We visit the rural town of Mae Hong Son in North Thailand, also known as The City of Three Mists
There’s something about returning to a place visited long ago, where the memories have sat idle in your mind for years and you’re no longer sure if what you remember is real or a scattered combination of similar captured experiences now linked carelessly together.
We were going back to Mae Hong Son to celebrate Jmayel’s birthday. It had been almost 8 years since we last visited. The drive was long and arduous, not just on the driver but the car itself. After 3.5 hours of hard driving the hills gained advantage and our old car once again pulled to the roadside for repair.
The forever troublesome accelerator cable had broken from its mounting points. Again.
Fortunately Jmayel is quite the innovate type and managed to ‘bodge’ together a suitable repair out of a cheap pair of locking pliers. Just to complete the journey of course 😉 (It’s still on there until today, tut tut)
When we finally arrived in the town, Jmayel’s memory jumped to attention way before mine did. Memories flooded back to him as my mind lay dormant.
The only part I remembered from our past trip to Mae Hong Son was walking up to the temple high in the hills and having dinner in a bar owned by an Irish man.
You have to forgive my slack recollections as it was 7 years prior that our feet had wandered the streets of this mountain town and my thoughts were now muddled. A lot had happened in those years.
Once I saw the temple however I began to remember, we then searched in vain for the guesthouse we hunkered down in on our world travels that now no longer seemed to exist and walked to the lake, which took all of 5 minutes, it all felt much bigger when we were last here.
As moody skies gathered above us and the threat of rain imminent, we discovered a great little restaurant, Salween River. Positioned along the road by the lake, we spent a lot of time in there whiling out the rain showers with delicious food.
Salween River Restaurant
When the rain had relented we began walking uphill. It is a steep climb up to the hilltop temple that I remembered so clearly, Wat Phra That Doi Kong Mu, but it offers a good view of the whole town laid out below.
The view is the only reason to really go up there though, the temple itself is a bit worse for wear and construction work was going on all over the grounds.
View from the temple
The town of Mae Hong Son is centred around Jong Kham lake, with two of the oldest temples in the province reflecting in its waters, Wat Chong Kham and Wat Chong Klang.
Jong Kham Lake & Temples
Mae Hong Son is known as the City of Three Mists. Often swathed in a covering of foggy vapour, set deep in a mountain valley that wasn’t connected to the outside world by a paved road until 1968. Despite it’s late birth into civilisation, Mae Hong Son is one of the most popular tourist spots in the country, especially noted for the trekking and hiking in the surrounding countryside.
Mae Hong Son hills
It is a small place with a cool climate and though there is not much to do in the town itself, the areas encasing Mae Hong Son are enticing enough to draw you out for day visits, hot springs, waterfalls and remote villages such as Mae Aw and Ruam Thai.
Driving through the mist
Mae Hong Son is both Thailand’s most Western and Northern province, neighbours with Myanmar, it is also the most mountainous area with over 80% of the region on a 45 degree slope.
A very popular journey for visitors to the North of Thailand is to embark on the Mae Hong Son loop.
A 600km circular route from Chiang Mai to Mae Hong Son winding through beautifully rugged mountain scenery. Sufferers of motion sickness should stock up on remedies and plan lots of stops along the way as the roads are unforgiving, with over 2,000 curves, one way.
Scenic mountain roads
On our way out on the night of J’s birthday, we were stopped in the street by a guy who recognised us from our travel videos. He lived in Chiang Mai, like us and yet it was a chance meeting in the remote hills of Mae Hong Son, 5 hours North that we crossed paths, after a long chat we parted ways and continued on in search of dinner.
We ate at the Sunflower restaurant opposite the lake, which gave us a good view of the twinkling temples across the water.
Sunflower Restaurant
View North Thailand Road Trips – Mae Hong Son in a larger map
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