by Scott Coates

When traveling almost everyone stays in a hotel for most of their trip abroad. International hotel brands provide supreme comfort, all the services you could want but often lack local character. Small boutique hotels can be very neat and quirky but sometimes lack the quality and upkeep that one still expects from a hotel and the prices that go along with them. Then there’s the homestay where you bunk down with a local family, usually meaning facilities are very limited and perhaps not comfortable

Smiling Albino adventurers enjoying a break in the Newa Chen courtyard

enough for the average traveler. Enter something different and in between all of these – Newa Chen.

While developing the Nepal Trek & Trail adventure back in 2007, our Nepal Team leader Mads suggested we spend a couple nights in the old capital of Patan and really explore it. A former capital of the country, located in the Kathmandu Valley, it’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site where every street, alley, corner and building serves as a living museum. Patan was a center where artisans flourished, specializing in word work, smelting, bronze work and along with it, they spent a good deal of time creating intricate and beautiful homes.

Newa Chen is perhaps one of Patan’s best preserved traditional homes. Owned by the Shrestha family, it’s constructed of brick and timber in traditional Malla style, a period where great importance was placed on art and culture. With modern times many of Patan’s traditional homes and those in the greater Kathmandu Valley for that matter have and are being torn down in favor of modern concrete structures. If you’ve been around intricate wood carvings and wooden homes most of your life it seems concrete seems like progress.

An intricate window frame

With its heritage literally being torn down around them, the Patan Tourism Development Organization along with UNESCO set out to protect and promote historical homes and buildings before it was too late. Many Patan homes are in disrepair due to the passing of time, lack of funds to fix them and Kathmandu also lies on an earthquake fault and is prone to occasional tremors, causing damage to poorly built structures. Often tearing down old homes, subdividing the land and building modern concrete ones is a way to earn money. The two organizations approached local families with what they deemed to be heritage homes and proposed a plan: use a low interest loan to restore your home, then develop a way to showcase it to visitors. Rather than being a financial drain on a family, sometimes crumbling structures like Newa Chen were not only refurbished and preserved but quickly became a significant source of family income.

Opened in 1996 after a thorough restoration, Newa Chen welcomes visitors to stay in one of their eight guest rooms. Short doorways force one to bend over or bow when entering, making you pay respect to the home as you enter. Residents share communal spaces, courtyards, dining areas, an attic

Waving from their room

which serves as a lounge and you see family members come and go throughout the day. Gorgeous brickwork, intricate wooden window frames and doors, Patan art and traditional furnishings don’t just share the area’s feel but submerge you right into everyday life. Steep wooden staircases (ladders really) take you through Newa Chen’s three floors which surround the central courtyard which all rooms look out onto. While great attention and effort is put into the preserving the past, they’ve thoughtfully installed such modern amenities as sit down toilets and nice hot showers, ensuring you’ll want to come home at the end of a day exploring.

Newa Chen is one of the most interesting and enjoyable places I’ve ever stayed. I’ve brought my parents there for the experience and we’re thrilled to have it as part of our special Jazzmandu Grand Slam adventure starting on October 28, 2010. In a world cluttered with boring, overpriced, and soulless hotels, Newa Chen is successfully blazing new trails and setting a new standard.

by Scott Coates

Back in late 2003 while redesigning the fabulously fun Chiang Rai Northern Exposure adventure, I passed through the Golden Triangle, located at the town of Sop Ruak, which forms the physical point where Laos, Myanmar and Thailand all converge on the Mekong River. A big white building caught my

The sign out front

attention – The Hall of Opium at Golden Triangle Park. An impressively large building set amongst a large expanse of manicured land, I had heard about an upcoming museum that would explore the history of opium but knew little about it. Time to dive in!

