2014, Day 312 - Enlightened

Today we availed ourselves the driver's services but before Josh was to pick us up we went into town for a quick breakfast.  Many restaurants are closed on Sunday but there is a nice little vegetarian place adjacent to the market that was, with a little prodding from Francene, open for breakfast.  We had a nice array of dishes and scampered back to the hotel before Josh arrived.

Our main objective was to head up to Doi Suthep, a beautiful mountain temple initially constructed in the 14th century.  It was a busy day on the mountain but we had a nice time exploring the temple and were even blessed a couple of times by different monks.  Even with the crowds of people there is a feeling of serenity at Doi Suthep.

Once we extricated ourselves from the crowds we headed down the mountain and at the bottom Josh took us to a restaurant which he declared made the best khao soi, a curry dish with egg noodles that is common in Chiang Mai.  It was immediately apparent that none of the staff spoke English and were afraid to take our order until one was obviously instructed to do so.  It took a little time with the English and Thai menus but we got our orders placed and were eating in no time.  It was a nice meal and cost us less than three dollars each.

Next we tried a visit to JJ Market.  Not a produce market but more a local antique mall, unfortunately most of the shops were closed because it was a Sunday but we find that there was an exhibition of orchids in one of the courtyards.  From massive plants to tiny specimens there was a huge variety of shapes, sizes, and colors.

I think we've all been feeling a little ragged and the additional heat today didn't make things any better so we decided to head back to the hotel a bit early today.  After a little cool down in our rooms and some quality time catching up on the news of the world we decided to cool off in the pool.  The water was colder than I anticipated but very refreshing and we all stayed in until we were nice and wrinkled.

For dinner we headed out to the night market but, as with much of the city, many businesses were closed.  We finally got desperate and decided to sit down at the nearest restaurant.  Dinner was a bit of a disappointment but, as Melissa noted, we've had so many amazing meals we were due for a bad one sooner or later.  So we ate our flavorless food and decided to have a little ice cream before heading back to our lodging.  Tomorrow afternoon we leave for Sri Lanka so we will have a nice relaxed morning before heading to the airport.

Fuji X-T1, Fujinon 56/f1.2R
56mm, f1.2, 1/160 @ 200 ISO