We arrived in Chiang Mai last night and surprise surprise, our taxi driver said he knew where he was going, when he didn't. So after taking over 30 minutes to get to our apartment (which should have taken about 15 minutes), we were finally able to get settled. The apartment we decided to stay in is a bit out of the center of town, which may have been why it was so difficult to find. Our apartment is a penthouse that over looks the rest of the city...it's pretty sweet. And in this weather, the A/C isn't too bad either.
I can't tell you how excited I was for this, seeing pictures of this place was really the only reason I agreed to Thailand - the whole point of me going. After arriving at Tiger Kingdom we discussed which age groups we wanted to see and agreed to seeing all of them - if you are coming this far, why not?! We were let into the tiger park and we first went to see the smallest tigers - so stinking cute. But surprise surprise, they had the longest waiting time. So we went to see the medium tigers first...and for mediums sized tigers they were HUGE!
You are allowed 15 minutes in each cage with the tigers (and a tiger handler of course). Let me reiterate again - the medium tigers were MASSIVE. It was very hot and humid today, so the tigers were just lounging around. We were able to pet them, give them a hug - anything but touch their front paws and their heads. Our handler even showed us the tigers teeth and claws - Mabel and Olive have nothing on these guys!!
At one point one of the tigers was getting a bit grumpy and as Jacob and Matt would put it "lunged" at them - I don't thing I would go that far, but we were definitely a bit on our guard after that.
The next age group we went to see was the big cats - just incredible. The largest cat in this enclosure was about 100k (220lbs). The largest cat they have at Tiger Kingdom is 300k (over 650lbs), but he wasn't able to be played with, for obvious reasons. These cats are just so incredibly beautiful, I still can't get over it.
This was just honestly such a great activity. I know there is a lot about how when people visit places like this the animals are sedated and drugged, but owning 2 cats I can see a lot of similarities (I know Mabel and Olive aren't tigers...). They sleep a lot - especially when it is HOT and HUMID and they play really similarly - quite a few of the tigers we saw at all the various ages were jumping and playing and moving. After observing this place, I didn't feel like I was aiding in any form of animal cruelty.
The next stop for our day was the Chiang Mai Zoo - now if you are an animal welfare person or all about health and safety, you might just want to stop reading here...or here. Seriously. I mean it.
Alright...I warned you...last chance?
So we decided to make it a day all about animals (actually most of our Chiang Mai stop is about animals). We asked our taxi driver to take us to the zoo and away we went. We decided to upgrade our zoo tickets to include the Chiang Mai Aquarium as well. The way the zoo is formatted is so different from what we are used to back home. You can choose to walk around the zoo (which is really hilly), use there little bus/shuttle system, rent a golf cart, or drive your own car around the zoo. Since it was peak afternoon and quite warm, the boys opted to rent a golf cart.
The first stop was the hippo enclosure. I was literally 3 feet away from a hippo. NO jokes. I was on the same level as the hippo. I could have easily reached into the enclosure. In fact, for 10 baht I could have bought some grass to FEED THE HIPPO. The next stop was the African section, where we fedd the giraffes. I know they have long tongues, but it was crazy to see their long tongues reaching for the grass we had on offer.
As we drove towards the aquarium, there was a tiny little enclosure (about 2 feet tall) with an elephant reaching out of it - it could have easily stepped over or knocked over the fence - and again, you could feed the elephant.
After that it was pretty standard animals - monkeys, more snakes, goats, deer, otters, etc. The only strange fascination that we found was that they had at least 15 varieties of turtles, if not more. We even watched 2 turtles fighting, it might have been the least aggressive, slowest fight I have ever watched. But we stood there and watched it for about 10 minutes nonetheless.
At this point we decided it was time to head off and go explore Chiang Mai's Old Town, so we found a taxi and after some pointing and miming we were off. We arrived and started to walk down the street, when Jacob realized that the golf cart lady had kept his drivers license!! The zoo closed at 5pm and it was 5:02pm. We hailed down another cab and convinced them to take us to the zoo, even though they kept telling us the zoo was closed.
When we arrived at the zoo, the next hurdle was the security guard, who was insistent that we needed to come back tomorrow. but we fibbed a bit and told him that we were leaving Chiang Mai in the morning. He eventually let us in (we think the only reason he was resistant was because he didn't want to walk up the hill.)
With ID in hand, we headed back into the Old Town - we had all agreed that a massage would be a great way to end the evening. When we were about 5 minutes drive away from our destination, our taxi driver stopped to tray and take on more people! How rude! we waited, and waited, and waited. But he wasn't moving. He was just parked looking for more passengers. I should probably explain that taxi's in Chiang Mai are basically pick-up trucks with benches in the truck bed. Again - health and safety isn't a priority. After we asked him multiple times what was happening, and with no response, we hopped out of the truck and walked the rest on foot - free ride back to the Old Town - we'll take it.
After that we enjoyed an incredibly inexpensive 2 hour foot, neck, head, and shoulder massage - much more painful than the one we got in Bangkok, but it felt so much better afterward...I could really get used to all these massages!! To end the night we wandered around the big evening market in Chiang Mai, then headed home for a relatively early night, because tomorrow we are riding some elephants!
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