Cynical about the much-travelled Thailand? You’re not the only one.
The restaurant at Eakachai Floating House in Sri Lanna National Park; Trang is known for its delicious seafood – though it is spicy, even by Thai standards.
I am sitting at the water’s edge with a Chang beer when I notice that a curious ant is investigating half a piece of rice left over from my glorious red curry. Within a few minutes there’s a healthy bundle of them, waving their anty antennae at each other, getting excited. Then one single ant joins the bunch and suddenly they have critical mass: they hoist the entire thing and drag it away, leaving the latecomers sniffing the fumes where it used to be, wondering what all the fuss was about.
The thing about Thailand is that you can never be sure which ant you are.
I turned down this assignment, the first time. Can you believe that? If you’re a certain kind of cynic, or perhaps a self-important travel writer in your 20s, you can. I had heard about the telephone lines running along Bangkok’s streets like clotted liquorice laces, and I knew that bowing was a big deal. I’d seen photos of long-tailed boats beached on creamy stretches of paradise, of sweet-spicy pad thai, of monks taking selfies with iPads.
I also knew, as you probably do, that Thailand is one of the most visited countries in the world; that it was picked up in a backpacker whirlwind in the seventies and has never really come down; that Koh Samui has a Tesco’s; that group jump shots at Koh Phi Phi require a queue; that there’s a certain kind of South African who goes to Thailand and comes back describing the drinks specials. Send me to Lagos or Indonesia or Japan, I grumbled with absolutely no sense of irony or perspective. I can write a story about Thailand without leaving my house.
The glinting beauty of a temple in Trang; Sundown over Koh Mook.
I was wrong, of course: both about the country and about the kind of people who go there. But the thing about getting off the grid, anywhere in the world, is that it requires either more time or more money, and sometimes both, and unfortunately most of us can spare neither. Luckily, in Thailand, there is a third option. For the cynics, staying far from the tourist spots will be of equal if not more importance than staying near beautiful places; and what you lose by setting your sights slightly lower in terms of spellbinding landscapes, you gain back many times over by having a travel experience which doesn’t feel like pre-chewed gum.
I only had two weeks in Thailand but I was determined to stretch it into the two archetypal experiences – beach and jungle. So there were two questions: is it possible to find a beach in Thailand where you don’t have to fight through three rows of sizzling pink-prawn Brit bodies to get into the water, and is the jungle-bound northern town of Chiang Mai really all it’s cracked up to be?
The beauty of a temple, even in slight disrepair; tea served from copper pots in Trang.
I didn’t know the answers to either of these questions while waiting out a four-hour layover at Don Muang Airport in Bangkok. This is more than enough time for people-watching. The Thai travellers looked put together as a pastel Pinterest board: wide-brimmed hats, lacy sundresses, brogues. In fact, the only bright colours I found were attached to the legs of the backpackers, who seemed to be wearing a uniform of flowing patterned pants and a fine layer of grit. After wandering up and down and buying a snack (baked cuttlefish?), I sat down at my gate.
A woman with a grin and a bouquet of flowers was texting. A grandfather in a wheelchair scowled indiscriminately at everyone passing him. A girl with a snapcap tried to listen to music, hat pushed down awkwardly over her earphones. Crocs, Converse, silver stilettos: all kinds of shoes were getting on my flight to Trang, but no backpacks.
If Trang had less photogenic neighbours, it might get more attention. But it’s further south than Phuket and the popular islands dotted around there, and it’s sandwiched between places of such virtuosic beauty that Trang’s hardly a tourist destination. For my purposes, this was just fine. It’s a big town, and without the tourist industry to match, you mostly get the refreshing sense that people are just getting on with their lives. The combination of Chinese and Malaysian ancestry means that it has a truly remarkable food scene – roasted pork, pickled fish swim bladder, amazing night markets – and it’s also the closest town to a constellation of islands that I’d heard were different to the rest.
On the east side of Koh Mook, houses on stilts cluster around the harbour.
