top.

All the neighbours' kids are out screaming and running around with excitement, and I can see young James next door starting on a snow man with his maid down the bottom of the garden.

A quick check with some friends as far afield as Chiang Rai, Pai and Mae Hong Son reveals they too are enjoying this freak occurrence, which is apparently brought to us by a low pressure system over China. So much for global warming.

It has snowed only once in Thailand before, in Chiang Rai in the 1950s, jing jing.

So this is so cool, literally. None of us who've seen this amazing vista of Chiang Mai carpeted in snow will ever forget this day.






 

Unbelievable fun in Pattaya

Unbelievable: a family attraction in Pattaya!

So let's say it's raining in Pattaya and you need to kill a couple of hours. Or your sun burn has been diagnosed as blisteringly radio-active and you don't want to go near the beach again -- ever!

Well, you can always slide off to the Tahitian Queen bar as usual. However this is not recommended if it's only 11am and you have the family in tow. So ...

The pilot was later breath-tested

Head for Ripley's Believe It or Not! at Royal Garden Plaza, slap-bang in the middle of Pattaya's increasingly interesting Beach Road. You can't miss it -- it's the building with the big red DC-3 carelessly crash landed on the 3rd floor.

Ripley's is really a 5-in-1 attraction offering the Museum (where you could spend a whole day gawking at the weird and wonderful exhibits), the 4D Moving Theater (billed as 'the wildest simulator ride in the world'), the Infinity Maze (a mesmerizing series of optical mazes and illusions), Haunted Adventure (a ghoulish walk through various nightmarish scenarios with real live actors), and finally, there's Louis Tussaud's waxworks.

The dummy made more sense than the real Becks.

At the latter, you can rub shoulders with Jackie Chan, Will Smith, Posh and Becks, have a laugh with Eddie Murphy, and laugh at Paris Hilton (well, what else are you supposed to do with that bimbo?)

Ripley seemed to have a fascination with two-headed cows (no, not Posh and Becks), three-legged horses and the like. Freakish. He also introduced the western world to the Padaung women with 15" necks, which you now can see any day of the week in hill-tribe villages in Mae Hong Song, jing jing.

But Ripley's childlike fascination with the crazy, the creepy, and the colourful, makes for a very memorable and thoroughly entertaining half day for everyone in the family. And the same can't necessarily be said for Walking Street!

[cue voice-over effect] Believe It or Not ...

For more: see www.ripleysthailand.com

The Ultimate Caffeine Trip ...

Pai Now cafe made the town of Pai famous ...

I just did Route 1095 from Chiang Mai to Pai and Mae Hong Son, and may I suggest that the 280km road hereinafter ever be known as 'The Caffeine Corridor'.

You see the curving, meandering, side-winding road has around 1100 curves in it, and -- by my unofficial count -- conservatively about one coffee shop per corner.

But what's great is there is not a Starbucks in sight. All these are home-grown coffee shops. Real cafes. Usually with charm. And art. And a smile. And, most importantly, coffee to keep you alert along the often precipitous route.

My favourite is probably Pankled, which is only about 50km or so out of Chiang Mai near the Mork Fah waterfall turn-off. A love swing seat. Acres of landscaped lawns. Paper umbrellas. Original silk-screen prints hanging in the toilets.

Then you get to the hill just before Pai and there are at least 20 coffee places perched on the hill, the most famous being Coffee in Love. Little known fact: You are not allowed in to the town of Pai unless you can show them digital photographic proof that you have stopped and taken a cheesy or cutesy photo there. Really: there are military roadblocks to enforce this, jing jing.

In Pai itself, Pai Now is the most famous coffee shop. In fact, you could say that that coffee shop spawned the town because of it's appearance in the Thai movie Pai in Love. Of course there are hundreds of imitators all over the place.

By now, your hands are already shaking violently, eyeballs popping and threatening to spring from their sockets.

Then every Ma and Pa shop on the way to Mae Hong Song dishes up coffee, coffee, and more coffee, all grown in the nearby northern Thailand tablelands of course.

It's Gonzo travel with a difference. Great trip, man!

Problem is, I won't be coming down for at least a week ...

Khun Yuam -- A Long March from Tokyo!

Pushing further on this bikescapade from Mae Hong Son, the next day is a bite-sized chunk of a few hundred kilometres of winding mountain roads (wooooohoooooooooooooo!!!) to Khun Yuam, the site of a Japanese military memorial which has always intrigued me.

