Day 4 - Chiangmai - 15/8

Time to fly back home to Kuala Lumpur and we are all geared up for at Thai massage.

We decided to try the Thai massage at the shop just next to the hotel. I opted for the oil massage as I heard that Thai massages tend to be very painful. Slightly expensive at 300 bt it was really good. 

Before the massage we tried to look for the white tomyam but the lady did not open the stall. We settled for some anchovies and took it to a cafe nearby for a hot drink. After the cafe, we checked in for the massage.

It was good and relaxing but the massage ladies asked for tips which we found rather obnoxious. 

For breakfast T bought a Thai pancake to eat at the hotel.

It tasted sweet and crispy at the same time. The stuffing tasted like eggs and coconut cream while the toppings were coconut shreds and carrot.

We went early by private car to the airport. The hotel arranged a nice car for us but we had arrived rather early. At the airport, we looked for gifts to buy home. The only thing we could buy with our funds was seaweed and some nuts. You see we had used up all our bhats!

For lunch, we decided to try the kao soy and I had tea latte. T had to have his black coffee without sugar.

The flight was delayed by 2 hours but we were given Macdonalds for dinner.

Farewell Chiangmai - I will return to buy the wooden amplifiers and the handmade wallets at Wua Lai and Ratchadamnoen for friends.

Chiangmai - Day 3 - 14/8

Today is my birthday. I turn 57 this day!

We woke up bright and early. The van that will take us sightseeing was coming at 7:30 am. We had booked a full day tour up the mountains to the highest peak in Thailand - Doi Inthanon. 

The tour include a visit to the king and queen garden built specially for the king's 60th birthday. 

Lesson 4 - bring enough money so that you can sign up for better tour trips like the Doi Inthanon tour!

We almost missed this fascinating tour as we had insufficient funds until we found out that the tour company allowed us to pay with card.

Excited, we make the 2 hour journey to Doi Inthanon with a break at one of the highway stops. I found an Amazon cafe and enjoyed the green tea latte again. I had become hooked! Probably from the green tea latte I took in Hokkaido so much so that everywhere I went I had to look for the same latte that I had tasted and drank!

 Doi Inthanon was cold. The temperature about 15%C but it was clear and refreshing. We walked the nature trail and admired the trees and flowers. 

After the trip to the top, our van took us to the king and queen garden. Beautiful flower gardens adorned 2 pagodas dedicated to the king and queen. They were built for them when the king turned 60. I did not go up to the pagoda-like structure as I felt that it was like a temple.

However the flower gardens were really enjoyable. We then visited the Hmong market on the way down. We saw many types of nuts and local sweets but no coffee.

We had lunch at the king's station a place opened by the late king of Thailand to provide employment for the local people. All kinds of vegetables, fruits, chicken and fish were bred there. The restaurant served lunch which was cooked from the produce freshly harvested from the station to the tour group - 2 ladies from Barcelona, a couple from Singapore and us. 

We then made our way to the karen village. Here we sampled the best coffee freshly ground (by the way I am not a coffee fan but T is) and T decided to buy their freshly ground. The fragrance of the coffee was intoxicating. According to T, they were the best coffee he had ever drank.

Final stop, the beautiful Watchirathan waterfall meaning diamond waterfall. Indeed the falling waters look like diamond drops from afar. It was so cool and refreshing. We could have stayed there whole day enjoying the splashing cool waters.

We reached about 5:30 pm at our hotel. After a short rest and shower, we were ready for Khun Toke!

Khun Toke is a traditional Thai restaurant serving Thai dishes in a big platter and with traditional seating places on the floor and long tables. We opted for the tables. While we dined we were treated to traditional Thai dancers from the many different tribes in Thailand.

The dancing was lovely and graceful. The food was unique. We were served many kinds of dishes in small bowls. Waiters continually refill the dishes upon request - chicken, pork, pork skin, vegetables, sweet potatoes, sweet sauce - it was simply delicious.

At the end of the dinner, we were invited to join the dancers on stage with guidance from the dancers themselves!

Later when we got back to the hotel, we were surprised to received a small cake and fruits - compliments from the hotel to celebrate my birthday!

A memorable birthday indeed!

Chiangmai - Day 2 - 13/8

We booked a half day tour today with the hotel.

Lesson 3 - when booking tours, book the ones that the hotel has to offer to avoid being taken for a ride.

Our guide was a pretty lady called Chanya (managed to give a tract to her) who took us to 2 places: the CM orchid and butterfly farm and the Maesa Elephant Camp.

If you are into orchids, you can buy pretty real orchids that have been preserved and made into brooches and necklaces.

