From Sukhothai to Chiang Mai by bus
Moving between cities in Thailand by bus is super easy. In this post, I go over my experience taking a long-distance bus from Sukhothai to Chiang Mai for a total trip of 5.5 hours!
This time I bought my ticket in person at the bus company’s office within Old Sukhothai. It was MUCH cheaper at only only 324 baht / $9 USD compared to the online price of 599 baht / $16.80 USD. I also got to select my seat right away, and I managed to snag a window seat.
Still prefer to book your buses online? Here’s the best websites to buy bus tickets in Southeast Asia.
The bus was perfectly fine; a little older maybe but clean enough and with comfortable seats. The seat next to me stayed empty the whole time so I was able to spread out a bit, which helped. Like the last bus, we got a free snack and water when we boarded– but we didn’t get a lunch break.
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We arrived in Chiang Mai on time and without any problems. Once we pulled into the station, the bus was immediately swarmed by taxi drivers trying to get riders, but I escaped down the street and caught a Grab to my hostel. We made it right before it started raining!
I stayed at Baan Lung Poshtel, a local-run hostel recommended to me by a friend. It was very quiet, only me and one other person in the room. Comfortable beds and nice showers, though they’d stopped doing breakfast. I dropped off my bags and went out wandering for food.
Dinner was a delicious beef noodle soup from a local place that invited me inside when the restaurant I originally wanted to visited was closed. I think technically they were closed too, but they waved me in and put something together for me. Cost (with drink): 120 baht / $3.36 USD.
Walking around after dinner was a little tough— it was raining pretty hard and the cars just loved driving through puddles near the sidewalk— but I did get a glimpse of a part of the Chang Phueak Gate and old city wall at the north end of the city.
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A visit to the Ramkhamhaeng National Museum (Sukhothai)
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Exploring Chiang Mai
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