# chiang rai



## steve ritchie (Nov 8, 2008)

does anyone know of anything worth looking at or anywhere nice to go in chiang rai.


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## stogiebear (Mar 20, 2009)

No. It's a small town with very limited features that would appeal to Westerners unless the solitude and feeling of isolation is something you are looking for.


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## KhwaamLap (Feb 29, 2008)

Go over the bridge to Myanmar - spend a few hours there - and then CR looks beautiful 

Seriously, I have only been there on trips, but there are some beautiful waterfalls and the like. You can take a tour to the long neck Karens (like CM), Lakha and other tribes. There is a temple there that is over run with baboons (and cats actually). There is a set of rough stairs carved in a cliff that leads you up to a cave at the top in which is a tiny Buddha shrine and four thousand bats. There is a sign that say something about the fact that the biggest and most aggressive baboons live at the top of the cliff and not to take kids up there as they tend to get eaten. I went up, alone as no one else had the balls. At the top is a small plateau between some higher cliffs - all the way to the cave I could hear low growls - scared the k-rap out of me, but almost lost my bowels completely when I entered a pitch black cave and the bats decided it was time for a flight (all at the same time and through the small openeing I was standing in)....great memory, and kept my Thai travel companions in histerics for days after.


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## Guest (Apr 3, 2009)

Yes the town itself is very quiet, a pleasant enough night bazaar area, longtailed boat trips up river to a choice of destinations near and far (elephant camp, hot water springs)... You can visit a variety of hill tribe villages nearby too.

They have a weird Disney theme hotel, just seems completely misplaced there somehow.

The trip to Myanmar (Mae Sai on Thai side) isn't far, less than an hour away. The market and general poverty is depressing at the border crossing, but I've hired tuktuks to travel a fair way from the border to places farangs rarely go... fascinating experience.


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