At 6am everyone is sleeping. Everyone.

Even the street dogs were still passed out on the road.  Everything was quiet.  I roamed the streets as all I needed was a drink or something, anything.  Finally the fancy fancy resort I had checked out earlier was setting out their free buffet for the early go-getters, which I assumed was a perk of staying at the hotel.  I pretended to be one of the fancy resort guests and proceeded to suck down a few glasses of orange juice from the self serve dispenser.  No food, just something to drink.  That would tell the whole story if I were to leave for the airport or not.

Thanks for the drink, I’m outta here.

I felt better and knew that things would be ok, not perfect, but ok.  I guess I passed some kind of bug or something.  Whatever it was sure cleaned me out. I was almost on 24hrs without eating – but nothing sounded the least bit appetizing.

The airport experience was a breeze and once on Asia Air, but passed out for the whole 2 hour trip. After collecting my bag I purchased my 120bhat taxi to Old Town Chiang Mai. Immediately I noticed a relaxed atmosphere, and the prices were MUCH cheaper – like almost half for everything.

Being high season most of the hotels I checked out were full, but I finally found one called the Same Same Guesthouse. It had a international backpacker vibe to it without the pretentious fancy resort quality. The staff was very friendly and the price was even better, about $10USD/night.  I have hot water, 2 beds and nice window views. The hallway walls here are covered with past-guest scribblings describing the awesome stay they had and what country they were from.  This place had that charm I was looking for. The best part of all, the WiFi is fast and works great form my room.  I have been rating rooms based on the internet reliability and reach…so far it’s thumbs up for Same Same.

The climate is cooler & drier here, so the ceiling fan is more than adequate. Last I checked, the low from last night was 55 – so yeah, much different. Still the high for today was 91.  That’s quite a temp swing.

Tonight, Sunday,  in Chiang Mai they have the weekly night walking market which is a couple blocks from my room.  I think after the pizza for lunch, I have enough energy enough to check it out.  Yes, it is going to be pizza and pasta for me for a while.  Need to lay off the spicy Thai food for a few days.