Thelma and Louise Take on the World: Myanmar Visa Run

Sunday, May 6^th was visa run day because as a US tourist we only get 30 days for a visa. We were going to be in the country for an extra 7 days, so off to the border for us. To start, it was pouring rain. This fact was really annoying because we had to walk to main road for our pick up. Awesome. So..we got up, walked to 7 Eleven for snacks and such and then waited for the van to pick us up. It finally arrived and we had to make a couple more stops for a few others to join us. In total there were nine of us including 3 girls from I believe Hong Kong. There was another grumpy old man from the UK who not very friendly when he joined us. Anyhow, we started our journey north to Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.

Our first stop was a Thai version of a truck stop. It had a bunch of open markets and restaurants. Its only worth mentioning because there was randomly a hot spring with a geyser in the parking lot. Yea…totally random, but it was neat to see no less. We finally got everyone back on board and we headed for the border.

When we arrived, we headed for the passport control having no idea what we were doing and we were a hot mess. We got our passports stamped by Thailand and crossed into the nowhere border zone. We were in neither country and had no clue as to what to do. There were people of all race and nationality going in every which direction. We tried to go back in to Thailand, and they told us that we had to go to the Myanmar border patrol first. So…across the bridge we went. It was really sketch. We walked into this room. There an officer at the door that took our money and gave us some forms. Then, we turned to our left where there were 2 other officers working on computers. They took our info filled everything out and then instructed us to go back to the first one. This is all occurring in a tiny room filled with all sorts of people speaking all sorts of languages. Then, we returned to the first officer who asked us if we were shopping or just leaving. We said leaving and they stamped our passports and sent us out the door. The whole process was a complete cluster. We were grateful to pass back into Thailand unscathed.

Then, we were to rendezvous with the group at 7 Eleven. Well, we managed to do so as did everyone else except the 3 girls from Hong Kong. They were 30 minutes late. It was ridiculous. Either way, we ended up back in Chiang Mai by about 5. It was an all day rainy adventure.

Exhausted and not really wanting to go out, we decided to eat at the hotel. No big deal right? Of course, with us, everything becomes a ordeal. So we go down to the restaurant and order our dinner. It is an open air lobby and restaurant. Completely normal for the area and the entire country really. Well, it had been raining all day and when it rains...especially the first few times of the year...the insects take over. By the time we finished our meal, there were thousands of bugs swarming the whole place. They flew into our faces, our food, our drinks...they even got stuck to our forks. It was ridiculous. Not only that, but there is one insect in particular that we had met in Africa too. It is super stupid and flies around like crazy but gets stuck and losses its wings at the slightest stress. They were swarming in the high numbers. It was just plain awful. We hurried to our room, cranked up the A/C, and stuffed our towels around the doors. We were not in the mood to deal with those dumb bugs in our room.