Chiang Mai Doi Inthanon National Park

I have limited experience of organising family outings and especially trying to cater for tastes between awkward teenagers and elderly parents.  In addition, in Thailand, when you ask the question 'What would you like to do?', invariably the reply is 'Up to YOU!'  So it is best to make your own decisions and lo and behold, everyone will follow, possibly groaning and complaining about your choice, but if they do it doesn't show too much.

So it was up to me to decide to take the family on a day's trip to Doi Inthanon National Park, where we were promised a hotel pick up in the mini van, a trip to the highest point in Thailand, a visit to the Royal Pagodas and garden, a quick tour of fine examples of two waterfalls and a visit to a Karen tribe village - and lunch.  I thought this was an impressive menu of delights and should satisfy most of the wishes of the family, and certainly keep us occupied for a day.

The tour was organised by Journey Tours and easily booked by the hotel reception.  The mini van arrived Sunday morning, slightly later than anticipated, but our guide who was called Moon, greeted us all with a broad smile and a warm welcome as we joined the other eight people on board the comfortable mini bus.

About an hour and a half later we entered the National Park and started the long uphill drive to the top of the mountain.  In my former life as a mountaineer I have struggled with acute mountain sickness at 6,000 metres in the Himalaya, I have climbed ten 4,000 metre plus mountains in the Alps and walked up countless mountains in Great Britain.  However, I have never ever driven up a mountain in a mini bus.  I am ashamed to say I have stood on the highest point of Thailand, but actually I got there by a taxi.  My guilt seemed to accentuate when Moon informed us that the mountain was in fact on the eastern edge of the Himalayas!  Guests gasped with gratuitous gratitude and glee, I gulped at my guilt and looked out of the window into the rain, which increased my depression.  Has it all come down to this?

Entrance to the Park and the start of the drive up to the highest point in Thailand

The summit team at Doi Inthanon 2565 metres

Next stop was the site of  pagodas dedicated to Thailand's highly respected King and Queen .  These impressive structures were constructed by the Thai Royal Air Force to commemorate the 60th birthdays of Their Majesties The King and Queen in 1987 and 1992 respectively. Sadly the rain clouds would not part, so instead of spectacular views we got the atmospheric ones.

The Queen's pagoda in the foreground, the King's at the back, the family on the bridge

We then moved on to a waterfall, the name of which escapes me, but it did involve a short walk to its base.  This being the rainy season, the falls where in full flow and quite impressive.

Moon informed us that the park includes three distinct types of forest - rain forest, deciduous and evergreen. Whilst at the rain forest Moon informed us it is distinctive by its growth of fern on the bark.  She scoffed at my joke that it always seemed to rain in a rain forest.

The walk to the falls 

The falls falling and the family looking impressed

A view from down stream

An impressive fern

Next stop was lunch.  This was good and was included in the cost of the trip.  There was plenty of Thai chicken and fish dishes with a smattering of papaya salads, rice etc.  We then walked over to waterfall number two, which was much more impressive than the waterfall one.

First view of waterfall two

Mama and Khamma

Rainbow

 Finally, we made a short trip to a Karen village.  This area of northern Thailand is populated by many hill and forest tribes who are still trying to live their lives in the way of their ancestors.  Modernisation makes it easy to move to the city for a new life, but opportunities are not always what they seem to be.  The Thai government is keen to keep the old traditions alive, at least for the flourishing tourist trade, and invest in keeping the tribes and the their ways of life.  Crafts and agriculture help them and of course group visits like ours help with sales of textiles, coffee and other crafts.

Karen weavers

Karen rice fields

That just about wrapped up the trip.  A great day out for all the family, they were all tired out and fell asleep on the journey back to Chiang Mai - OK I did as well.

Moon did an excellent job, moving round from guest to guest explaining everything in Thai and English.  The driver was called Nick and although he drove very fast, he was good and several times he looked after Mama where the walk or the weather was too much for her.

If you ever decide to go on this tour - make sure you pick Journey Tours.

Click here for Journey Tours Chiang Mai

Royal Flora Ratchaphruek Gardens Chiang Mai

It was Khamma's inspired idea to take the family to Ratchaphruek Gardens for our first afternoon in Chiang Mai.  The weather was grey and dull but it wasn't raining and ideal for walking around this beautiful area of Chiang Mai.

I was a little bit disappointed that there was only a few other people there; maybe because it was a Friday afternoon, but nevertheless more visitors would have added to the atmosphere.  We sauntered around for a couple hours including looking at last year's international exhibition where several countries had a space in which to create a theme representing an image of their country.  It certainly looked looked like last year's stock!  It was ill maintained and in parts very run down.  It was, in part, the old Thai tradition of permanent temporariness. There is a stop and ride service to save you walking between the main sites, which is very useful in rather humid conditions.  

First Time Flyers and Air Asia

Khamma has obviously travelled extensively in the last five years since we met and is now a seasoned air traveller, but her children, Pell (24) and Yo (15) and mother have never been on an aeroplane.  In fact they haven't travelled any great distances at all and none of them have been outside Thailand.  So it was a special family treat to fly from Ubon Ratchathani to Chiang Mai for a short weekend break.  

Air Asia have revolutionised air travel in Asia and Thailand in particular.  Their low cost flying really does make it possible for everyone to fly and it is very affordable even compared to travelling VIP on the bus.  The cost of a return flight from Ubon to Chaing Mai was about £46 and takes just over an hour, compared to the overnight bus which costs about £35 and takes at least 16 hours! 

There are many reasonable hotels in Chiang Mai and we had no problem booking on line for three nights at the Anoma.

As the day drew closer, the family became quite excited about the flight and visiting Chiang Mai.  Mama, has not been too well recently, but she looked forward to the flight, and it seemed that telling her friends in the village about her adventure really perked her up.  Pell and Yo tried to keep cool about the whole thing, but their guard often slipped, especially as Pell was so excited she couldn't sleep the night before.

The flight was faultless and the excitement there for all to see.  After countless flights in my previous career, I had forgotten about the pure joy of travelling, but watching the joy of three people from Thamuang remind me not to be complacent.

Mama, Pell and Yo on their first aeroplane flight