Chiang Mai - Chiang Dao

Chiang Mai has been the biggest disappointment of our trip. It is supposedly a ´must do´ in Thailand and the problem is that everyone ¨does¨ it. We found it very touristic with some large markets with lots of tourists and touristy things to buy. So we took it as a couple rest days and walked around the markets and actually found some markets without tourists in them. Also it was good to check the internet and find out what was going on in Bangkok.
Then we rented a motorbike (about 5 dollars per day) and came up to Chiang Dao, 75 or so kilometres north of Chiang Mai and are happy to find a peaceful town with hardly any tourists. We´ve been eating well and enjoying the sights around town. Here they have a noticeably different dialect or language and are more serious and have different physical traits.
We went on an incredible motorbike ride through the Chiang Dao Wildlife Refuge. In the park there are little villages where hill tribes live in huts with gorgeous landscapes. It had to have been the most incredible day yet!
I was lucky to be on the back of the bike of an experienced cyclist and motorbike rider. That road could not have been done by just anyone with steep 30% grade ups and downs and extremely windy roads! It was absolutely beautiful and an amazing life experience.
At the last town we stopped in, it looked like they were having the school field day and there were like a hundred kids playing tug-a-war in a soccer field. We stopped for a coffee to watch the goings on.
The maps we had showed two ways to go back, both of them ended up dirt roads – one that ended in a stream and the other was way too crazy for a scooter and two people.