Chiang Mai Day 1

After we got into Chiang Mai in the morning, we got a tuk tuk and headed to our hotel, Galare Guesthouse. Our hotel was nice, but a little older. It was a relaxing place with its own restaurant. Even though we got there way early, we were able to check in to our room. We went & showered and decided to go check out the town for a while on our first day. Our hotel was about a 20 minute walk from the old center of town.

During our walk, we came upon a couple wats. One of them was spectacularly horrible! DK & I dubbed it "Grandma's Wat" after her grandmother. It seemed like it was the leftovers after Thailand had a garage sale. There were awkward statues everywhere, including Donald Duck, a giraffe, and a lion. The inside of these wats was not very exciting. Another Buddha, which, sadly, was becoming unimpressive & common place. At the next wat we came to, there were chickens & a rooster roaming around. This is normal in a Buddhist temple, but not ok with DK. She is terrified of chickens. Luckily, with my guidance, she stayed safe.

After all of that excitement, we went further downtown & wandered around. There was another Boots pharmacy, our new favorite after Bangkok. We had lunch, also delicious! Next, we checked out some little stores & I bought some Thailand pants. They are hideous & I won't wear them in public again, but they worked great for my circumstances. After our tour of the old part of the city downtown, we headed back to our hotel for a rest. We had cooking class that night & wanted to be on the top of our game!

We had a van pick us up for cooking class. Every single person in our group was part of a couple, including honeymooners from Australia & belated honeymooners from the US. So, we tried to make the best of it as sisters. Our instructor was great; she was very excited & enthusiastic. Plus, she is a great cook! We did a tour of a market, to learn how to choose the best ingredients. Then, after a tour of their little garden, we finally got to start cooking. I made Pad Thai first, I figured that since it is such an iconic dish, I should know how to cook it. DK made some sort of soup. We split up the dishes so we would learn as much as possible. Everything we made was delicious! We did a main dish, a soup, a curry, & a curry paste. There are pictures on the photo site (we promise to caption soon) and we got a souvenir cookbook. So once I am home, I can cook Thai food for you!