Greetings from Chiang Mai Thailand. I'm spending a few weeks in far North Thailand in an area where many westerns have escaped to either full time or for the winter and I can see why. The weather here now is just like a warm June day in Yamhill County with very pleasant cool evenings. Chiang Mai is a big city of 2 million but the ancient city complete with moat is the area which attracts the travelers. The square mile is full of guest houses and cafes and music clubs. The food here is wonderful and it's hard to spend $5 on two dinners. I've been really enjoying the fresh fruit shakes made from about every tropical fruit you can think of.
My goal here was to slow down and get on Thai time. Up to now I have been pretty much a tourist and on the move. We were in the far North of V Nam near the China border for 5 days which was very nice. We based out of Sapa and rode motor bike for three days to see the surronding countryside. Then we headed out to the coast for the boat tour of Halong Bay and extended a few days on the National Park Island for a bit more motor biking. After a few weeks basing out of Hanoi, Huong and we decided to try traveling together so we took a plane to Bankok to start our Thailand adventure. A 10 hour over night bus ride got us up north in Chiang Mai where I was in new territory. This is the first time Huong has been out of V Nam so it is all new to her. After a week and a half or so in Chiang Mai it was time to move on to see more of N Thailand so we are off for several days on a 125cc Honda seeing the sights. Made it to near the Burma border yesterday to see a village of the long neck women. We are basing for a few days in Ma Hong Son with the little bike but will move closer to Lao in the morning. This is a very quiet town tucked away in the mountains and is very low keyed compared to everything we have scene up to now.
Considering Huong has only limited skills in English and has never traveled before I think things are going very well. She is a successful business women from Da Nang in Central V Nam and is very independent so that works well for me. At times the cultural differences are pretty profound but all in all I am enjoying not doing this adventure alone.
I have lots of pictures but have not taken the time to down load but hope to soon. It is very hard to spend time in the web cafe after a day of seeing this amazing and beautiful country so I have pretty much given up on the blogging but will try to post some pics soon.
Christmas is a total non event here. I'm not sure were we will be but it will be closer to Lao than we are tonight in far NW Thailand near Burma.
