Rediscovering Chiangmai

It started yesterday when we set off to visit my favourite tailor near Thapae Gate, the heart of the tourist area of the city just outside the moated Old City – and received a welcome fit for royalty and the usual service with a smile. But more of that later.

Today started with a visit to Chiangmai Immigration Office, a place I used to have to visit at least once a year to arrange visa extensions or re-entry permits . My old passport was full of their stamps and signatures! We used to queue outside in the sun and wait to be called into a small one-storey building. No more! The office is in the same plot land near the airport but is now a three storey building with a decent car park. I can’t think was has been removed to create such a change -but it was well worth doing.

We had to register within 24hr of my arrival the fact that I was staying with friends at their address. Not to do so might result in a fine – for them – of 10,000THB apparently. With the Thai baht at around 40 to each pound sterling, that’s about £250. So an expensive oversight we were intending to avoid!

The Immigration Office is very near what was, in my time, Chiangmai’s most enjoyable shopping mall and despite its having been supplanted by newer, grander venues, Chiangmai Airport Plaza is within walking distance of the Airport but seldom a first stop for visitors.We decide lunch there in the revamped Lanna Market stalls on the ground floor was what we wanted. So it was that I had my first £1 meal of this visit – I’m sue it won’t be the last!!

After lunch a wash and blow-dry in what used to be a fairly highly regarded salon cost just 250THB – about £6. They weren’t as good as they used to be, nor as busy but their prices were still the same and I have clean hair to last for the next couple of days!

I was reminded of the artisan shops and Foundations along the river Ping and enjoyed looking through the offerings of Villa Cini and the Sop Moei Foundation before making our way back to Thapae Gate where it was to be hoped my tailor had come up trumps and had a blouse waiting for me…

But first we stopped at the Art Cafe for a stop out of the 35 degree heat. I have happy memories of sitting and watching the Loy Kratong procession go past here on November, managing to find a corner seat in the window and having a perfect view of everything as it passed. The cafe is in a great location right by the open area that is Thapae Gate so is a good point from which to see some of the celebrations and to start walking the Sunday ‘Walking Street’ which starts on the other side of the Gate, across the moat.

Suffice it to say, the ice-creams are huge!!

And now to the highlight of my day: my friendly tailor and her staff had managed to make two thing to their usually high standards overnight – much faster than the usual two or three weeks. And one piece wasn’t a standard pattern of theirs either. I cannot recommend highly enough the work done at Kaotok where for years now, the designers have worked to a fusion of Asian designs and fabrics, heavily influenced by Japan but increasingly with new ideas to keep customers’ interest alive and their purses open – mine certainly was today!!

And so it was that I ordered more as did my friends and we’ll be back later in the month to pick up more new clothes that fit well!

At 6.30, somewhat on the spur of the moment, we went to another favourite – ‘BannDong View Doi’ which is exactly what it says – a place in BannDong which has a view of the mountains and where we knew the food would be good.

Three of us were aiming for the wrong building – the restaurant still has the same name but has moved to a different place very close by. The view may be even better than from the old one and in at least one of the photos below, to the left you can see the school where I lived for some years after 2004.

Now to get organised…. there’s a wedding to go to!