Chiang Mai (Northern Thailand) Tourist Guide


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TWO DAYS AND A NIGHT IN THE COUNTRY - CHIANG MAI
An Eco-tour Outing

Text: Ann & Terryl
Photos: Ban & Karin

When you work hard like us journos, or you're always on the run, it doesn't do any harm to take a break, cool out, slow things down.

Here you have it: slowing down, cooling out, taking a break in a small village called Mae Kampong out to the east of Chiang Mai city, a 45-minute journey on a smooth road and in clean, clear air that makes you wish you have a convertible - mountains around you and green fields of paddy closer at hand...though by the time you're reading this the fields will have been harvested and be under the plough for the new planting.

We stopped at David's Kitchen, a farang establishment in this lovely eco-tourism village. The owner, David Gordon, is a friend of mine, and was once a regular figure of the nightclubs in town. But for years now he's been absent from my wong lao - drinking circle - and been operating this business with his loving wife.

Well, besides talking a lot about how it's been in Mae Kampong, we kind of ate a lot there. Under the ample canopy of a large banyan tree, David sells delicious Italian and Thai cuisine that deserves the clientele of a hectic tourist district rather than this simple, quiet rural village of Mae Kampong.

If you're planning on following in our footsteps and going there, you might want to skip the next paragraph, because it contains a potential spoiler of surprise!

Anyway, as if the excellence of the food was not enough, we guests were given a truly surprising welcome - wait for it - waitresses-turned-professional-dancers performing a graceful and meticulously-performed Lanna dance just after serving us our orders. I didn't see it coming, but that's the beauty of it, and it kept us talking for some time afterwards. Metropolitan Chiang Mai, eat your heart out!

We spent the night at Tharnthong Lodge, David's other business located in the same compound, by his invitation. It's a lovely place with several chalets, as well as a waterfall and stream passing through the compound. I said we `spent the night', not `slept' advisedly, because the sound of the waterfall was so nice many of us got up and engaged in a long conversation, fueled by the odd drink or two.

Morning came and we woke up late, but very fresh, to the sound of the flowing water. A short walk took us to John's House, another guest house with farang name, where we had our first home- grown coffee in Mae Kampong.

You might wonder why we didn't have breakfast at David's. To tell you the truth, we were out tio-ing on a pretty tight budget and decided to start the day with something simpler than David's Lodge offered. And no great hardship when push came to shove, since a cheap noodle stall can do pretty much the same as an American breakfast, don't you think?

Let me tell you readers now that when it comes to food, Mae Kampong is not exactly a gourmet centre. To put it simply, it's a small village in the hills. Much of the forest is still there, as well as the ever-flowing river that runs from the Mae Kampong waterfalls. Communities, or pok as they're called in the local dialect, are sparsely located. People have their lives to tend to, and most of them do the cooking themselves, and therefore there's not much incentive to open a restaurant. So, if you come here to stay in a guesthouse, then your choice of food is quite narrow, with only a few noodle stalls and small home restaurants to choose from, apart from the bigger establishments catering to tourists such as David's Kitchen and John's House. However, if you want to try a homestay experience, then you'll be having what the villagers eat at home. Some of the dishes, such as fried ant's eggs or bamboo worms - to mention a few of the more exotic choices - may not sound like your gourmet specials, but you'll understand why some of us Northerners crave them, only after you've tasted them.

All in all, when it comes to the homestay biz, the villagers do know what they have to offer. And you can be sure you're in good hands because the entire village was invested with a TAT Homestay Standard Award in 2004.

Anyway, breakfast over, and during a short walk to the seven-cascade Mae Kampong waterfall, I was wondering what had happened to all the villagers, since there was hardly a soul around. That's to say, apart from a few housewives sewing etc. in their homes, most of the other work-age inhabitants were out in their fields, or labouring on other folks' farms. So a word of warning, if you're planning on visiting, phone ahead to make a reservation (see below), otherwise you might find yourself arriving to a quiet welcome indeed - or none at all. This is, for us metropoles, the middle of nowhere.

A foreign young lady who fell for the charming solitude of Mae Kampong, and is now working with David, told us that when she first arrived here, she thought it was a deserted village. She and her friends couldn't find anything to eat, and had to walk for miles to find David's Kitchen.

It should also be noted that this area is remarkable for its tea - that's to say meang - plantation : none of your foreign oolong lapsang etc. here. From time immemorial, local people have been chewing fermented tea leaves as a refreshing energy-booster for their hard day's work. So it's still common these days to find stacks of tea leaves, fermenting in a big barrel in the back of any house in these parts.

The nearby Huaykaew village - no connection with the major drag of that name back in the Northern Capital - is also of significant interest and has played some part in recent history that hasn't been forgotten by the wider public. Some rich and powerful figures came here with logging licences and some heavy machinery, with the intention of making a bundle clearing the forest from the local mountains. The Huaykaew villagers declared the vicinity a `community forest', and in the process initiated the movement that has been going ahead since to decentralise authority and empower local people, giving them some say in the use of their environment and its resources. With the help of pro bono-type lawyers, the Community Forestry Act was drafted in 2000, the first such law to be outlined by an assembly of local people. It still hasn't been taken seriously by Bangkok bigwigs (or perhaps indeed they do take it seriously, and understand what a threat it represents to their hitherto unchallenged hegemony in these matters). So far at all events, the draft hasn't been approved by the government, but the story won't end there, and the local people have given a significant indication of how they should protect their local resources.

Well, this is another story. We don't have all the details, but this recent history of struggle presumably provides the explanation as to why the forest in this part of the North is still in such good shape. The fact is, we were able to enjoy strolling under the dense canopy at the waterfall. Some of us strolled further up a well-constructed concrete walkway to the nearby peak, up beyond the seven cascades of about 30 meters in height; leaving others of our party to enjoy dallying by the shallow, clear pool down at ground level. (At the time you read this, though, some pretty heavy rains having fallen, the water levels and the strength of the current will have been much augmented. Watch out, in other words. Look before you leap...look before you step too. Those rocks get awfully slippery, and they're surprisingly hard when bumped into.).

That was it, more or less - two days and a night away from the city, out in the country. And very nice it was too. The cheap noodles, the quiet chuckle of the water, the thick forest canopy - we don't have any of these in the city. But we took them back with us, memories to be cherished, and shared too, by us all.

To make a village homestay reservation, contact the village headman at 053-229526. A 2-day 1-night with 3 meals package costs 550 baht per person. A package of 3-days, 2-nights with 6 meals costs 900 baht per person. For Tharnthong Lodge and David's Kitchen, call 053-939472.