8:30am, after breakfast at The Wing Boutique Hotel, we walked to Samlan Road where we hailed a Grab car to Wat Phra That Doi Suthep on the mountains of Doi Suthep National Park for ฿427. It had rained heavily during the night and was drizzling lightly. There was no sign that the rain would stop any sooner.
If it had rain a little heavier instead of a slight drizzle, we might have postponed the trip to Doi Suthep to Day 5. But, there was no certainty that it would not rain the next day too.
Despite "advices" online about not agreeing to a return journey with Grab driver and to use the cheaper red songthaew (taxi) to get back from Doi Suthep, I deemed it easier for us to use the same Grab car for the return journey since we intended to visit two other temples before returning to the old city. And since it was forecasted to be raining whole day, we would not want to go through the hassles of waiting and switching between songthaews. We agreed on a price of ฿800 from Wat Phra That to Wat Umong to Wat Suan Dok and finally to Wat Phra Singh near to where we were picked up.
Wat Phra That Doi Suthep was about 16Km from the hotel and the journey would take about 40 minutes. Damages by the overnight storm could be seen along the way to the temple. There were fallen trees and large broken branches on the road. A utility pole with electrical cables had fallen too. The Grab driver carefully avoided the cables before continuing on the uphill climb.
9:30am, we arrived outside Wat Phra That and it was raining a little heavier. Unwilling to walk up the 306-step "Naga Stairs" to the temple in the rain, we purchased the admission tickets (฿30 for each foreigner) together with the "cable car" tickets (฿20 each and it was two-way). The two cable cars were funicular carriages, about the size of big cargo lifts, and pulled by cables up the hill.
We toured the temple ground using umbrellas which was really inconvenient. The tiled floorings were slippery in the rain too. The temple had several interesting sights, including a large wooden carving of a reclining Buddha, an emerald Buddha, more wooden carvings depicting Life of Buddha. There were ubosots, small viharns and pavilions housing various Buddha statues.
An inner raised platform where the golden chedi was situated required shoes to be removed. I removed my shoes in the rain and walked up to the platform — I nearly slipped on the marble floor. There were many golden Buddha statues surrounding the elaborate gold-plated chedi in the middle of the platform. The "phra that" chedi contained a Buddha relic. Pilgrims walked around the chedi in clockwise direction. I also walked one round, taking photos instead of praying, before exiting the inner ground.
Instead of taking the cable car down the hill to exit the temple, we chose to walk down the Naga Stairs. It was easy and did not feel like there were 306 steps, but since I did not do a count on the way down, I could not be certain too. The two Nagas that flanked the steps were 7-headed Nagas — the most I had seen on this trip. There were two crocodiles below the Nagas.
10:45am, we returned to the Grab car for our second destination. From Wat Phra That Doi Suthep to Wat Umong, we passed through Chiang Mai University (CMU), caught sights of some architectures as the car cruised through the compound. Wat Umong was situated in a forested area at the edge of the university.
11:20am, we started exploring Wat Umong, also known as "the tunnel temple", with an admission fee of ฿20 each. We had to remove our shoes before entering the tunnel-temple with waxed red-brick floor. There were 4 Buddha statues, each seated at the end of each tunnels. Other occupants in the tunnels were few young bats hanging from the ceiling.
Beside the tunnel-temple, a short Naga stairs, flanked by two 5-headed Nagas, led us to a non-stuccoed chedi sitting above a mound. Due to the drizzle, we did not fully explore the temple ground, including some ruins in the forest. After 30 minutes at Wat Umong, we headed for the 3rd temple.
12pm, we reached Wat Suan Dok, the royal temple and an important one for locals. The main viharn, with an admission fee of ฿30, had no mythical guardians at its entrance and housed a large seated bronze Buddha back-to-back with a standing Buddha facing the opposite direction. Unfortunately, the main chedi, towering 50 metres in height, behind the viharn was having some repair works. It was supposedly a must-see due to its unique style and having some very special features. The main chedi was surrounded by a number of smaller white chedis.
In one corner of the temple was an area with numerous white small chedis which were reliquaries for ashes of the Northern Thai royal family members, including rulers of Chiang Mai and their descendants. Seeing these reliquaries under a rainy sky gave it a gloomy feel.
After being dropped off at Wat Phra Singh, we walked to Lim Lao Ngow Fishball Noodle (林老五鱼丸面) near the Three Kings Monument. We had a dry-tossed special egg noodle with bouncy fishballs, fishcakes and fish wontons (dumplings) in Chinese black vinegar. And a dried wonton noodle with meat dumplings, a soup with more meat dumplings and a dish of fried shrimp balls. The noodles were very good. It was no wonder that they had been Michelin-accoladed since 2018 — the parent outlet was in Bangkok.
Leaving Lim Lao Ngow, we noticed a Japanese-style restaurant just two units away but it was named Three Kings Boat Noodle. We made a note to dine here later in the evening — but plan changed and we visited it on Day 5 instead.
1pm, the rain had dwindled to a slight drizzle. We decided to go for coffee to waste a couple of hours before heading back to the hotel. After walking a big round to Ratchamanka Road, we walked past Jomkitti Boutique Hotel and saw a cafe named KonJohn Handpress Coffee on the ground floor. I saw bags of coffee bean on the bar counter through their glass panel and decided to try this cafe.
I had a cup of espresso made with one of their blends of light-roasted Thai and Myanmar coffee beans with fruity and nutty taste notes. After resting for about an hour in the cafe, I bought a pack of 250g medium-roasted Shan coffee beans (from Myanmar) before leaving the cafe.
We were back in the hotel at 2:30pm. On our request, before leaving the hotel in the morning, room service had made up the room — just once during a 5-day stay would do.
It was still drizzling at 5pm, but umbrellas not required, we went out for dinner. We had a place in mind to go for Northern Thai cuisine that was not far away. We came to Huen Phen Restaurant along Ratchamanka Road where we had walked past several times. It was just 60 metres from KonJohn Coffee, where we had coffee in the afternoon.
It was easy to mistaken Huen Phen as an antique shop due to their decorations with numerous wood carvings of Thai ancient culture. We were here for their khan toke set that was meant for 2 pax. The set comprised several popular dishes: Burmese-style pork curry, Northern-style minced pork salad, chicken curry with assorted vegetables, fried crispy pork (skin), Huen Phen's pork sausage, Northern-style green chilli and minced pork with tomatoes, sticky rice and banana in coconut milk for ฿450 per set. In addition, we had tom yum soup with prawns and two iced tea.
It was a meal to taste most Northern Thai dishes at one go. The Northern-style tom yum soup with creamy coconut milk was sweet-savoury rather than sour-spicy. It was a great meal and nice taste experience.
At 6:30pm, we exited Huen Phen. The rain had stopped. With nothing much to do on a weekday night, we decided to take a walk to a cluster of night bazaars, known as Chiang Mai Night Bazaar and Kalare Night Bazaar, about 2Km to the east of the old city. It took us about 30 minutes of passing restaurants, cafes, bars, massage parlours and temples to reach the night bazaars.
We strolled around the area to see the goods being sold in the makeshift stalls and check out the street food, restaurants and bars in Kalare Night Bazaar. There were not many people around — it was probably still early at around 7pm. Nothing attracted us. We U-turned, walked back the way we came and back in the hotel just before 8pm.
It started raining again at 10:30pm.
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