Chiang Rai One Day: Golden Triangle, Laos Border, Long Neck Tribe

Good set of goals. Bad car: Dark, small windows, crammed together. Driver good and helpful. Guide a disaster (she called herself Mrs. Diamond). Totally listless, demotivated, practically only present in and on the car, otherwise gone. Few facts only in advance in the car, without the destination already being visible. Incidentally, only “free time” + minutes. Didn't care about the guests at all, just their phone. The tour cannot be recommended with this guide. Very different was the guide of the neighboring group, who took us on the boat on the Mekong. Commitment, sympathy, expertise were there. You could only get jealous. Our guide didn't even go there. The guide significantly affected the tour overall.

Our tour guides were really great and so fun. We were picked up at our hotel (Rim Resort, Chiang Mai) and traveled to Chiang Rai to see the White Temple, The Blue Temple and then on the to the Long Neck Village before enjoying the boat ride on the Mekong River, learning about the Golden Triangle. While it was a long day, it was worth every moment. I learned so much about the areas and traditions, enjoyed tasty local foods. It is a must see!

Guided driver: very kind and friendly. The food was also delicious. The guide always spoke simply.

the white temple - after its restoration - is a wonder and you never tire of admiring the details of the sculptures and lace.

I would not make the excursion again, all day by uncomfortable minibus, stops to the sites very fast and not worth traveling so many hours for the excursion.

This trip had all the potential in the world with regard to several of our stops: the White Temple, the Karen Long Neck Tribe Village, and the Golden Triangle - all astonishingly fascinating places. However, our guide's style of presenting information consisted of lecturing us ten minutes before arrival, on the very noisy van (apparently no shock absorbers! - so very difficult to hear), and then turning us loose at each location after a brief on-site orientation focused on when to return to our group. For instance, at the Long-Neck Village, we had to attach ourselves to other tour groups to listen in on their very informative lectures, which involved on-site interviews with tribe members, photographs, and detailed explanations of their history and lifestyle - I would have thought that for the price we paid, we would have received that kind of education from our guide. Oddly, our guide seemed to be focused on providing us with "shopping, shopping" opportunities - which were not mentioned in the advertisement. We made several side stops (a town on the Myanmar/Thailand border was one) that seemed to be thrown in solely for shopping - which was not on our priority list. Additionally, we were offered only one bottle of water, after 10 hours of touring; it's a good thing we brought several bottles of our own. On all our other experiences while in Chiang Mai, the tour operators had unlimited water for their patrons. Finally, the driver was actually unfriendly - so different than all of our other experiences with the wonderful, warm Thai people. So I would rate this tour experience as the most disappointing of all our excursions while in Chiang Mai.

I've used Viator for all my tours everywhere I go (I travel a lot) and I've never had a problem. I recommend viator to everyone who asks my advise, but this time I have to admit this was a horrible tour. The tour was longer than it needed to be and the guide was not good at all. I know it's not Viator's fault, but they need to make sure the company's they hire, have good guides otherwise that will give them a bad rep. Let me start with the guide. I understand that English is a second language for them and they are going to have an accent, but this guide was by far the worse I've had in all my traveling days. He even knew this because his introduction was "bear with me, my English is not that good". This was a LONGGGG day and to have someone who rarely spoke and when he did speak only 20% was understandable made this day even longer. It was obvious that he was repeating what he had memorized because he would close his eyes (so he could remember) every time he would tell us something about what we were going to see. The tour company should hire people with better speaking and guiding skills because we pay for a guided tour and I felt this guide was not This tour for me could have been shorter. The hot springs, the white temple and the long neck village would've been enough. The other stops were really not necessary or worth driving to, instead we could've spent more time in the hot springs (20 min not enough) and turned back to the city sooner. It took us 4 hours to drive back. We got to the hotels around 10:30PM. So to sum it up. The trip is too long (I know it says 12 hour tour) but it could be even longer depending on traffic and not all the stops on this tour are worth getting out of the vehicle for. The guide needs to be an excellent guide to make this day tour more enjoyable and we were not as fortunate with our guide. I don't even remember his name because if he said it, I probably didn't understand him.

We saw some good things on the trip ... obviously the Golden Triangle; but also, the white temple, the blue temple, the hot springs and the Long Neck Village. Not sure how viable it is as a day trip though .... you’re spending most of the time in the bus ... instead of a 12hr trip, it was 15hrs and approx 10hrs of those, are spent sitting on a bus! In our case this was far from ideal, as our driver drove far too fast ... literally screeching round corners!!

Lovely guide but drive was so far and spent little time at each stop. Could have skipped the northern border and spent more time at the white temple. Lunch was awful and for 3k baht each I would have expected snacks and drinks on the way. Had to pay extra taxes to cross into Laos despite being stated as included in the booking. Was o my 30baht though. The white temple was amazing and could have spend half a day there but only got 50min. The Laos border was not worth visiting, just a bunch of tourist market stalls selling fakes, rum and cigarettes. Actually all the attractions had vendors selling to tourists, from the hot springs, norther border, golden triangle and long neck village. Apart from the white temple, everywhere felt very geared to bus loads of tours. The drive back to Chiang mai was long and painful... we both got sick from the cold air conditioning in the van.. we were dropped off at our hotel in Tapae Gate at 10pm! We were picked up at 7am and therefore much longer than the advertised 12 hrs. I would recommend if the price was 2k - 2.5k or if there was a better lunch and snacks/drinks on the way. No dinner was included... which made the journey home all the more uncomfortable.

The visits were very rhythmic and we spent more time in the car and in flea markets than in places of worship. After 1 hour drive we stopped at a 1st market with a geyser in a parking lot. We took the road back to Chiang Rai and the white temple where we spent barely 1 hour, it would have deserved more visiting time. Then comes the lunch break, with a buffet without bottle of water, water certainly but in self Service (not consumable for tourists). The water is included in the price but when we asked the guide, they were distributed only at the end of the day and at the time of return. Then head for the long neck women. We arrive in this small village where we had barely 1 hour to visit it, do some shopping if needed. This human zoo where they wait after tourists is still impressive and we would have liked to spend more time to talk with these women anyway. Once this stone-throwing visit was over, we headed to Myanmar where we once again stopped at a flea market, where from one stand to another the items are identical. We just cross the wall that separates the two countries but this time we stop far too long for the little visit to see. After that we head to the golden triangle, this time again a flea market awaits us before taking the boat on the Mekong to the border of Laos and surprise: another market where perfumes, cigarettes and counterfeits mix. The boat ride lasts about forty minutes for as much market time. Once back by boat, we take the car back, about 4 hours drive. To conclude this day, the visits were interesting but far too quick at the expense of the markets. We recommend visiting the place but not through this excursion.