Part of the Mae Fah Luang Foundation, started in 1988 by Her Royal Highness Princess Srinagarindra, the late Princess Mother of His Majesty the King of Thailand, as a means to better the lives of hilltribe communities in Thailand’s northernmost province Chiang Rai, the Foundation has its roots at nearby Doi Tung. Originally a home for the Princess Mother and botanical gardens was built, coffee and macadamia nuts introduced as alternative crops to opium and there’s been no stopping the Foundation since.

Fast forward to 2003 and the they opened Golden Triangle Park, combining the Hall of Opium with lodging on its expansive grounds. The Hall itself is truly a state-of-the-art facility and huge at 5,600 sqm. The intent is to explore the entire history of opium, which played a large role in the region up until the mid-90s, at which time it was mostly irradiated in Thailand.

Smiling Albino isn’t the kind of company that general takes guests to museums, too often underdeveloped, unimaginative and boring in this part

One of the Hall's very inventive rooms

of the world, so it was with some doubt I entered its doors. A bit over two hours later I walked out the Exit totally wowed. I immediately called my business partner Daniel and shared my findings with him. “This must be part of our northern Thailand programs”, I exclaimed. Never did I think we would make a museum a part of our adventures but I was a changed man. The Hall is so much more than just a museum.

It begins with the long entrance tunnel, a spooky cave passage of sorts with sculptures of tortured souls built into the walls, representing those who get lost in drug use. You then enter into a theater where a well prepared video gives a quick overview of the Mae Fah Luang Foundation and opium’s role in the immediate area. From here you move through a series of information boards, sets and semi-interactive displays that explain the first 5,000 years of the drug’s use. Next there’s an extensive and very informative section on the Opium Wars between the Chinese and British, something you’ve likely heard of but don’t know much about – very interesting stuff. Next it’s on to opium’s role in Thailand (then Siam), its use in modern medicine, efforts to control international drug trafficking and finally a sober exit through the Hall of Reflection which showcases famous persons’ battles with drugs.

A typical visit takes about two hours, but can easily be stretched to three. What makes the Hall so interesting/entertaining is its makeup. Great thought and effort has been put into making sure the visitor is constantly engaged in a different manner. There’re traditional information boards, built sets, but it’s entire rooms that take the visitor into a different world and make you forget you’re in a museum. One room sees you walk over a full-size prison cell built into the floor, there’s an expansive section with interactive exhibits that see you try to figure out who in an airport is smuggling drugs and how. Wonderful videos examine international governments’ roles in fighting drugs in foreign countries (no names here) and you wrap things up in the very bright, but enlightening Hall of Reflection which wakes you up and brings you back into reality.

Most of our northern Thailand trips pass through the Golden Triangle and we

Entrance hall

make every effort to work in a visit to the Hall of Opium. Days prior to arriving here immerse guests in the larger Golden Triangle, through areas that no so long ago would have once been rife with opium. You get to hike trails through coffee/rice/corn/nut farms which once were opium fields, meet hilltribe groups previously entrenched in the opium trade who are now earning livelihoods through other farming methods and careers. The quaint town of Doi Mae Salong is now the country’s prime site of Oolong tea production, a crop that replaced opium in the mid-eighties and factors highly into most trips.

Drug cultivation, use and abuse are very complicated issues and something that few societies recover from, let alone in roughly 15 years. The Hall of Opium does a fantastic job of tying together the region’s many towns, people, and livelihoods that have gone under dramatic transformation for the better. While passing through the Golden Triangle, which at first glance seems nothing more than a tourist bus trap, be sure to turn off the road and spend a couple hours at this captivating Hall that Thailand should truly be proud of.

The Hall of Opium is located at the Golden Triangle opposite the Anantara Resort.
View Larger Map
Opening Hours: 08:30-17:00 (last admission at 16:00), Tue-Sun
Admission: 200THB (Thais), 300THB (foreigners)
Phone: +66-53-652-151
Email: hallofopium@doitung.org

The Smiling Albino Team went to Tha Kha and Amphawa Floating Markets on a training trip on Saturday, April 3, 2010. Here are a few shots from our day out!

