So after a week of visiting Bangkok on my own, I met up with a tour group called Intrepid Travel. I wanted to travel to the more rural parts of Thailand, but I did not think it would be wise for me to travel there alone. I found this Intrepid online, and basically they organize tours that try to be as much a part of the local culture as possible. They use local transportation, eat at local restaurants, and tour places off the beaten path. For the tour I chose, we would stay in Bangkok for a day, travel to Chaing Mai, and then backpack for three days in the rural parts of northern Thailand. We would then make our way back to Bangkok by train.
I reached our meeting point, which was a hotel right downtown Bangkok. After checking in with the group, I wandered a nearby market, which sold a lot of lightweight clothes for extremely cheap. It was fun to see so many colorful clothes while eating fresh fruit and drinking coconut milk.
That evening, we had a group meeting. Another thing about this tour group that I really liked is that the group does not exceed twelve people. My group consisted of three girls from the UK, two sisters from Australia, an RN from Australia, a guy from Belgium who has traveled extensively, and an American girl who teaches in Korea.
The next day, we walked around a food market. It is interesting the similarities and differences between Korean and Thai markets. In both, there is an abundance of fresh fish (some still alive), fruit and vegetables. In Thailand, there was a variety of other interesting foods in the market including turtles, eel, and ant larvae.
After visiting the market, most of the group went to the Grand Palace. Since I went there a few days before, I went to a nearby fortress right on the river. I also visited a riverside park and two temples before heading back to the hotel.
That afternoon, we took taxis from our hotel to the train station for our overnight train to Chaing Mai. As we were driving to the station, we found ourselves right in the middle of a Red protest. For those who don't know, the Red party is the opposition party in Thailand at the moment. If you remember back to last summer, there was a lot of violence in Bangkok between the Reds and the police. Our guide told us that the Reds hold a protest twice a month, and it just so happened to be right as we were heading to the station. Our taxi driver was a no nonsense type, so he just drove straight through the protest. The protest was peaceful, just a bunch of people in the main square of the city dressed in Red walking around. There was a police presence, but they were just observing the protest. It almost looked like a carnival: people in bright clothes, people selling snacks and Red merchandise, and music being played in the background.
Once we reached the station, we had about an hour before our train. I went with a bunch of the girls to buy some dinner before boarding the train. I had some awesome Pad Thai with chili sauce. We boarded the train at about 5:00pm and were scheduled to arrive the next morning in Chaing Mai at 6:00am. It was my first experience on an overnight train. At about 9:00pm, the attendants converted our benches to beds. The train was air conditioned and quite smooth. It was nice to talk more with my fellow travelers and hear about what brought them to Thailand.
The Australian sisters, Yvonne and Kim, were here on a three week sister trip. Yvonne is the mother of three and has never traveled outside of Australia. Kim has traveled quite a bit, and wanted to travel with her sister.
The Australian RN, Kerry, has traveled quite a bit as well. She recently went to Nepal to backpack, and wanted to do some additional backpacking in Thailand.
The girls from the UK, Claire, Helen, and Ellie, were here for a holiday. They are friends from Manchester and wanted to escape the cold England weather to do something new together.
Jan, the guy from Belgium, has traveled extensively in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. He was on a three month holiday around Southeast Asia and wanted to see something new in Thailand.
Maggie, the USA teacher in Korea, was on the same holiday from school as I and wanted to travel somewhere warm. I think it's amazing the interesting places you meet people who share so many similar experiences. Maggie lives about an hour from my school. She was a music major like me, but realized that her passion was for Asia. She majored in Japanese and Anthropology, and is teaching in Korea for the year. We have so much in common, swapping marching band stories along with Koreaisms. Who knew that I would meet an American teacher teaching in Korea while on a tour in Thailand? We have stayed in touch since the tour and we're planning to travel in Korea sometime this spring.
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