Bangkok and Khoa San Road – City size, big – dorm 150-300 baht[1], nice two person room, 350 baht (no hot shower) – cheap meal, 70 baht – average temp 70 (night)-95 (day)
Thailand is truly a country with many faces. If you’re arriving by air, you will more than likely fly into Bangkok and head directly to the Thanon Khao San area, the main backpackers drag. Here you will be offered everything you can imagine, from a taxi to a ping pong show (don’t ask), a coconut to a scorpion, a kebab to a tattoo, a beer to laughing gas, Pad Thai to burgers and fries…the list goes on. You will likely hear the sound of croaking frogs and turn around to find a lady with crazy hats stroking a wooden frog with a mallet to attract your attention long enough to sell you something.
The music is pretty much exclusively 90s-current pop/dance music–all those songs you’ve heard somewhere but were too drunk to remember and could never enjoy sober anyways but kind of remind you of your time in college and high school since for some unknown reason they are played so ubiquitously at all dance parties. The music is too loud to hear yourself think, let alone talk, and you’ll often have to fight through a crowd to get anywhere, especially as you approach the center of the street.
Not sounding like your cup of tea? Try one road over at Rambutri road, where it is less crowded, less noisy, and the vibe is a healthy dose of live, often acoustic music (scorpions and frog ladies still abound). In just a few steps you’ve left the frat house[2] behind and entered a far more relaxed atmosphere. If this is a step in the right direction your next stop after Bangkok should probably be Chiang Mai, otherwise head south to the islands.
In my experience the further north and the more rural you get you can expect the Thailand to become cheaper, chiller, and colder. For people over 30 reading this, chiller means nicer locals and tourists, more available weed, better food, a more relaxed atmosphere, as well as better live music. Further south things are usually more expensive, and there is more of a raucous party vibe, with less live music and less friendly locals. Certain places are exceptions of course, like the rock climbers haven of Ton Sai.
Day trip ideas – Floating markets, Ayutthaya ruins
Chiang Mai and the Pae Gate – City size, medium – dorm 150-250 baht (not sketchy), nice two person room 300 baht (yes hot shower) – cheap meal 60 baht – average temp 60-90
Like Bangkok, Chiang Mai is a large city, so it is quite multifaceted, but to get a quick idea of the place from what we know already; Chiang Mai is to Rambutri as Rambutri is to Khoa San. The Pae Gate is the most touristy area, diminishing radial outwards as in turns into backpackers bars, wats (temples) and further still real live Thai people who have no relationships with tourists and tourism (Chiang Mai heavily populated by college students). Pro tip, just across the river to the east of Pae Gate you can find an area with a mainly Thai rather than western crowd, accompanied by some stellar live musical performances (for more on this see my section on tourism in Thailand).
Just to the north west are the main backpackers bars where you can hear live reggae or ska or more crappy dance music, and to the east before the river you go through what one might call hooker alley, where Thai girls and lady boys call farangs (foreigners) into bars to try to get them to buy drinks and lord knows what else[3]. Also on this street is a Moi Tai ring surrounded with bars where you can see free practice fights most nights, and if you continue down along it will lead you to a vibrant night market selling everything imaginable. The food in Chiang Mai is pretty sensational, and it just keeps getting better...
Day trip ideas – doi suthep national park and wat phrathat, Wiang Kum kam ruins
Pai – City size, small –Dorm 100-200 baht, nice two person room 250 – cheap meal 50 baht (best food in Thailand, and that’s saying something) – average temp 50-85
In keeping with the comparisons, Rambutri Road is to Chiang Mai as Chiang Mai is to Pai. It is also the first stop on a wondrous motorcycle loop around northern Thailand, This first leg of which takes you on a whirlwind tour including nearly 300 turns winding through mountain vistas with turn offs for multiple hot springs, national parks, and waterfalls.
Pai is a multicultural hippy mecca and you may end up staying longer than anticipated, especially if you’re a musician. There is at least one open mic every night rotating through the majority of the towns bars, and other joints will happily higher traveling or local musicians for 300 baht an hour and up per performer. You can also engage in trekking or rafting, and many of these day and multiday trips are superior to those offered in Chiang Mai, since big cities are often build where it’s easier to build them, and most of the impressive nature and more authentic hill tribes reside in more rural regions.
A warning: nights are actually cold here! You can see your breathe at times so make sure you get a good blanket. Only one place that I stayed failed to provide a suitable one, the backpacker’s haven called the circus. This place also only had three or four bathrooms and one hot shower for the some 100 youngsters that flocked there every night, and charged you to use one of their towels!
They did however have a really chill vibe, complete with hammocks, shady areas, a swimming pool, billiards, couches, lounging areas, a guitar, a fire pit, a large grass area to sunbathe or practice yoga, juggling, hoola-hooping or any other crazy hippy thing you can imagine, and were located just a ten minute walk from downtown. They have a policy that to use their area without spending the night you must pay 100 baht, but fortunately this seems to be unenforced, and you can find a place down by the river that’s closer to town, cheaper, with way better accommodations and just head up to the circus to relax the day away.
Recommended day trips – pai canyon, white Buddha
[1] Cheaper ones are a bit sketchy, for example no lockers.
[2] No offense to any frat bros reading this, you apparently like to read or you would have never see this to begin with, so you’re evidently not the type of frat bro I’m referring to.
[3] The main area where I experience this type of nightlife, mainly catering to older white males, most prominently on display was in a town to the west of Bangkok called Katchanaburi. However this area is also famous for its natural beauty (impressive caves and waterfalls) as well as historical significance (the death railroad, museums and cemeteries).
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