Eve in a paddle boat at Tha Kha Floating Market

A food vendor at Tha Kha Floating Market

The Team on the Mae Khlong River

At Wat Bang Goong

Old house at Amphawa Floating Market

Ordering iced coffee at Amphawa Floating Market

A boy on the Mae Khlong train

Experience all of these places on our super cool Bangkok 1910 trip.

Enjoy reading Trains, Boats and Planes…, from the December 2009 edition of Expat Living Singapore, a neat story about Smiling Albino’s Bangkok 1910 trip.

Vendor at Tha Kha Floating Market

By Daniel Fraser

December 5, 2009

I was in Ho Chi Minh City (generally still referred to as Saigon by locals) recently exploring some new ways to see the city as part of our Vietnam Grand Slam adventure. When Smiling Albino designs city day trips we always look for unique features to showcase the history and people, but we also try to gain insider’s access to certain areas and forge relationships with locals so that our guests experience something deeper – and more fascinating – than simply a well-organized stroll through the main sites.

So, while in Saigon last weekend I was trying to uncover the truth behind a couple of urban legends. For many years I’ve read about the famous photograph taken on April 29, 1975, the day before Saigon fell to the communists, which became one of the most compelling images of the American War.

the original image captured by photographer Hugh Van Es, April 29, 1975

The quick facts of the photo are this: it was taken by Hugh Van Es, a Dutch photographer working for the American press covering the war in 1975. The image shows people scrambling up a ladder from a distance in order to reach a US helicopter perched on top of a building. When the photo appeared in papers around the world the following day it was erroneously reported that the photo showed Americans evacuating the US Embassy, a fact which the photographer tried for many years to correct. Certainly this mistaken reporting pleased the Vietnamese government as it fit their agenda more than the truth, being that the photo is really of Vietnamese escaping from the roof of an apartment a few blocks from the US embassy where several US covert officers and Vietnamese staff were located. The old US embassy in Saigon (renamed Ho Chi Minh City shortly after reunification in 1975) was eventually torn down 15 years ago.

When some reporters, especially the photographer himself, were allowed back into Vietnam in 1990, many of them went searching for the location where the photo was taken, but by this time the roof of the Caravelle hotel had been transformed, and the direct line of sight was marred by foliage. I think the idea came into being that if authorities reported the building had been demolished and re-built, it would put an end to the intrigue, and close yet another unusual chapter of cover ups and historic revisionism that has constructed much of what we know about the war.

Anyway, curiosity led me to search it out last weekend in the hopes it might add an interesting element to our trips in Saigon.

my shot of the existing rooftop in 2009 from a fire escape of a building half a block west

The photographer’s notes indicate he took the photo from the top of a hotel several blocks south, and that the address of the apartment for the evacuation site was 22 Gia Long Street. After the new regime took control of Saigon most of the city streets had their names changed and Gia Long Street become a distant memory. I had read that the building was torn down years ago around the same time as the old embassy and this was confirmed by several locals as well as a few western expats who had followed the story. Whatever the rumours, it turns out that the former Gia Long Street was changed to Ly Tu Trong Street sometime in 1976, and that the Vietnamese government probably perpetuated the story that the original photo took place on the roof of the US embassy in order to dramatise the American demise in Vietnam.

After some snooping around at an art gallery on the corner of Ly Tu Trong Street, I was able to climb out onto the fire escape and up to the 5th floor where I found a perfect view from the west of the famous rooftop elevator shaft captured in the iconic photo. Further curiosity brought me to befriend the building superintendent, and after a couple of gifts and a lot of waiting around I gained access after closing hours to the rooftop itself for a few moments.

a direct view with my face directly in front of the rooftop.

