THAI TRIP 2012

Itinerary

Itinerary subject to change

Pre-official Beginning of the Trip

Friday–Sunday, February 24–26

The trip officially begins Sunday evening, February 26th and all expenditures up until that time are taken care of by each individual – not the school.

Wat Po etching, stupas and famous reclining Buddha, a water taxi on the Chao Praya river, and a boat at a floating market, selling fish as fresh as it comes!

Arrival options:

Take a flight directly to Chiang Mai and meet us on Sunday evening at 3pm at Baan Thai.
Fly to Bangkok on Saturday night, stay overnight in Bangkok, fly to Chaing Mai on Sunday and meet us at 3pm at the Baan Thai.
The extra special option – and the one that most people took in this year’s adventure -- Fly to Bangkok on Friday night where we will meet you at the airport, take you to your hotel, and spend the next day with you, guiding you through Wat Po to see the Thai medicine engravings and get a Thai massage and then tour around to other points of interest in Bangkok. We will then take a night train to Chiang Mai on Saturday night.

Notes: This is an optional opportunity that is not officially part of the trip.

For those who want the added experience of seeing Wat Po, Bangkok and taking the night train, which, by the way, is a great way to feel the true connection between the capital and Chiang Mai, we will be there with you the whole way. Most flights to Bangkok arrive in the evening, between 9:30 and 11:30pm.

We will have one pick up time on Friday night (after the last Friday flight arrives) and we will take everyone to a nearby hotel for a good night's sleep, a day out on the town and then a night time train trip up to Chiang Mai. (We will get a sleeper car!)

Official Beginning of the Trip

Sunday Night, February 26

3 -5 pm We will meet at Baan Thai Residence for an introductory meeting
6 pm Homprang people are taken to Baan Hom to get settled in and get a good night’s rest before beginning study the following day. Pichest people have the evening free to eat, hang out and relax.

The welcoming grounds of Baan Hom, a shared taxi ride, steaming curries in Chiang Mai market

Week 1

Monday–Friday, February 27–March 2

Study at Homprang / Pichest

Saturday-Sunday, March 3-4

Group Trip to Chiang Dao

Homprang and Christopher will be our guides for a trip of the whole group for two days and one night trip in Chiang Dao. This is a sublime little village in the hills outside Chiang Mai located on the site of a powerful and ancient cave temple. Homprang will take us to a local healer she knows well and show us the well-known herbal market of the area. We will explore the hills, the sacred monuments in the hills and the cave temple, accompanied by the stories and history Christopher knows so well and will share with us.

Chiang Dao

Week 2

Monday–Friday, March 5-9

Final week of study with Homprang / Pichest

Saturday, March 10 and Sunday, March 11

Saturday: Free day to explore Chiang Mai, eat, get a Thai massage and rest.

Optional: You are welcome to join us as we go to a local market for breakfast and then take a hike up to a forest temple on the edge of the city. It's a mysterious and beautiful place to explore, meditate, rest and eat on the rocks.

Sunday: A fun cooking class at a local vegetarian restaurant -- we cook our own delicious lunch!

Local Healer, Thai therapist and a Monk Chat

Week 3: The Adventure Continues!

This is when we take you even further off the beaten track. Together, we journey to places that we only know about from our own explorations and our friends who have spent a lot of time traveling and seeking out the hidden gems of northern Thailand. We are especially indebted to our friend Ellen Ward for all she has shared so freely with us. (Usually, we can convince Ellen, a fount of knowledge about healers, shamans and humans, to come out for a meal or a tea with us during the trip…)

Monday, March 12

We visit a local healer and Traditional Thai Doctor, or Mor, which means doctor in Thai. Over the course of many years, she has developed the Traditional Thai Massage practice she learned into a deep and powerful form of energy work. She has much to teach us about expanding the practice. We will earn about her approach, her technique, and her philosophy on life and healing. She will show us how to do what she does.

Optional: In the evening, the monks of Wat Suan Dok hold a weekly “Monk Chat.” This is a time when they sit down with the public around a table and talk frankly about their lives and practice, and answer any questions you might have about Buddhism or how Buddhist thought might inform any issue you have. This is a great opportunity to interact with the monks.

Tuesday, March 13

Free morning

In the afternoon, we will go to the most well-known temple in Northern Thailand, Wat Doi Sutep. It is a very large complex up on the hill overlooking Chiang Mai. From the temnple grounds, there are beautiful views of the city and surrounding countryside.

Wednesday, March 14

We visit another local healer and Mor who lives in the countryside outside of Chiang Mai. His lineage comes all the way from Burma. His practice is quite vigorous, using thumbing to work energy lines of the body. This set of techniques is often called “jap sen.” He also grows
and processes his own herbal formulas, and we will use his medicinal herbal steam and learn about how he approaches the practice.

Thursday and Friday, March 15 and 16

We will head outside of Chiang Mai for a two day “Vipassana" meditation retreat. We have put these days aside for exploring Buddhism and meditation more deeply. We will be at a forest temple where monks perform daily rituals in ways that have changed little since the time of of the Buddha. We will spend the time here to connect to the heart of Buddhism, meditation and Thai massage.

Local healer and grounds of Wat Suan Dok

Saturday, March 17 - Last Day of Trip

Goodbye dinner (CSTM’s treat). Teary celebrations and farewells. Desperate last minute gift purchases, organizing travel plans…Is there time for one more massage? Of course there is!

(note: The evening of the 17th is the last evening that your room is covered as part of the trip. If you decide to stay longer, you will need to arrange and pay for additional nights.)

Fruit market and red curry. Mmmmm!

Post Trip Thoughts

We suggest that if you can stay longer, do so. You will feel safe and comfortable traveling around the country by now and you will know enough Thai language to at least find a bathroom and not starve!

On the Monday after the trip ends, Paul and Michelle will be conducting a 10 day Touch Meditation Retreat where we explore the changes that take place in the mind and the body when touch is applied. This will be a quiet, meditative and focused retreat in the hills of northern Thailand. We will do a lot of meditation as well as a lot of processes that will help us understand our place in the space between our body, mind and someone elses' body and mind. If you would like to join us for the Retreat, we will give a substantial discount.

If you choose not to do the meditation, perhaps you will still stay to study with a teacher. Or perhaps you will decide not to come back to the USA at all. If so, you would certainly not be the first! Case in point, our own Michelle!

Important note on potential itinerary changes:

This itinerary is subject to change. Thai people are fluid and roll with the changes. Often, as those who have traveled beyond the West may know, things do change, buses can be late, things don’t always run on time. We will do our best but we need you to be patient and understanding with changes that will inevitably take place.

The nice thing about Thailand is that if something that we were expecting to happen, doesn’t happen, usually something even better takes its place! Plus, we are leaving our itinerary somewhat loose so that we can be flexible and work with the universe as it presents itself at the time. We ask that you be flexible too!

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