I’ve been to Chiang Mai many times over the last 20 years. Thailand’s "cultural capital" is always a great place to relax. I’ve probably visited the city at least 50 times, but I never tire of wandering the small lanes and exploring the old temples. Even after so many visits, I almost always stumble across something I haven’t seen before, or something new since my last visit.

My main goal on this trip is to re-visit the sights of the old city, on foot. The streets within the city walls is a remarkably walk-able area. There are markets full of stalls stacked with strange and colorful tropical fruits, the many temples for which the city is famous, a growing number of beautifully restored buildings turned into interesting museums, some interesting shops and boutique hotels.

Chiang Mai is such a walk-able city that the weekend walking street markets have definitely become a fixture. On Saturdays, the Wualai Road market, although much smaller than the Sunday market, is certainly worth a visit. Perhaps because of its small size, it’s more easily walked, and it has much more the feel of a local market than a big craft fair. The Sunday fair on the other hand has gotten very big. Even when the weather is a bit "iffy", as it is at this time of year, it extends all the way up Ratchadamnoen Road from Tapae Gate to Wat Phra Singh, as well as over to the provincial hall along Phrapopkhlao Road.

While there are a few big new hotels about to open down near the night bazaar, not much else changes dramatically in Chiang Mai. There are a lot of small incremental changes to see, however. At least one temple seems to have some work being done at any given time. Right now, the main prayer hall at Wat Chedi Luang is undergoing a quite radical makeover. In addition, they’re building a small dharma museum in the compound, and remodeling the city pillar shrine within the temple.

Outside the old city, the pagoda at Wat Suan Dok has been gilded, while the reliquaries of the royal family at the temple have all been painted with stark white paint. Not much has changed at Wat Umong. The forest temple remains a cool retreat from the heat of the city.

With Monday the 20th declared a special holiday so Thais could vote on the new constitution, I decided to escape to Chiang Mai for a long weekend to check on some things for an up-coming addition to AsiaForVisitors.com. More on that later, but for the purposes of this trip, the Buri Gallery House seemed like a good location to base myself.

The Buri Gallery House is a small (21 room) hotel built into a large old (50 years) wooden house. Carving even a large house into 21 rooms has resulted in something of a rabbit warren that may be confusing to guests without a good sense of direction, and even my deluxe room was not that big. The room had ‘wood’ floors and walls, and a woven bamboo ceiling. All very authentic looking, but I put ‘wood’ in quotes because I think the floor was actually a plastic laminate. The thin floors and walls means that you can also hear a lot more of what goes on in the hallway or the next room than you would expect in a hotel.

All the wood doesn’t help light up the room either, especially since the only windows are two small frosted panes set in the door to the balcony. The small balcony faces directly into the wall of an apartment building, so even if it were cooler outside, opening the doors was not a very appealing thought.

On the plus side, the room did have a large television with a DVD player, and an internet connected PC free to use. The downside on the TV was that only a couple of the 30-plus channels were in English.

The bathroom was roomy enough, although the ceiling was low enough for me to have to watch my head. There was only a shower provided, with no tub. In addition, the shower had a manually operated water heater, the kind common enough in Thai homes but westerners may not know how to work it.

I suspect that the Buri Gallery House might appeal to ‘flashpackers’ - those people who used to backpack in their younger days but are now older and established enough to want a bit more from their accommodations. The location, just outside Wat Phra Singh in the old city, is not bad, although well away from the center of things - except on Sundays, when the walking street market is right outside the front door.

It was once one of the main sights in Bangkok, but in recent years the Giant Swing at Wat Suthat had fallen on hard times. An extensive restoration was under-taken a few years ago, and is now nearly comlete. This week, it was announced that the King would preside over the re-dedication of the swing on 13 September.

No word on whether or not they would be reviving the swing ceremony, but that seems unlikely. The festival was banned in the 1930s due to the high number of deaths incurred.