Day 5, 25th April, Anzac Day and 6, 26th April, Bangkok to Chiang Mai

I bought a Bangkok Post in Chiang Mai on Monday and read about Australians and New Zealanders commemorating the 95th anniversary. There were also articles about the current troubles in Thailand, which seemed to suggest that the government was not handling the situation well. The chief of staff had advised against military confrontation with the demonstrators, but there are hawks in the ruling party.

This is Kenneth (left) and his mate who sold me the red and black Backpack with wheels in the MBK shopping centre.
My Sunday 25th was a logistical exercise involving shopping, luggage, storage, a sleeper ticket on a train to Chiang Mai, a metro ride to Sukhumvit to find a book and some red wine to survive the journey, and leaving Bangkok, vowing that my next hotel had to have a swimming pool. The book: Guns, Germs and Steel, from Asia Books, the wine: Peter Lehman 2006 Shiraz.










This is Hualamphong Station:

The train set off on time at 22:00, and half an hour later I was enjoying a delicious dinner from the local food lady. At 00:30, the train stopped for two hours, so the ceiling fan was no longer helped by cool moving air from open windows. Luckily the 2nd class sleeper carriage was only half full, and quiet.
This is the view from my bunk, the blue cloth bits are curtains which turn your bunk into a private cabin, but also cut off the air from the ceiling fans.
The metal bits are ladders for the upper bunks and luggage-holders.

Breakfast came at 9 am. The scenery I had hoped to enjoy was fairly boring, but the worst was still to come. The train arrived not at 12:45 as planned, but at 17:00. "delay, delay, delay" said the conductor.




A useless episode with "Tourist Information" at the station was followed by a pleasant taxi-driver who took me to the nice place I am now in, the SK House. It does have cockroaches (3 dead on the floor, one live which disappeared into a crack in the ceiling), but the shower has its own floor space instead of jetting into the toilet bowl, and the swimming pool is just outside my door, very refreshing. Also it's in the old town and costs less than half of the special offer the guy at the station was offering for a large impersonal hotel instead of this cosy traveller's inn.
Chiang Mai is the most touristified place I have ever seen. Every second shop sells tours: trekking, elephant rides, white water rafting, hilltribe visits, mountain biking, ... Not to mention cooking and language courses, Thai massage, all sorts of esoteric, ecological, you name it it's here activity. Of course rock climbing, bungy jumping etc.
Hard to find a decent place to eat though, but at Ratana's Kitchen I had nice food and "Italian wine" by the glass, first ever in Thailand. It turned out to be South African Mont Clair cask white, but I wasn't bothered. OK in fact.
Due to the train delay I haven't booked a tour for tomorrow (and in fact I do not want to ride on an elephant and raft down a river, I would prefer a simple hike in the woods).
I might just rent a bike and cycle around.
Anyway I have a cool room in a pleasant hotel and tomorrow I will swim again and think about "The Gibbon Experience" on the Laos border and the slow boat to Luang Prabang.