June 12,

It had rained again last night, but not as violently. It still woke me up about 2230, after I had just gotten to sleep. Both nights have been raining at this same time… could be a thing, maybe?? We’ll see as we have three more nights here. We got up and about by 0700. I was looking out from our big picture windows to check out the sky, when I saw a flash of yellow. I opened the curtain fully and saw a yellow parrot sitting in the top of a tree. Then two more flew in to another tree and I called Jeff to come quickly. He was able to see them as well. Quite colorful with maybe green halfway done and more orange on their heads. It made me think of a song by Bob Marley… 🎶“three little on my doorstep”🎵. We got a couple of pics before they flew off. Anyway, we were thankful for the blessed sighting.

Then we had our Javas, before going down for breakfast. I asked the lady and she said they are her birds – she used to have ten but some have been taken by workers who have come through. She has taught the remaining four she left to stay away from hands. We then had breakfast of fried eggs and toast and the yummy fruit. We both also had Ovaltine (like a hot chocolate). We thanked her for the food. She likes to make suggestions of things to do. It’s nice and a way to interact. By the time we were finished the sun was shining.

So we hopped into our Yaris and went 18km (11 miles) to our destination. It is actually outside of Chiang Rai in another town. We arrived and parked our car then crossed the street to the Wat Rong Khun, aka, the White Temple. It is actually a complex. It was stunning, especially with the sun shining on it – making the all white with small trimmings of silver, sparkle and pop. We went to the entry and paid 100 THB ($3.09) each. The Wat was built in 1997 by designs of an artist – Chalermchai Kositpipat. Anyway, from our ticket purchase we go to the main chapel marked #1 on our map on back of our ticket. There is a big entry way to get there. We cross a bridge over a small reflecting pool. There were some people, all wanting their picture so it seemed to take a while. We got our shot, but the sun was so bright it was hard to see our screens… the photo wasn’t so good but the views were amazing. Then inside was a big Buddha, but we weren’t allowed photos, and we were out before I realized it! That part was a bit underwhelming for me. It was so small inside, but this may be by design as we were being herded through so to speak. The next building was the Relic Temple and no one could go in here. It had a multi-layered steeper roof line. These two buildings, by themselves, were worth the ticket price to see up close! Dazzling!

Now we just meandered the complex. There were three buildings labeled the “Golden Toilet”. We did use one, it was nice for Thai standards, but golden… gimmicky to me. There was even a golden fish statue that served as a fish feeding station – where you could buy food to give to the fish. Really! Then we came to a couple of buildings that were closed – “out for lunch break”. Well, that was disappointing… One was the Ganesha Exhibition Hall, which was gold gilded, not white; and the Art Gallery of the artist who designed the place. Overall though we were both impressed by the two main buildings, felt it was worth coming here.

We left and went back to our no name car, and took off to our next point of interest. We arrived at 1240 in Nam Tok Khun Kon National Forest Park. There was no entrance fee or parking fee for our car. We drove on to the parking, following signs for Khun Korn Waterfalls. We got out of the car and set out for the trail to the waterfalls. The trail was easy to keep on, but had some rocky steep bits, as well as some built in steps all along the forest and many huge bamboo groupings. It was 1,400 meters in length and well marked. We heard so many bird calls and very loud cicadas; and saw many caterpillars that seemed dangling in mid air. There were also an abundance of all colors and sizes of butterflies that entertained us along the way. We were hot and sweaty, but we reached the waterfalls… and felt justly rewarded. They were spectacular. We had them to ourselves for about ten minutes and relished it. The placard read the falls are “the highest waterfall in Chiang Rai with a stream about 70 meters in height” (230 feet), “and the originating point for Mae Korn River”. The platform viewpoint is great with cooling spray mist from the falls. After our ten minutes, the solo girl we passed came, and we offered to take her photo – then left to let her have it to herself.

Now we arrived back to our car and went back into Chiang Rai for late lunch. We had a Crispy Duck place in mind, but ended up at a noodle shop, Umphun Noodles, if Google Translate is correct. We thought we ordered different bowls of soup, but we got the same, which was fine as they were superb. The soups had two kinds of beef (sliced and hunks of brisket) four springy meatballs and flat, wide rice noodles. Yummy as we were hungry after our workout! I had a green apple smoothie, Jeff had a coconut shake. It cost us 180 THB, but Jeff gave 200 THB ($6.17).

We then were heading back to our place, stopping at a monument to a past King. We arrived back and chilled out the rest of the day. For supper we had a light supper of cheese, hummus, bread and a bottle of wine. After we ate supper, it rained early at 2030! The problem: it dripped a small drip of water on us inside our room from the ceiling – it was a very slow drip and a towel took care of it. But we discovered a larger puddle of water from one of the windows. But the rain stopped then, thankfully. Bed by 2200.