Mae Chan
Mae Chan is a small district town in the very north of Thailand, in Chiang Rai Province. It's situated at a traffic knot, where the big highway no. 1, (Thanon Phahonyothin which goes from Bangkok via Chiang Rai to Thailand's northernmost place, Mae Sai), meets road no. 107 to Tha Ton and Fang and road 1016 to Chiang Saen, which had been massively widened around 2011.
Once there were millions of them on the roads, nowadays they are a rarity - the VW Beetle, here seen in Mae Chan. Image by Asienreisender, 10/2011
The place lies at the banks of a river who comes out of the Daeng Lao Range west of town. Doi Nang Non is a mountain of the range one can see from here. Mae Chan is practically an unimportant place, and there is nothing of much interest one could visit; it's only meaning lies in it's position as a traffic hub in the north.
The only remarkable thing I could find here is an unusually number of Indian tradesmen who run shops in town, particularly shops for textiles.
The road 107 between Mae Chan and Tha Ton, leading through the Daeng Lao Mountains, is particularly picturesque. Very enjoyable I found the trip on the rooftop of one of the yellow Songtheaws who run frequently the route.
The mountainous landscapes west of Mae Chan towards Tha Ton, seen from the rooftop of the local Songtheaw. Image by Asienreisender, 10/2011
