Home » Thailand » Northern Thailand » Chiang Rai

Wat Rong Khon and Doi Luang National Park

Posted by Stuart at 07:56 AM on August 24, 2002

After spending the night in a cheap but decent guest house, and having French Toast and coffee for breakfast (how Thai!), Isara and I went to his college to pick up his transcript. At the college we took a walk around the gardens named after the King's Mother. It was a beautiful terraced garden with lots of trees and flowering bushes surrounding a big lake, and a statue of the park's namesake.

This is all fine and good, but I have to admit I have a problem here. In various literature and conversations, I have heard the nickname of the King's Mother as "Grandmother Princess", "Grandmother Prince's", and "Prince's Mother". I have no idea which is correct. But at least I do know it was a nice park.

On the way back to Phan from Chiang Rai, we stopped by a brand new white and silver temple called Wat Rong Khon that is being designed and built by a famous Thai artist named Master Charlermchai Kositpipat. Its modern, yet classical style was quite impressive.

We then rode the motorcycle to Doi Luang National Park, where we rented a tent for the night. We had the campground to ourselves, since the idea of camping out during the rainy season is an unpopular one (if not downright strange!). Sure enough, it rained most of the night, but we stayed dry in the tent. When the rain stopped in the morning, we hiked about 1 km to see the Pa Keng waterfalls. There are 9 waterfalls in all -- each unique in size and shape. Needless to say I took a lot of pictures here.

After bathing in the falls, we hiked back along the very slippery and steep trail. We then took the motorcyle to another hillside temple, then to the town of Phayao on the lake for dinner.

After dinner we traveled north through Phan and back to Chiang Rai, where we visited the Night Bazaar again (no rain this time) and went to a few nightclubs to sample the night life of a medium-sized northern Thai town. We spent the night in Chaing Rai again, this time at a different cheap (yet still decent) guesthouse.