Day 2 itinerary:
9.30am - Mekong river Long tail boat ride
10am - Laos (tourist) market
11.45am - Mae Sai
1.30pm - Lunch
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3.30pm - Garden
6.00pm - Dinner by the Mekong
A brief geography of Golden Triangle (by a city girl):
I requested to start day 2 later, at 9am. The previous night, I felt exhausted when we were traveling by road from Chiangrai Airport/night market area to our hotel. It took more than an hour. It (the hotel) is located at the famous "Golden Triangle", which is an area where 3 countries - Thailand, Myanmar and Laos, being separated only by a river, had a rich history of illegal opium production and trade. When we approached our destination in the dark, we were traveling on a road running parallel to the Mekong river on our right. On the opposite bank of the Mekong river is Laos.
It must be due to excitement, we woke up early. Thus we had plenty of time to eat breakfast, and to take in the beautiful views of Mekong river by the terrace outside the hotel cafe.
It was a cooling and slightly misty morning, thus the photos turned out greyish. See the photo below, all 3 countries are in it: where I stand is Thailand, to the right (top) is Laos, and to the top (starting from the small island right in the middle and then moving into the left) is Myanmar.
Later when I google-mapped the area, I learnt that the rivers - Ruak (curvy one) and Mekong - run like the letter "Y", and thus the 3 countries form a triangle:
I learnt that Uncle SK got a camera as a long service award gift from his company about a year back, and had since been going around SG to take photos of places, such as Orchard Christmas Light up. That morning at the hotel, we were roaming around taking photos, and I took a (very rare) photo of us.
Ha, pokemon go just released Gen 3, so we had AR on, with backdrop of the Mekong.
Mekong river - Long Tail boat ride - Special Economic zone - Laos market:
We gathering at the lobby at 9am, where Lynn played on it's piano (will post on day 3). Took a 5 mins van ride to "Golden Triangle Park" where there's a special immigration arrangement for tourists who take long tail boat ride to go to Laos. We do not need to clear immigration at Laos; instead we hand over our passports to the Thai immigration office there, and retrieve them when we come back.
Boarding at Thailand; Golden Buddha statue in the background
Took a photo of a passing boat, similar to ours.
A very nice group photo!
First, we go north thus Laos was on our right, and soon, Myanmar was on our left. The tour guide explained that now we only see grass land, as there are no more poppy (opium plant) fields. There are short buildings here and there, and they are mainly immigration buildings or hotels/casinos for the tourism industry.
Then we turned around and headed south. On the Laos side, there's a sign board to mark the "Golden Triangle special economic zone", where there are casino and hotel development.
After about 30 minutes in the boat, we stopped and boarded at Laos, and visited a tourist market. We spent an hour there, where Lynn got a souvenir and a few of them got "cheap n nice" backpacks. We also got to experience the large throng of Chinese tourist, and how locals learn to speak Mandarin to cater for the biggest spenders.
When we turned back towards Chiangrai, we saw that Thailand is much more developed. Here's a church, in the predominantly Buddhist country.
Finally we landed, and the tour guide requested that we clasped our palm in respect when taking the photo with the Buddha statue.
The lesser known Ruak river:
Afterwards, we visited another famous border, the Mae Sai checkpoint, which is the north most part of Thailand. Here, across a bridge (over Ruak River) to the top is Myanmar. The bustling market place here is an authentic local market, with grocery and necessities (7-11 too) along side souvenir shops.
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