The image with my face in it (I just climbed climbed 6 flights of stairs) shows the original view from which the photo was taken, albeit directly in front compared to a half mile away. A US government agent in Saigon in 1975 wrote that in order to support a possible helicopter evacuation they hastily reinforced the elevator shaft with steel beams a few days before the evacuation. Why these trival details stick out in my mind I’m not sure, but the caretaker confirmed this little fact – and it is one of the reasons that the same elevator cabin is still in use 35 years later, instead of a new one, due to the limited space around the shaft supports to allow for a replacement.

Clearly I’m no detective, but this image and the story has intrigued me for years and it was a fun caper tracking down the details last weekend. Call it trip research – or a personal obsession – in any case SA guests have another neat story after their trips with us in Vietnam!

a north-view from the cafeteria of the HSBC bank a few blocks north. This view would be opposite of the original photo, which we can see now is blocked by the large construction project with green scaffolding behind.

Ultimately I guess it is these little discoveries that I hope make our adventures more interesting.

For some interesting background on the photo and the events leading to it, here’s a link to a story by the photographer: http://www.mishalov.com /Vietnam_finalescape.html

by Scott Coates

Last week I wrote about my coming trip to Yangon, Myanmar. The trip turned out to be insightful, fun and exciting.

A 1:10 flight took me from one world to another – Bangkok to Yangon. Hard

Typical street in downtown Yangon

to believe in such a short time you can be transported from one world to a totally different one. Arrival at a modern airport was followed by a line to get my visa on arrival, but all in all it was a fairly painless process. You need a travel agent to help you get the visa on arrival, but it’s much less hassle than visiting a Myanmar Embassy and acquiring one before arrival. I was also told by a fellow traveler that the airport is the most modern building in the nation. In the country I waited a bit over an hour for my girlfriend Erika to arrive from Singapore. Erika in-hand we joined our host and jumped in a van to Trader’s Hotel which was graciously arranged for me by a local agent.

Ice melting for cool drinking water

I was struck immediately with how much more modern things were than I expected. Roads were well paved, there were a good number of cars and businesses abound. This wasn’t the dirt road, third world place I thought it would be. Checked-in it was time for food and we elected to walk to a nearby place, Monsoon, recommended in the Lonely Planet. The walk there, as almost all walks in new cities are, started to shed light on the reality. We came upon a massive stupa that serves as a traffic circle. Sule Paya is about 2,000 years old and definitely gets the prize as most interesting traffic circle I have ever seen. The immediate area features colonial buildings, a church and mosque, truly showing that religions mesh well here. We opted for small side-streets, saw that locals use microwave phones on the side of the road for making calls, palm reading is huge with fortune tellers on most city streets, and a chew mixture of Betel Nut with other spices is very popular and sold at little stands.

Full stomachs we took a different route back to the hotel and I tried some Betel Nut chew. It was really tasty with all kinds of magical flavors colliding. You have to continually spit out your saliva while chewing and I got a big thumbs-up from a man on my technique. The downside, if you chew it for a while your teeth turn permanently red. Due to this I only tried once while in the country. I like my pearly whites! We passed on having our fortunes told while walking by Independence Monument where those with the skill to see into your future were everywhere. Another interesting site were little stands selling cool water for drinking. They have a large block of ice that melts and drips into a bucket giving you cool water. I’m adventurous but not that adventurous and gave it a miss.

While all seemed well and peaceful on the surface dinner with a few different

Having a good look at the pagoda

contacts shed light on the real situation. Names are not mentioned to protect my gracious hosts, but it turns out everything we have read about the oppressive Myanmar regime is true. A SIM card for a mobile phone costs $1,500US to keep people from having them, bicycles and motorbikes are banned in the downtown core to limit people’s ability to move around quickly and to offset the ruling generals’ fears of assassination. You cannot send sms messages out of the country to limit communications and most staggering, if a local resident is going to spend the night sleeping anywhere other than their registered dwelling they must inform their community supervisor who works for the government and the supervisor in the area they will be sleeping. So, my contact has to report before staying at his uncle’s house, each and every time. He also told me that government forces do random late night checks about three times/month at most houses to ensure all registered occupants are there. Wild! But on the surface you would never know these things.