When I arrived on Koh Mook, the smallest of these, I thought there must be some mistake. It was the day before a public holiday, and yet my beer and I sat alone and unjostled on the perfect beach. As the colour faded from the sky and the rocks glowed, I realised that a full moon party can be quite palatable – as long as it’s for one.
The islands are an essential part of a tropical holiday, but I’d been told that to see the ‘true Thailand’ you need to go north. So after only a few days of riding a scooter over tree roots and duck-diving through hazy jade water, it was time to take the night train to Chiang Mai. Flights within Thailand are dirt cheap, but I was convinced by the romance of the train; the way, in retrospect, a train ride can seem to be symbolic of an entire trip. (Plus, I’d been told that train assistants come and make up the beds wearing white gloves, which seemed too unbelievable to be true. It isn’t.)
Waiting on the platform in Bangkok, I found myself almost entirely among a jury of my peers. A girl wearing a ‘Chang’ T-shirt talked to a girl with a Cambodian lotus tattoo. A guy with a bone in his ear and a woman with a pile of red dreadlocks ordered a fruit shake from a vendor in shaky Thai. This wasn’t going to be the grizzled Kerouac train journey of my imagination, but when I arrived in Chiang Mai I realised why that was.
Chiang Mai literally means ‘new city’ – and it was, in 1296, when it was founded as the new capital of the Lanna Kingdom. The walls that used to fortify the city against enemies still stand in some places, crumbling worn brick making a picturesque background where tourists feed the pigeons, striking the traditional Christ-the-Redeemer pose. These days, it’s a new city in another way. It’s been refounded as the travel blogger capital of the world, and ever since it became the setting of a Chinese rom-com, the ratio of selfie sticks to yogis here has increased.
Scooters can be rented cheaply for the day, although you’re on your own if you crash (they are not insured, so you’ll be expected to pay damages); rice is sold parcelled in banana leaves, with coconut or eggy custard.
Many people have described Chiang Mai as ‘the past reaching an uneasy truce with the present’. It certainly is a wild contradiction – the backpacker district overlapping with a jaw-dropping array of temples; flowering trees lining the moat that still rings the Old City; elderly Thai women selling parcels of rice, young German women selling joints. But if it ever was off the beaten track, it certainly isn’t now. After an American swilling a whisky told me to let go of my ego, followed by a precise tally of the thousands of dollars he is paying for a bachelor party in ‘the oldest brownstone in New Orleans’, I decided to move on.
To walk the 500 steps leading to the temple of Wat Tham Pha Plong is intended to be a meditation in itself.
Chiang Dao is a revelation. It’s a small town an hour north, huddled under a towering limestone massif. It’s not the highest mountain in Thailand, nor even the second-highest, which is probably how it shimmied past the guidebooks’ all-seeing eyes. And on a beautiful day in spring, I was able to wander its hiking paths without meeting a single other person. The trail lead me through a bamboo forest and a valley aflame with cherry blossoms and honest-to-god clouds of butterflies. I sat down to eat a messy, coconut-sized dragon fruit with my bare hands, victorious. It seemed that the entire mountain belonged to me.
When I returned to Chiang Mai, the contrast was stark. I gave myself the night off, walking the streets, smelling garlic, durian and smoke, when a brown dog darted out from a temple into the road. I ran towards it, but a monk had already come out to calm him and bring him back inside. This is how I met A. He asked where I was from and we ended up speaking for over an hour as the light turned lavender and swarms of mosquitoes danced around the street lights. He told me that before he joined the monastery he had worked as a fireman, and that when they are understaffed they sometimes still ask him to come and help out. He grinned. Of course, this can be complicated because the monastic oath curtails him from wearing anything but his robe, even if that anything is fire-retardant equipment. He could clearly see my scepticism because he took out his phone, his tattooed fingers scrolling through Facebook photos, so I could see for myself. Yes, there he was, standing bare-shouldered in the fire truck, smoke billowing around his head.
