CHANG RAI AND THE WAY BACK TO BASE

Biker
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The Next morning we awoke, had breakfast and headed in a taxi to Chang Rai. Once dropped off the plan was to grab a bus back to Chang Mai and have a relaxing afternoon. Well lets just say that not everything goes to plan... Once at the bus terminal we were under the impression that we would be able to grab a bus every half hour... Problem was that the popularity of the flower festival in Chang Mai had meant that all buses up until 3.30pm were book out. Not planning on staying in Chang Rai this long we accepted our fate and headed to a local cafe to figure out how to entertain ourselves for the next 5 hours. believe it or not we succeeded...

Emerald Buddha Copy
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First stop was a sheltered day market where I purchased a much needed North Face copy back pack. Next we headed for a local Buddhist temple called "Wat Phra Kaew" (Bamboo Forest Monastery). Only to discover that this is the exact Monastery where the legend has it that the famous Emerald Buddha (now housed in a temple by the same name, located in the Grand Palace, Bangkok) was found in a pagoda that had broken apart from a lightening strike. The Chang Rai monastery now has an almost exact replica of the Emerald Buddha(both actually make from Jade). In a temple located to the rear of the monastery.

'...found in a pagoda that had broken apart from a lightening strike.'

Turtle Pond
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Once we were satisfied with our explorations we headed out side to be greeted by a kindly old gentleman with a rig-shore who was determined to ride us anywhere we wanted to go.... After about three blocks we started to feel sorry to this overly fit 65+ year old and begged him to stop so to relieve him of his duties with a bonus payment of course.... I was hoping that he would take the generous offer and retire for the day.....

From this point we headed back for a bit of late lunch then back to the bus station... So the city that we thought would offer us little gave us a lot. Looks like adventure is around any corner that you are willing to look.

3.30pm came by and we jumped our bus back to Chang Mai.....