Despite being one of the most oppressed people on earth for roughly 40 years, Yangon residents were some of the friendliest people I’ve ever met. Smiles were everywhere, English was generally quite good and the city is extremely safe. Taking taxis around town was affordable, the drivers honest and there were no offers to go shopping or to other places as often happens in Bangkok. Just a nice, quick drive where we wanted to go – truly refreshing and impressive!

Having tea at the market

Other activities and sites visited include a train ride around the city on their ancient railway, a great way to see real daily city life. A nice run around Kandawgyi Lake, the Bogyoke Aung San Market, a great place to shop, people watch and drink tea. The highlight, aside from chatting with locals was our visit to Shwedagon Pagoda. I was rather nervous about the visit after reading so many glowing reviews of it and being wary that it wouldn’t live up to the hype – I was wrong. From the outside it looks like a massive golden pagoda, but inside it’s so much, much more. Stupa after stupa, statue after statue, gleaming gold and more and more gold made this one of the most impressive/overwhelming sites I’ve ever visited – truly awesome. Much like the Grand Palace in Bangkok in that one visit is not enough, I can’t wait to return one day (hopefully soon) and sit for a while, watch people pass by and take it in again. This is without a doubt a site to be seen once in your lifetime.

Four days later, some great meals had, interesting drinks enjoyed and a half-full memory card, it was time to leave. I’ve obviously only scratched the surface of Myanmar and many people noted that everything outside of Yangon is another world. There’s so much to explore in this vast nation with more than 130 ethnic groups and languages, Himalayan peaks, sandy beaches and UNESCO World Heritage sites. I can’t wait to return and really get into the country.

by Scott Coates

I’ve been living in Thailand and the region for 10 years and have never properly been to Myanmar. What’s up with that?!
It’s always been a place I’ve really wanted to go but always wanted to wait

A balancing act in a Karen refugee camp just inside Myanmar

until I had a couple weeks so I could see the must-sees in one go: Yangon, Mandalay, Bagan & Inle Lake. A couple years went by, then a few more, trips back to Canada happened regularly then mountain biking in Tibet to Mt. Everest, Nepal across the Annapurna’s, Switzerland, Cambodia, Vietnam and on it went.

So, about nine months ago, a regional no-frills airline Air Asia had a Free Ticket Sale, where you only pay the taxes. I looked around and ended up with a ticket to Yangon, Myanmar for four nights for 1,200B ($35US) all-up. If I could go, great, if I couldn’t, no big deal, only 1,200B down the drain. So here we are, November 13 is just two days away and Yangon is going to happen!

Bought the latest Lonely Planet yesterday after years of avoiding it as the edition we have in our office library was written by our friend and longtime Lonely Planet guidebook author Joe Cummings, and he stopped writing for them a while ago. I couldn’t face replacing Joe’s edition. But when I started reading the book and realized it was drafted in 2000 and things have changed (and not changed) drastically in that country since then, the latest edition was required.

Back at home last night I put on relaxing lights, sat on my bed and dove into the book. Next thing I knew I had read the first 100 pages, blazing through the History, People, Food, Where to Drink (big surprise there), Money, To Go or Not to Go? Sections and I’m super pumped now.

One of the incredible things about living in this region is how close you are to so many exotic destinations that are completely different from one another. Travel from Bangkok to Yangon (575km) and you’ve gone just 17km further than San Francisco to Los Angeles (558km). But the language, culture, cuisine, architecture, government and alphabet are totally different. The same can be said for traveling to Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Hanoi, Vietnam or Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from Bangkok. Different, different, different.