Just seven kilometres south of MHS we stop at a breathtaking lookout, where a friendly chappy is stoking a fire on which a blackened kettle rests. We sit, rugged up against the cold (combination of altitude and inclement weather) and enjoy a big mug of coffee, a cup of tea, and a banana all for 30 baht -- that's ONE Aussie dollar!

I could've spent hours here, enjoying the solitude of this glorious spot, but it's back in the saddle, through the brilliant wide sweeps of this mountain pass. The quality of roads is continually surprising me. We bank left and right, left and right for hours until we ramble into Khun Yuam, and check into the Farang Hotel (talk about market segmentation!)

For 600 baht single (700 baht double) you get a room with nice warm shower, set on a hillside in the bush, with frogs and birds providing a natural chorus.  Oh, brekky's included in the price, too.
A friend of mine, Reid, who runs motorcycle tours made this observation about motorcycle touring in Thailand: 'It's the best place in the world to ride, because apart from the great scenery and attractions, you can have a really cheap bum massage at the end of every day and it costs you nothing.'

Well, not exactly nothing, but for 200 baht, nearly nothing. Jing jing!

After a great massage and siesta, we venture out into the big smoke. Nightlife consisted pretty much of one dingy karaoke place and an internet cafe. But next door to it was a perfectly fine noodle place where we enjoyed fried omelette, mixed veggies and stir-fried chicken and basil all for 50 baht (including a bottle of water!) They must have seen us coming.

Dinner was enlivened by a young guy from Malmo, Sweden whom I'll call Sven. He'd been fired from his job and was travelling through Asia for four months (as you do). He was planning to go to Pai then someone suggested he do the Mae Hong Son loop ... on a scooter! Not only had he blown his daily budget on renting a scooter (no more than 200 baht per day, maximum) but it'd taken him several days to make it this far. He was dead dog tired, and drunk on half a beer, and went home to collapse at 8pm.

Don't laugh, I was asleep by nine! The concentration of riding mountain roads really takes it out of you. I will go and look at that Japanese Memorial tomorrow ...

Mae Hong Son -- The long and winding road ...

The road from Pai to Mae Hong Son is a red squiggle on the GT Rider Map (the best maps of northern Thailand by the way, created by avid Aussie motorcyclist, David Unkovich). But, depending on your stomach for adventure, it is either a wet dream or an unending nightmare. For me, I love the winding curves, hairpins, switchbacks and can do these all day, every day. Gaining hundreds of metres in altitude in a flash. For my companion, she often has to stop to recalibrate her sense of balance (or otherwise fill the helmet with the contents of her stomach).


For me, this road a wet dream. Winding, climbing. Beautiful lush green primary jungle. Hill tribe villages. Caves. Hot springs.

Soon, we reach Sopong, where the Sopong River Inn (named creatively thus because it’s an inn on the side of the river at Sopong) is a welcome retreat with its almost Balinese design aesthetic, and the soothing sound of gushing water below.

Sopong is a sleepy place with not much doing. The main industry seems to be an Immigration Checkpoint (it’s only a few kilometers from the Burma border here, and there are tens of thousands in refugee camps in this area, plus ethnic minority hilltribes too).

A walk down the hill finds only one place recognizable as a restaurant/bar. It’s called The Border, and its owner is an amiable Pommie named Andy. ‘I’ve proved you can get around the Mae Hong Son loop just as fast on a small bike as a big bike,’ the keen motorcyclist says. ‘Sixteen hours, non-stop.’ Cripes! I do the math, that’s averaging around 75 kilometres an hour for the loop which we’re following. Jing Jing! That means he’d be sharpening his foot-pegs on all the hairpin bends for sure!

We enjoy tom yam soup, omelette and a small Singha beer for 150 baht. His customers are a mix of Thais enjoying a good solid drink. ‘Technically we’re open till 1 am, but as most of my customers are policemen, it’s till whenever I get rid of them,’ he says, adding a few colourful closing time stories of officers not being in a really fit state to drive or ride.

I dig into a few more Singhas.
It’s at this point I wish I’d brought the motorbike down into town with me. After all, the Singha had magically cured the numbness of my bum from the day's ride, and all the police were still inside the Border getting drunk anyway.

It was a long slow walk uphill to bed that night ...