Whilst the orchid and butterfly farm was nothing to shout about, the Maesa Camp was simply fascinating. There are many camps in CM but each elephant camp will specialize in different things. This camp specializes in elephant drawings! Yes, elephants who can draw beautiful pictures with their trunks!

Firstly we were taken to the elephant feeding enclosure. We took photos with some elephants and then went for the elephant ride (the price we paid is all in). We sat in a sedan chair atop an elephant. Up and down a small hillock the elephant and the mahoot took us. Even with my braces, I found the ride very comfortable and enjoyable.

The highlight was the elephant show. Elephants paraded, played football, threw darts, gave massages to their trainers and finally a few selected elephants drew beautiful pictures with their trunks. The pictures were sold at about 2k to 3k bt per painting. One painting stood out. A young elephant had painted a baby elephant and a mother elephant and drawn the words "Mum"! Wow!

At the shop we saw the biggest elephant painting done by a group of elephants that were entered into the Guiness book of records. It was so beautiful. Elephants can draw better than me!

After this trip, we took the hotel van to Ninmanhaemin road (something like Bukit Bintang in KL). We had red tomyam and pineapple fried rice at a small restaurant.

Amazon cafe is somewhere inside here. Best green tea latte....

While T explored the rest of the street, I decided to rest at the Amazon cafe (this seems to be a chain of cafes in CM that is quite popular). I simply love the green tea latte.

At night we went to Ratchadomnoen, a market that was only set up on Sunday night. Surprise, surprise, God heard my prayer, the lady who sold the wallet I wanted was there too! So I did manage to buy my wallet after all.

Edible insects like crickets and grasshoppers

The Thais are very friendly and hospitable. I could not walk the whole length of this 1 km plus market and decided to rest in a cafe. I only ordered a blueberry soda but the owners let me sit down for over 2 hours. They even allowed us to buy noodles from outside the cafe to eat inside the cafe. This restaurant is smack in the middle of the night market. Remember this place - Ratchadamnoen cafe somewhere in the middle of the Ratchadamnoen night market. Food and drinks are reasonable, owners are hospitable!

Lesson 4 - while at the night market, if you find something you like buy it as you may not have a chance to go back there again!

Chiangmai - Day 1 - 12 Aug 2017

Chiangmai is so fun! 

So many things to do and see and to buy too! Simply unforgettable. I love this city so much that I am determined to return to buy some of the most unique stuff that I have never seen anywhere else before. I am glad that I bought them here at Chiangmai!

Day 1

We were in Chiangmai (CM) to celebrate my 57th birthday. We touched down at the airport safely after a bumpy ride on the plane.

Realizing that we had only brought about RM1.5k worth of baht with us we had to save money. We rejected the offer of the airport van (300 bt) for a drive to our hotel in town. Finally we found a tuk-tuk who will take us to Holiday Inn for only 150 bt. 

Lesson 1 - take the tuk-tuk if you do not have too many bags. We only took one suitcase and 2 backpacks with us. There are also taxis that do not charge a bomb. 

We took a walk to the market near the hotel for lunch. We bought some delicious packed salads for only 150 bt at the market and also ate delicious white tomyam. I have not eaten white tomyam for a long long time. Usually the tomyam back home is the red tomyam with the coconut spiciness. For the first time after more than 20 years, I tasted white tomyam. The taste was sourish but just how I like it. Thai food has lots of vegetables, basil leaves and sprouts. Very healthy.

We resolved to come back to the market for lunch again as the tomyam was yummy!

At the hotel, I rested my knees as it was not check in time yet while T walked to the Waroro market to buy black garlic. He came back with more than black garlic, he also brought some dried longan. Dried longan tasted horrid. Like something stale and kept in the store for a long time. 

I prefer to soak them in water till they looked like normal longan!

I slept at the lobby from 12 - 2 pm.

The hotel staff was kind to let us check in early. After sleeping till about 4 pm, we took the hotel van (to save costs) to the Wua Lai market. This walking night market is about 1.4 km long. To walk from end to end (slow walk) is about 2 hours or more. You need to rest in between if you have knee problems like me. However by God's grace I was not in pain as much as before. I did not even wear my braces. I enjoyed every stall. Unique and inventive stuff were being sold at this night market.

Wua Lai is only a weekend market thus you need to be in CM on a Sat to experience it.

At WL we ate tungfun, fruit juices (very cheap at 50 bt) and healthy. I decided to stop halfway through as the market was just too long. While I ate spring roll, T continued his adventure. 

