Chiang Mai travel info

At seven in the morning the sun slants across the red-brick wall at Tha Phae Gate. Pigeons settle along the moat and a line of barefoot monks in saffron robes works its way down the lane. Inside the old square city, roughly 1.6 km a side, there's an old temple on almost every soi, so gilded roof tips keep catching your eye as you walk. The city was founded in 1296 as the capital of the Lanna kingdom.

Leave the moat and head about 2 km west and you're in Nimmanhaemin, where the lanes below Chiang Mai University are packed with coffee roasters, small design shops and rooftop bars. Go east instead and you reach the Night Bazaar lights and the slow brown Ping River. You get around by red songthaew truck or Grab, and plenty of visitors rent a scooter to ride the switchbacks up Doi Suthep.

It runs a beat slower than Bangkok, and from November to January the early mornings dip toward 15°C, cool enough for a light jacket. Lunch is khao soi, crispy noodles on a coconut-curry broth; dinner might be a coil of herb-heavy sai ua sausage at the Sunday market. Land late at night, and by the next morning you've slipped into the slower rhythm.

Chiang Mai International Airport (CNX)