Thakeylek just across the Thai border town of Mae Sai has seen my feet before, but it’s just a quick dash to see a couple touristy temples and pick up

Kids in a Karen refugee camp just inside Myanmar

some duty free wine. It’s hardly Myanmar. And I walked across a wooden plank over a small stream about 40km southeast of Mae Sod while staying at Highland Farm and was in an unofficially Karen refugee camp, which was wild, but didn’t really feel I was in Myanmar and truthfully wouldn’t want to go too much further in there.

So, into this city of six million I go and I’m truly excited. After traveling and living in this area for quite some time you grow accustom to going neat places often and probably don’t appreciate it as much as you really should. This is like traveling eight years ago, into the unknown, a new place, I don’t speak the language, don’t have a mental picture in my head and there are so many interesting people and sights I’m about to see. Wow – travel is still exciting!

Myanmar’s largest Paya (pagoda) Shwedagon is here in the former capital. With 53 metric tonnes of gold covering it and rising 98 meters every account I read of this site indicate it’s borderline life changing. Six million people, with a GDP $1,900US apparently live an incredibly peaceful life (when not harassed by the powers that be), 87% are devote Buddhists (4% are Muslim, 4.5%Christian, 5% are animist and 1.5% are Hindu) and dazzle the visitor’s senses.

Recommendations from former residents, colleagues that have been there,

A girl in a longneck village near the Mae Hong Song, Thailand and Myanmar border

authors and hoteliers see me taking a three hour circular route on a rickety train around the city for a look and feel of things, walking all over the place, meeting a veteran in the travel industry, a semi-underground writer/activist and a digital artist. Drinks have been recommended at a bar likely to have had James Bond in it in the early eighties and nooks and crannies in between.

Despite having blazed through a lot of pages and words about Myanmar I’ve still got a pretty blank canvas in my head about Yangon. Invigorating it feels to be this excited to the road and into somewhere new and unknown. A good thing for someone in the business of designing and leading world class adventures.

Next week, the story of how the trip was!

by Scott Coates

A few photos from a recent trip to sites along the Mae Khlong River,  south of Bangkok. See more here: http://photos.smilingalbino.com/Thailand-Photos/Waterways/Mae-Khlong-River/9845095_3o2oS#669502654_bRoRR

Lush tropical scenery along the Mae Khlong River

Bow takes on the enemy

Putting gold leaf on the Buddha image at Wat Bang Goong

Inside the Church of the Virgin Mary

Want to see these sites? Take part in our Bangkok 1910 trip.

by Scott Coates

Our driver heading out of the canal

Mae Khlong, a typical small Thai city in the central province of Samut Songkram (the birthplace of King Rama II), just at the mouth of the Gulf Thailand is a neat place.
It’s not far, about 80km from Bangkok, but it’s really different. You’re outside again, in the great outdoors, things smell like outdoor stuff too. The smell of the sea pervades the air and you could probably follow your nose to the Bight of Bangkok.

During a September trip with some of the SA Team while putting together the innovative Bangkok 1910 trip, we had a visit to the Mae Khlong Mangrove Conservation Project. Tucked in a mangrove forest, locals live in homes built on stilts along the final canal which runs into the ocean. A combination of the Kwae Noi River and Kwae Yai Rivers, flowing through Kanchanaburi, Ratchaburi and Samut Songkram provinces then dumping into the gulf, this canal is a very special area. Back in 1511 when the Portuguese rolled up to the ancient Siamese capital of Ayuttthaya (1350 – 1767), about 120km up the larger, but nearby, Chao Phraya River, they would have encountered a thicket of tangley mangrove trees at the mouth of the river. A curious tree that grows best in thick mud, in about a meter of salt water, these trees are kind of like a garberator, Elmer’s glue, a home and coffee filter all in one.