Many unique things are sold here. A lot of them was handmade stuff and reflected the cottage industry of CM.

I saw a really nice wallet for 170 bt but hesitated to buy as I wanted to bargain to 150 bt. The young lady said she made them herself and refused to reduce further. Regretted not buying it as I could not find a similar wallet. It was beautiful with lots of flowery designs and many pockets for cards (which is important for me as I have over 10 cards that I carry everywhere with me!).

However I prayed for God to help me find it at Ratchadamnoen. God is great and He heard my prayer. Will share later on this.

Halfway walking at the market, the Thai national anthem started playing. Everyone froze. We stood up and listen to the anthem. It was so respectful of the Thais. I was so touched by this.

I waited at a market place where a young man with his set of amplifiers played English and Thai songs all night long. Many foreigners gave him money as they passed by. Save that the sound was too loud for my ear drums, it was a good place for me to rest.

Almost 2 hours passed and I was getting worried. The hotel van will come back at 9 pm. If T was late, we would have to take a tuk-tuk back as we could ill afford it as our funds were limited.

Lesson 2 - when travelling to CM make sure you carry at least 30k bt if you love to shop, shop like me!

T came back in time. He bought a wooden handphone stand cum amplifier. It was handmade but really awesome. I loved it so much so I asked T to go back and buy me another one. That was the mistake. The crowd had swelled so much by then that people jam prevented him from coming back fast enough.

I prayed really hard for T to make it in time with my handphone amplifier! Finally I saw his head bobbing among the crowds. We walked really fast from the middle of the market to the pick-up place. We just made it!

But what a priceless find! I was so fascinated by this wooden amplifier for my handphone. I have tried many times to download a sound booster from playstore but none worked. The sound from my phone was still not up the volume I wanted. This was especially important when I wanted to listen to youtube messages.

Finally when T brought me this amplifier and I put my phone on it I could hear a distinct loudness! It was just simple invention. A handmade amplifier with small holes like netting at the one side of the wooden box that if you insert your handphone the right side up, sounds coming from the phone will be louder than normal. Now I needed this particularly as sometimes (due to some hearing loss) I find it hard to hear my 5 am alarm.

What a wonderful first day!

May 7 2017 Day 7

This is our last day in Hokkaido and we made our way to Furano a town famous for lavenders. As it was not the season for lavenders, the famous Farm Tomita was quiet and there were no visitors. 

During Autumn rows and rows of colored lavenders ideal for photo taking were planted and the place would be packed with holiday makers. We only found  shop selling lavender soaps, fragrance, eye mask and all things made of lavender!

We decided to visit a few places in Furano:

1. Furano Marche or Market where we had our lunch
2. Furano Cheese Factory - we sampled all kinds of cheeses at this factory
3. Furano Winery - we sampled all kinds of wine and visited the wine cellar

We also visited Noboribetsu, a place that's akin to hell valley. It became famous for the namesake because of the desolate landscape - eerie and haunting the landscape loomed up before our face. We saw brown and barren mountain sides with fissures scattered here and there from which arise steam from the ground.

It's called hell valley because it looked the hell. I wonder how people know what hell looked like for them to be able to name this place after it. 

The town of Noboribetsu had a huge statute of the devil looming at its entrance. I was not comfortable entering into the town. Other than the hell valley attractions, we visited Ninja Village, a Ninja themed park.

We also waited till nightfall to view the beautiful Ningle Terrace, traditional small wooden shops linked by wooden pathways selling art and craft stuff. At night, lamps lighted up the shops and the whole Terrace become a photographers paradise!

We ended the night at Makiko's place the only Airbnb that was like a home. Makiko set aside a room to rent out to tourists. The outstanding thing about this place was that M was a Christian! Her house was just opposite her church, the Green Chapel!

She also kept 3 big fat cats that have the run of her house! 

M served us a wonderful breakfast of bread, eggs, tomatoes, sausages, coffee and tea. It was the best breakfast that we had so far.

What a great way to end our holiday! Farewell Hokkaido, you will always be in our hearts!

May 5 2017 Day 6

We awoke bright and early. It was really cold but we made our way to Hokkaido University. However we were not allowed to go in for pictures and sightseeing. What were we looking for? Cherry blossoms, of course!

We spoke a foreign student from India (on bicycle) who advised us to visit Maruyama. He said that we will find a lot more cherry blossoms there. On his advice, we made our way there again. This time, I rented a wheelchair as I had knee pains and Tim gently pushed me to see the cherry blossoms. It was beautiful. One particular tree really stood out. It was simply blooming white and pink flowers among all the other trees.

