Chiang Mai City Culture - a bicycle ride through the old cultural city centre of Chiang Mai

Chiang Mai City Culture Ride is a half day cycling tour that takes you through and around the rich cultural centre of Chiang Mai.

During this ride of 25 KM, we bike as much as possible over quiet roads and small lanes passing beautiful temples and colorful markets while seeing local people continue their daily activities. We ride through small back roads and alleyways around and through the centre of Chiang Mai.

We stop at a silversmith who fabricates beautiful jewelry in different shapes and sizes (sorry, no shopping). We visit the adjacent Silver Temple to see the monks keeping themselves busy making decorations of alloy used for the renovation of this temple.

We continue our Chiang Mai City Culture ride through narrow alleys and small lanes to the centre of the city where we visit Wat Chedi Luang, which was built in the 14th century. Thailand’s most revered Buddha statue, the Emerald Buddha, used to reside in this temple until the Laotian kind took it to Luang Prabang (Laos) around 1545. Nowadays this Buddha statue can be found in Bangkok’s Wat Phra Kaew.
After shooting pictures of this remarkable Chedi we will stop for a refreshment at the Chiang Mai Women’s Correctional Institution. The aim of this institution is to reform and rehabilitate inmates who have almost done their sentences. Their residents are serving light sentences for minor crimes and they come from poor backgrounds, with many being hilltribe women.

Not too far from here we make a stop at the most visited and most beautiful temple of Chiang Mai, Wat Phra Singh. The temple houses a very important Buddha statue: the Phra Buddha Sihing which gives the temple its name.

Our Chiang Mai City Culture trip continues to the outer circle of the centre, passing through a fresh and flower market where we see the most beautiful flowers of the North. This area is called “China Town of Chiang Mai”.
We cycle further and cross the river and stop for another refreshment at a local market. Here we have more time to explain you about, and taste some exotic fruits and/or local snacks. After this stop we take a surprising route back to our office. With a lot of new impressions you return to your hotel!

Since we visit temples during Chiang Mai City Culture, participants are required to dress appropriately.