Visiting Chiang Mai Sunday Night Market to Eat Thai Street Food and to shop for Thai Souvenirs

On a quest to eat Thai street food and to shop for some Thai souvenirs we headed over to the Sunday Night Market in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

With only a few weeks left in Chiang Mai I've been feeling an urge to see and do as much as I can. Given that Chiang Mai has been our base as opposed to a travel destination it's embarrassing how little we've really explored the city. One thing we had been putting off for weeks was visiting the Sunday Night Market.

Also known as the 'walking street' night market, the entire streets of Pra Singh and Ratchadamnoen are completely closed to traffic. Officially, if one were to walk down the entire market it stretches out well over a kilometer.

Unlike the Saturday Night Market located on Wua Lai road, the Sunday Night Market sprawls and spews off in several directions in and around Tha Pae Gate. With such a mammoth territory to cover we decided to stick around the East Gate area of the Old City to focus on devouring Thai street food and shopping for some Thai souvenirs to send back home as presents. Considering this is peak tourism season in Thailand we bumped elbows with many others in this bustling night market that rivals the likes of Taipei's Shilin and Malacca's Jonker Street. As a tip it is recommended to go early if you want to avoid the insanity of a sea of pedestrians; however, for those who enjoy snapping photos the crowds may be preferred ;)

Transcript:

Tonight we are visiting the Sunday Night Market in Chiang Mai and right now we are at Tha Pae Gate and this is where the market starts running one kilometer into the old city. So we're going to be wandering around, sampling some food and showing you what it is like over here on a Sunday.

So you can buy a lot of handicrafts here at this market. For example, silk, scarves, wood carvings. You can get some paintings. They have ceramics. Silverware. Lots of jewelry. I mean you can browse here for hours on end. And trinkets galore. Mmmmm.

When you get tired of walking around in the night market you can just head over here to sit down and relax and get a nice Thai foot massage. Thirty minutes for two dollars right? Probably.

Actually it's 80 Baht for the foot massage. You can get a cheaper one at the Chiang Mai park.

One spring roll. Yeah. One tempura. One of this. One of this? Ah, yeah one.

Well you sure loaded up with some tasty treats. Okay, so this is my second dinner. I have some deep fried tempura eggplant with a sweet and sour sauce on top and fresh spring rolls with carrots and cilantro maybe and some noodles.

Okay, try one of them? And that would be? It tastes very healthy. Hahaha! Is it good? Mmmm, it's not as flavorful as I would have hoped. Here, have a look. It's actually bean sprouts not noodles. I was wrong.

Bean spouts and tofu and some carrots.

And what is this over here? Well, I must have been a monkey in a past life because whenever I get a chance to try a banana I'm always in there. And this is the deep fried version. So, it's already kind of smushed up here. Awesome.

Does it have some kind of special sauce over top? No, there is no special sauce it's just deep-fried and the banana is really mushy and moist in the inside.

Okay, this is my tempura eggplant. Mmmm. Okay, that tastes a lot better. It's almost like a french fry. Can I say that? Yep, it has a nice sweet and sour sauce over top and it's very oily. Um, but that means it is very flavorful. French fry on a stick.

And that concludes our visit to the hectic Chiang Mai Sunday Night Market.



This is part of our Travel in Thailand series. We're making a series of videos showcasing Thai culture, Thai arts, Thai foods, Thai religion and Thai people.

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All photos and video taken by Samuel Jeffery (Nomadic Samuel) and Audrey Bergner (That Backpacker).