Chiang Mai : The National Park and the Wat Phra That Doi Suthep

The National park and the Wat Phra Doi Suthep are located 15km from the city center of Chiang Mai. The best option is to rent a motorbike for 200 Baht (you can easely negociate 150 bath).

If you plan to visit the national park I advise you to wear good shoes. It’s a nice climb and you wil have a view on the city if it’s not too cloudy. In the National Park we spend time in the small waterfall to relax and we met a local group of thai teenagers who were playing music and eating food. The communication was basics and the offered food to us so we tried something which was, I guess, porck and watermelon seeds. We had a nice time there.

The Wat Phra Doi Suthep is one of northern Thailand's most sacred temples and one of the most revered by Thai people. So of course very touristic, th wat is really beautiful but because of the amount of tourist you will wait a long time to have your own Buddha picture. I guess it could be really smart to visit it on the morning around 9 when they open the site to avoid the mass of tourists.

In every school in thailand, kids learned the legend of this Wat. According to the legend, a monk bring a relic to the King Nu Naone. Once he arrived in Northern Thailand, the relic : a bone brokes into two parts. One of them, the small one, was keept at the temple of Suandok. The second piece was placed on a white elephant back which was relased in the jungle. The white elephant choose to climb Doi Suthep mountain and once he was up he stopped and died. The King Nu Naone interpreted it as a sign and ordered the construction of a temple at this site : the Wat Phra Doi Suthep.

In Southeast Asian kingdoms, the white elephant has traditionally represented divine royal power. The number of white elephants held by a king largely determined his power in the eyes of regional adversaries, and the white elephant was the featured emblem of the national flag of Siam until the name of the country was changed to Thailand.

The Wat Phra Doi Suthep itself is a beautiful example of northern Thai architecture. The 306 Step staire case flanked by mosaic Naga (snakes) deserve the effort to climb it. The

climb helps devotees to accrue merit.

The Doi Suthep Meditation center offer to visitor the possibilty to stay and experiment a vipassana retreat.

This is my next step of my trip and I am waiting for it. I realize how lucky I am to get the chance to attend to a 10 days meditation retreat in one of the most beautiful temple in Thailand.