The pros showing how it's done

This delta is home to lots of life such as crabs, shrimps and fish which lay eggs in the roots of the trees – great protection – and even monkeys. It’s an important part of ecological system filtering garbage before running into the sea, a source of medicinal herbs and provides great protection to inland communities from the ocean during storms.
The trees have also been a victim over the years of humans. Chemicals from factories and especially prawn farms running off have caused massive deterioration, to the tune of more than 80,000 Rai (about 26,000 acres) being lost by 1990.

In 1995 the Mae Khlong Mangrove Conservation Project was established by HRH Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn with the help of the government and private sector. Since that time more than 24,000 Rai (about 8,000 acres) of forest have been recovered, mainly by the communities living in Baan Leam Yai and Klong Klone.

Planting mangroves

The project creates profits from two streams – members of the community gain employment from planting trees, managing the eco system and taking visitors on trips.
During our visit we learned about the project from its director, cruised in a longtail boat out into ocean to eat in a purpose-built bamboo hut, enjoyed an after lunch swim, then the best part – skiing! Planters use a smooth wooden sled to kneel on in the very muddy water while planting trees, and they give visitors a chance to try riding on it behind a longtail boat. It’s a lot like snowboarding and quite a good laugh.

Visits can run from two hours to multiple days and they host a good number of corporate groups who come to do extensive planning.

Being just 100km from the bustling city of Bangkok, it’s easy to get here, a world away and truly a fun and unique Thai experience – even after having lived here for 10 years. Want to experience it? Join our Bangkok 1910 trip.

See you at the Gulf!

by Scott Coates

Thailand is famous for markets. Small, large, along roads, under tin roofs, on canals, there’s a plethora of them. One of the most unique markets is Talad Rom Hoob, or the Railway Market. Located in the center of a small city, Samut Songkram, located about 80km southwest of Bangkok, the market is one of the city’s modern claims to fame.

Situated just a few kilometers from the Gulf of Thailand along the Mae Khlong River, which is formed upstream by the Kwai Noi and Kwai Yai Rivers from Kanchanaburi, the economy here revolves around fishing and agriculture. Water is the lifeblood with 391 major canals serving as transport lanes for small paddle boats and daily life. As the birthplace of King Rama II, the second King of the current Chakri Dynasty (Rama IX is the current King), the province has been a longtime tourist destination for Thais, but is catching on with foreign visitors.

Sandwiched between the bus and train stations, literally on and along the train tracks, Talad Rom Hoob is a one of a kind that must be seen to be believed. Like most Thai food markets, vegetables, fruit and ready-to-eat dishes abound, with prices per kilo clearly displayed and everything being very fresh, fresh, fresh. The train tracks serve as the walking area for customers until of course the train comes…

The Mae Khlong Route which runs from the town of Mahachai (about a 1 hour journey) has been in operation since 1901, serving as a vital lifeline between the Gulf of Thailand and Bangkok. With modern highways and the popularity of cars not as many people use the train today as once did but it’s still quite popular with locals going between the two centers, many of who connect to a second train in Mahachai which goes to the capital. The ride is free for Thai citizens as a government service and 10 Baht (about $0.30US) for foreigners – a true bargain and great way to see some nice rural scenery on the way.

The train makes the journey four times per day in each direction and when it pulls in or out of Mae Khlong Station the real fun begins. Vendors scamper to fold up umbrellas, awnings, pull their stalls back (most are on wheels) and make sure their goods do not get run over by the train. They have the process down to a science and it only takes about 30 seconds to set up or tear things down. The train literally hangs over vegetables as it goes by with retailers knowing how close to the tracks they can leave things without them getting damaged.

The market is a great stop after visiting one of the many floating markets nearby (Damnoensaduak, Aphawa, Tha Kha) as you can easily pass through Samut Songkram on your way to/from Bangkok. To find the market drive through town and stop at (not on but nearby please) the train tracks which you have to pass over when driving through town. Walk down the tracks towards the sea and you’ll walk right into the thick of things. Truly a unique market and experience.

Want to see the market in the most comprehensive and fun way possible? Email Smiling Albino and we’ll make it happen.