During my volunteer programme in northern Thailand, we went on a three-day homestay, to teach English to Buddhist monks in a temple. We were always given top-notch hospitality and care when we were at the temple, and the staff were very friendly. This is a picture of a lunch that we were served on the second day. It was like a noodle soup with chicken feet. I’ll be honest and say that I didn’t eat the chicken feet but I ate everything else.
So the collection of photos above is from Chiang Rai city centre. We only went here a couple of times, as it was a 30-40 minute taxi ride from where we were. Thailand is famous for foot massages and I can understand why, after receiving a few of them. The plates above show a range of different fried insects I saw at the Chiang Rai night market. I am generally quite open with food…but nope… sorry…I did not eat any insects! I did try Durian thought which Thailand is quite famous for. The next picture is of a Korean barbecue place we ate at one evening. It feels so good to cook your own food at a restaurant table.
We visited Wat Rong Khun (the white temple), which is arguably the most famous attraction in Chiang Rai. It was absolutely beautiful, and I don’t think that you can find anything like it. There were many sculptures of hands and heads on pitchforks. You have to dress conservatively in temples so I opted for an orange midi dress and wrapped a leopard print scarf around my shoulders.
I was fortunate enough to be in Thailand during “Vesak” (Buddha Day), which is probably the most religious day of the year for Buddhists. The volunteer company arranged for us to go and see the rituals in a temple. People held candles and walked around the temple in circles. A religious chant was playing on a loudspeaker in the background. I remember feeling at peace and even went to sit inside the temple for a while whilst people were praying.
This is a random snap of the volunteer accommodation…and yes we were in the middle of the wilderness. To get to breakfast we had to walk past a pond, and there were chickens roaming around the place. We actually found a scorpion in our dorm room…and screamed like mad!
This was on the way to visiting the Golden Triangle, we stopped at a coffee shop and ordered yoghurt smoothies. I ordered a blueberry smoothie which was nice but way too big to finish, and nope that is not chicken in case you were wondering. It is a fried banana snack that tasted delicious.
We went to the Golden Triangle which is the border between Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar. We went to the House of Opium Museum once we got there. Then we took a boat over the border to Donsao Island in Laos. When we reached the island, there were market stalls everywhere. Some stalls had whiskey with snakes inside the bottles! I also saw a monkey for the first time in my life. It was just floating around on the road.
Choui Fong Tea Plantation is a beautiful place. We went to the Cafe and I ordered a green tea flavoured ice tea.
Baan Dam Museum was very interesting to see. This museum can be described as…unique to say the least. It was full of statues of skulls, horns, and penises. I would recommend this to anyone visiting Chiang Rai as it was really interesting :-).
Do you want to see more of my time in Chiang Rai? Then click here to read the diary I kept during my volunteer programme.
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