On my last morning in Chiang Mai, I stood on the bridge over the river, turned glossy as honey by the sunrise, watching people start their day: a Thai man with tattoos and an undercut walked past, looking like he’d been roughed up by the evening before; a vendor sold Chinese doughnuts, deep-fried rolls in the shape of a chromosome; joggers, those international bastions of health, were dotted about – one trying to encourage her petulant son in French. This, for me, is the truly exceptional thing: not the jumbled mix of old and new but the different lives being lived side by side. There are so many different versions of a place that exist simultaneously, depending on who’s telling the story. It’s in the tension between these stories that a place comes alive. Now that I have my own version of this story, Thailand will always be illuminated.
Plan your trip
Travel planner
Flights to Bangkok from Joburg are from R7659 return on Etihad Airways (etihad.com). If you’re flying domestically immediately, you change from Suvarnabhumi Airport to Don Muang Airport, so allow at least half an hour travel time. Flights from Bangkok to Trang are from R380 with Nok Air. There are many options for the train to Chiang Mai – best to take the night train for R325. To get from Chiang Mai to Chiang Dao, take a B40 bus from Chang Puak bus station for R16 return. From the bus stop in Chiang Dao you’ll need to take a songthaew to your guest house. It’s usually a flat rate of R61.
Need to know
If you’re visiting in the cooler, less humid months, you can often cut your accommodation costs in half by opting for a room without aircon. Rates are usually charged per room rather than per person. Don’t buy ‘Buddha heads’ – physical representations are sacrilege in Buddhist culture. Though there are many buildings with the sign ‘Tourist Information’ emblazoned on them, don’t be lulled into a false sense of objectivity – these are mostly tour operators.
Do this
Swim at Emerald Cave, near Koh Mook. After swimming through a tunnel of glowing water, you end up in a tiny cove, surrounded by high cliffs and butterflies the size of a fist. Boats leave from Koh Mook and Pak Meng pier on Trang mainland.
Visit Na Muen Sri weaving factory in Trang. Women here maintain traditional techniques and ancient tribal patterns on handworked looms. The scarves are a better souvenir than tie-dyed fisherman pants. +66814764318
Get a massage. Lila Thai Massage trains inmates serving minor sentences at Chiang Mai Women’s Prison, who then join the workforce upon their release: it’s cheap and good. From R82 for an hour. chiangmaithai massage.com
Visit Wat Phra That Doi Suthep, the most famous temple in Chiang Mai, just outside of town. Hike to the top, or for R205 return catch a songthaew (or split this cost with up to eight people). Go early. tourismthailand.org
Hike in Pha Daeng National Park. Reaching the summit of Chiang Dao takes two days, and you’ll need a guide and porters. The trail is clear enough for a short unguided day hike. Day entrance to the park is R41. tourismthailand.org
Stay here
Charlie Beach Resort in Koh Mook has lovely bamboo bungalows that are about 100 metres from the beach. R246 pp sharing. kohmook.com
Baan Hanibah is an old Lanna-style guest house in Chiang Mai, with dark wood and frangipani trees in the courtyard. It’s best for families. R863, sleeps four.
Villa Duang Champa, a boutique hotel in Chiang Mai’s Old City, has light-filled rooms, teal accents and a latticed balcony. From R390 pp sharing.
Saithong Guesthouse, down a tiny soi (alley) in Chiang Mai, has clean rooms, stained-glass windows and beautiful Thai doors. From R185 pp sharing.
Chiang Dao Nest 1 Resort in Chiang Dao has simple bungalows with fans, and is close to the start of the nature trail around the foot of the mountain. From R184 pp sharing. chiangdaonest.com
Eat and drink
The Boxx is an indie karaoke bar and lounge in Trang, built from shipping containers; it does Thai-fusion snacks and drinks from R80 per person.
Into the Woods in Chiang Mai is a little woodlands-style cafe with free Wi-Fi and great coffee.
A local eatery next to the police station in Chiang Mai sells the best khao soi (chicken and noodles) for R16. The sign’s in Thai so look for the large corrugated iron gates.
Chiang Dao Nest 1 and 2 are known for amazing Thai meals; number two is more affordable. chiangdaonest.com
This story first appeared in the September 2016 issue of Getaway magazine.
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Our September issue features affordable destinations around SA, great photographic hides, and a Thailand travel guide. On shelves from 22 August.
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