The Golden Triangle is about 4 hours drive to the North East of Chiang Mai, where the Thai , Burmese & Laos borders meet on the Maekhong River which comes down from China. The triangle was notorious for its trade in Opium and hence making it golden.
The Temple at Chiang Rai established in the 1200s.
At the Golden Triangle we take a 5 seater long tail boat, these are more impressive than the ones in Railay, they even had silencers! We shot up the river at about 30 mph, there were people on the Burmese banks washing themselves and on the Laos side lots of people fishing. These are very poor people indeed, lucky to earn $20 per month! We stopped at a market on the Laos banks of the river, paid our 20 Thai baht to enter the country and went shopping. The specialty drink is snake whisky, I just bought two tee shirts and a beer for a total of 3 pounds.
Then off to the North West to the Official boarder post with Burma to allow two back packers to extend their visas.
We visit a couple of traditional Thai hill tribes where we got pestered by the local kids who demanded money and bonbons. The second village was better and the locals much more friendly and less pushy, Suzanne bought a purse I don't know what she's going to put in it after this trip!