There is something biblical about cherry blossoms. The Bible talks about the flowers that bloom for a while and the next day is thrown into the fire. Yet despite the flowers being temporarily growing in the field, God still clothe them with many colors and make them beautiful. In Hokkaido, they bloom only a week in May and for one day in that week, the flowers reach its full bloom. After that the flowers begin to shed the petals and fall to the ground.

God spoke to me that my life is like the cherry blossoms, it is only temporary. However I will surely peak in this life and bloom in full color and splendor. God says that yet in this short life when I bloom, I must really bloom for the Lord in whatever seasons or age. I must really shine for His glory that others may see the beauty in me like the cherry blossoms.

After Maruyama, we decided to visit Shiroi Kobita, chocolate factory. Here we encountered Japanese discipline like no other. The Japanese are simply discipline and they expect others to do the same. From separating their trash to combustible, non combustible and plastics, they lined up patiently to go into car parks. The morning we were at Shiroi we tried to jump the queue. In Malaysia, our habit is to cut into the parking lots from the other side of the road without regard to the cars that had already lined up to go into the parking.

Tim tried to drive the car to the other side of the road and got the coldest glare from the extremely well dressed parking attendant. Not only that he put out his hands like a X indicating a big NO!

We had to dutifully follow the snaking line of cars and follow instructions. Tim dropped us at the entrance and we waited for him while he parked a distance away.

The chocolate factory is interesting. We took a tour of the floors and watched how deliciously thin cookies were made sandwiched with Hokkaido milk. They were delicious. Japanese cookies at Shiroi Kobito tasted light with a melt in the mouth goodness. Here I bought many gifts for friends and family.

This place reminded us of the movie Charlie & the Chocolate factory. Shiroi has some amazing and beautiful landscapes for photo taking. At 5 pm when the clock tower sounds, figurines of chefs and animals will show on the clock tower and play the closing music for us!

After Shiroi (we had lunch at the cafe), we then made our way to Esta for dinner. We heard from P and G that in Esta there were shops after shops of ramen. Indeed we saw a group of shops selling ramen and soba. We were spoilt for choice!

End of day 6.

May 4 2017 Day 5

In the morning, we made the move to Curb Market to shop and have our brunch. We were sad to leave Hayashi's beautiful house which looked like a perpetual Christmas house with its Christmas tree and snowman outside.

A suggested that we go to Curb Market for lunch. I bought sotong and small crabs for friends back home. I love to browse for stuff at the market as you would have ample opportunities to try all the unique gooey Japanese knick knacks some of which I do not really know what they are made of!

In fact you could sample and sample and be quite full as a result of the sampling!

The sotong is really genuine, smelly and fishy, the were really good tasty stuff. I love sotong especially with all kinds of flavoring!

For brunch we had crab soup, steamed fish, sashimi, rice and fish roe, seaweed soup. By far our most expensive meal.

After Curb Market, we went to the Hokkaido Beer Museum. As I am not to keen on beers, I opted to go for tea latte at a nearby supermarket, Ario. Is at down and Starbucks and drank green tea latte. Delicious. I discovered google translate and used it to ask for directions to a pharmacy. T and A joined me later for another round of tea latte!

We later went to Sapporo Art Park. I opted not to move around as the terrain was really unfriendly to my osteo knees. I managed only to see some sculptures. It is an open air Art Park with many interesting and unique sculptures. At about 5 pm (closing time) we had to leave without finishing looking at all the sculptures!

We then drove to Moiwayama another beautiful mountain in Japan. We had to take 2 trains to go to the top. The first train was a bigger train and the second train a smaller train. The trains were packed. Our plans to take dinner and enjoy the view did not materialize as the restaurant at the peak was booked for a private function.

But Moiwayama (voted one of Japan's top 3 mountain views) was stunning and did not disappoint at all. Although it was extremely cold, many people braved the cold to wait for the sun to set. When the sky was dark all of Sapporo lighted up before us. Just so so beautiful sight!  For sure no such sight in Malaysia!

Rushing to go home, we thought we could beat the queue by taking a lift down to the ground floor. To our amazement the human queue snaked down from the place where we had a fantastic view, the 3rd floor. Sheepishly we had to make our way up again and lined up obediently for the next one hour. This is self-discipline in Japan! No cutting queue!

We finally made it to Miwa's house. We were to stay 2 nights there to visit the scenes and sights of Sapporo. A very small apartment with a very small toilet with practically nowhere to put up our clothes, we were gripping that the radiator was hot, the clothes rack was insufficient and the bed was flat!

End of day 5.