Scooter Adventures in Chiang Mai

After a wonderful morning snuggling with giant cats at Tiger Kingdom, we continued on our rented scooter to discover the real Chiang Mai. Some locals drew a small map for us with some spots to visit. 

We started by visiting Doi Suthep-Pui National Park, where we took a walk through the jungle to see the waterfalls  and the biggest, tallest bamboo I've ever seen. Locals were having a picnic on the rocks at the base of the falls and I wished we had packed something to eat. We continued on our scooter and drove past rice paddies where men and women were watering the crops and scattering seeds. We ran into a few elephants on the side of the road and occasionally stopped to photograph huts nestled deep in the foliage. We came across children swimming in a nearby creek with magical light streaming through the massive trees overhead. All of it looked like scenes from a storybook to me. 

Some of our best adventures have been those that were unplanned. It's always rewarding to venture a ways out of the center of town to see where the locals live, work, and play. Many of the photos below were taken by me from the back of the scooter while Yuriy drove. Enjoy!

- Julia

P.S. 

In honor of our one year anniversary(!), I will be sharing our wedding images on my personal blog. Feel free to join in!

Tiger Kingdom

We rented a scooter for the day and decided to venture out of downtown Chiang Mai and see what there is to see around town. Well we heard there was a place called "Tiger Kingdom" (sounds magical, doesn't it?) so we headed in that direction. 

I didn't even realize how excited I was until we pulled up and it hit me that I would get to pet a giant kitty cat! Every feminine instinct kicked in and I was pretty much squealing and jumping up and down when I saw the tigers. The cats are beautiful. They look beautiful, they move beautifully. With our ticket, we had 15 minutes to spend with a tiger of our choice in his cage. It wasn't nearly enough. We had just enough time to snap some photos, get the lazy tiger to walk around the cage with us, and force him to do a little snuggling...  then they booted us out. I expected a tiger to be really fluffy and soft, but the hair is coarse and waxy and the body is firm... quite similar to petting a horse. We were allowed to touch the back paws but not the front paws or the face. 

The tigers were really lethargic and the employees at Tiger Kingdom tried to keep them awake by dangling toys on sticks in the air. Many people assume that the tigers are drugged, which made me uneasy. However, Tiger Kingdom had information posted around the site that the tigers are never drugged-- tigers are night hunters and if they are well fed, they have no need to exert energy during the hottest parts of the day. You can read more about it here. 

Last time I wanted a tiger for a pet so much was during my Calvin and Hobbes obsession as a kid! Visiting the tigers in Chiang Mai was one of the highlights from our entire time in Thailand.

- Julia

Baby tiger!