Friday 17 October 2014

Chiang Mai trip – 17 Oct 14

We have a choice of either the Green Market Lounge or Ambassador Transit Lounge and we picked the first lounge since we walked passed it. But it's a bad choice as the food variety here is limited.
Green Market Lounge
Limited variety

There are several stalls selling local food beside the lounge at the transit area level 2.
Hawker stalls

We explored the Enchanted Garden while walking to the boarding gate. It is beautifully decorated with flowers and it's an attraction on it's own.
Enchanted garden
Koi pond

We made use of the foot massage machine outside the boarding gate before boarding the plane. I was disappointed that the inflight entertainment streaming was not available in this flight. Breakfast was served and passenger can choose from either pancake and omlette or fried rice.
Pancake and omlette

After 3hr of flight journey, we landed at Chiangmai International Airport. The airport is small and we cleared the immigration and collect our baggage within half an hour. After we exited the arrival hall, there are 2 taxi counters but the fare difference is only THB10. Taxi fare to downtown Chiangmai cost THB160 ~ S$6.20 and is paid directly to the driver. We collected the taxi number slip and waited for the taxi to come over.
Taxi kiosk

The journey to Seven Senses Guesthouse took less than 15min as the airport is only 4km from downtown.
Facade of Seven Senses Guesthouse

The receptionist Noot is very friendly and gave us a warm welcome. She gave me a map of Chiang Mai and explained to me the main attractions. 
Reception area
Souvenirs corner
Cafe

For the first 2 nights, we stayed at Ayutthaya room on the ground floor. There are only 8 rooms in Seven Senses Guesthouse which provides the guest with an intimate and homely feeling and Noot will address every guest by their name. The room is made of teakwood and I feel like stepping into a Thai's house. There is a small outdoor garden in the room but most of time I'll be staying inside the aircon room to get away from the heat.
Ayutthaya room

Noot gave us the breakfast menu which we can choose from either set A, B or C for the next day breakfast and breakfast is served from 7am - 10am.
Breakfast menu

I have read from tripadvisor that there is almsgiving at Seven Senses Guesthouse in the morning so we asked Noot for more information. We bought 2 offering set which consist of necessities for the monk at THB100 ~ S$4 each for tomorrow morning almsgiving.
Offering for monks

We had lunch at Seven Senses Guesthouse since there is a inhouse cafe here. We ordered Phad Thai, Green Curry and Tom Yum Goong and this meal cost THB 295 ~ S$11 which is quite reasonable. The Phad Thai is delicious but we had better Green Curry and Tom Yum Goong elsewhere.
Lunch

We walked from hotel to Nimmanhaemin road as Noot told us that the walk is about 15min. However the weather is hot and the walk is in fact more than 15min.
Kad Suan Kaew shopping centre near Seven Senses Guesthouse

There is a modern shopping centre at the start of Nimmanhaemin road which resemble Bugis+.
Maya shopping centre

I was expecting Nimmanhaemin road to be vehicle free but it isn't. Nimmanhaemin road is the hippest and coolest street in Chiangmai where the students usually hang out as it is near Chiangmai University.

Our first stop at Nimmanhaemin road is Ristr8to cafe (Add: 15/3 Nimmanhemin Road, Suthep, Muang, Chiangmai (between Soi 3 & 5), Opening hours: 9am - 11pm). It is reputed to serve the best coffee in Chiang Mai. They use doppio Ristretto for all the hot coffee and one get to choose the Origin coffee seed too. The surrounding wall inside the Cafe is full of chalk board illustration of how the coffee are prepared, the origin of the coffee seed and how it is roasted.
Ristr8to

We ordered the Piccolo Latte which is one of the more popular drink in the cafe & Affo Gato which comes with 2 scoops of ice cream blended with long Ristretto.
Coffee Indulgence

Nimman Promenade located at Soi 4 which is just beside the Wawee coffee cafe is lined with small boutiques selling unusual and eye-catching object from art and antiques to fashion and jewellery. We browsed through the shops but nothing catch our attention and business here is lacklustre.
Nimman Promenade
Artistic Nimmanhaemin Road

We were stopped by a Taiwanese family who is asking for direction to Mango Tango so hubby and I decided to pay a visit too as we did not try Mango Tango in Bangkok. We ordered the Mango Tango with extra sticky rice which cost THB160 ~ S$6. It provide a respite from the weather outside but nothing to shout about.
Mango Tango
In house slide

The last stop at Nimmanhaemin Road is iberry Cafe (Add: Nimmanhaemin Road Soi 17, Chiang Mai). We didn't dine at the cafe and only walked around for photo snapping. There are interesting sculptures inside the compound.
iBerry cafe

We then took a tuk tuk to Green Bamboo Massage (Add: 1 Moon Muang Road, Soi 1, 50200 Chiang Mai). The fare for Tuk Tuk within Chiang Mai downtown should not exceed THB100 ~ S$4. Usually we will show the address in Thai to the driver and ask for the rate before we hopped onto the Tuk Tuk or Songthaew.
Green Bamboo Massage

We had 90min Thai massage which cost THB300 ~ S$12. We were a bit skeptical when the masseurs here do not wear standard uniform and indeed the massage didn't turn out to be good. Green Bamboo Massage ranked highly in Tripadvisor but it ain't good at all. We have set high expectation for Thai massage after being pampered by Ruen Nuad which we always visit when we are in Bangkok.
Waiting area

We then walked to Lert Ros which is also located inside the city wall for dinner (Add: Soi 1, Ratchadamnoen Road (Opposite Vieng Mantra Hotel), Opening hours: 1 - 9pm).
Lert Ros

We ordered medium size Tapilia fish (as the small size is sold out), grilled pork and Tom Yum Goong which only adds up to THB305 ~ S$12, which is very cheap. The fish is coated with salt and grilled to perfection but we can only eat the flesh as the crispy salty skin is not edible. It's taste heavenly when dipped with the green sauce which gives a sweet, sour and spicy taste. The grilled pork is tender and juicy. Hubby was disappointed with the Tom Yum Goong as it's not up to his expectation.
Cheap and delicious dinner

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