A Good Place to Stay in Chiang Mai: Dozy House
Chiang Mai is a soup bowl full of smog this time of year. The metro area with a population of over 1 million people already has enough air pollution from its traffic to put it in contention with Bangkok, but when the farmers burn their fields for the coming growing season, the smoke just turns this amp up to 11. Is it so bad? Well, that depends on one’s point of view. Do like going camping? I sure do. Think of time in the city as being camping and sitting by the campfire. All day. With your head in the smoke and forgetting to say you hate white rabbits. So really it’s like scouting without the merit badges.
We had four days to catch up with old friends and guzzle up our favorite coffee at Akha Ama just north of the northwest corner of the Old City.
We found a new hotel that we really liked. Inside the Old City on the west side, a stone’s throw from the moat is Dozy Hotel. When we checked in Jina, the manager, gave us a map and eagerly started circling things we might be interested in. We have been to Chiang Mai several times but she still managed to come up with a few things we’d check out that weekend. (Including a temple with underground tunnels.)
The rooms are quite big, brightly painted with little artsy touches and polished concrete floors with a few tiles embedded in them. TV, air-con, closet and shelf space, and comfortable beds. The policy is shoes off at the first landing of the stairs up to the rooms. We paid about $24 USD on Agoda.com
The ground floor is open-air with a small area of tables for eating or playing table games (anyone for Jenga?). Nice for parking your motorbike (you can rent them here).
There are also laundry facilities on site and a little kitchen for the guests. Coffee, tea and white-bread toast are free all day and you can grab an egg or two out of the fridge for a few baht and fry them up in the wok. Free WiFi throughout the building. The folks are really friendly and helpful.
This is also the parking spot for that peculiar Chiang Mai institution, the Sperm Drink Van. Don’t try to understand it; just accept it.
Dozy House
ORDER YOUR COPY TODAY!
ORDER YOUR COPY TODAY!
When in Chiang Mai, I usually prefer the $5.00 guest houses, but every now and then I need A/C and other creature comforts. Looks like a nice place. I just clicked on the Sperm Drink website and it did not answer my questions. Very strange but funny.
Yeah, I’ve done the $5 nights in Chiang Mai. I’ve also stayed at the business-style hotels such as Imperial Mae Ping (so so) and Centara Duangtawan (decent, but no free Wifi, which is offensive to me. But this place is AWESOME from a high-floor, corner room during Loi Krathong/Yi Peng Festival). I’m getting old maybe, but a bad night’s sleep on a hard bed just leaves me grumpy the whole day. I found Dozy House via Agoda.com which gave me a price around 800 baht, for two people. So for just a bit extra per person (in a couple situation) gets rather close to the serious budget traveler price but offers great comforts in the sense of nice bed, a/c if you choose, but a hostel-style kitchen for DIY. Plus as an Agoda member I keep getting points for stays and reviews and just since December I have booked free stays in Green Bay’s Holiday Inn near Lambeau, two nights on Koh Samed, and a night in Trang in southern Thailand coming up in March. That sweetens the deal!
Nice little hotel. I’d thought that it is difficult to get any real coffee in Chiang Mai! But I will surely check out the place you mentioned. Thanks!
True! And Akha Ama is tops. Lee the owner’s family grows the coffee in a mountain village near Chiang Rai and they do so organically and with mixed crops and growing shade cover. Roasted by an Italian-born Turk from Australia (I think I got that right – and does that not just scream “coffee”??). You can buy the beans there too. A friend of Lee has a coffee shop 23 km north of Chiang Mai and serves his coffee. Watch for an upcoming post on that place. Makes a good bike ride and they have a lovely botanical garden and a one-bedroom guesthouse. So cool! AND Akha Ama does occasional Coffee Journeys, a weekend trip to the village for a homestay experience, coffee education, and some picking of coffee cherries in the fields. 🙂
Kevin, you crack me up. I hate rabbits. I hate rabbits. I hate rabbits. I suppose you just give up after an hour or four. Should be conditioning for your Michigan research this coming summer?
Julie, if it’s not a white rabbit, it ain’t gonna work. Sheesh.
I was looking around for alternative accommodation in Chiang Mai and I had a look at this place, so good to know it rates well. And I did see that van while in this street. What were they thinking?!
I can’t really imagine. Maybe they are trying to say their drinks make men virile. Or viral. Or something. Just a raising of the eyebrows and slow shake of the head there.
Vigie Sist Cafe’ has superb coffee. The cafe is comfortable and peaceful. Yupa, the owner/operator, is charming and makes a point to operate a cafe where visitors are welcome and treated as if they had been invited into her home. We talked with her about local culture and global politics on our recent visit–we went to the cafe a number of times– and look forward to visitng Vigie Sist Cafe’ again.
Located near Wat Chiang Mun and Wat Lamchang in Chiang Mai’s old city, the address is 200/3 Rachapakinai Rd. Phone: 081672113
Thanks for the recommendation, Connie. I’ll have to check that out next time. Do you know where she gets her coffee? Is it brewed, barista-style or Thai-style?
Hi Kevin…Jina here from Dozy House. Thanks for all comments. I just would like to clarify what Sperm Drink is! Before I have a Dozy House, I stayed in Bangkok with my boyfriend. So, we think that when we move to Chiang Mai, we should have another business along with Dozy House. We have a very good recipe of bubble milk tea. To sell milk tea at Saturday/Sunday night market is too common. So we prepare a special bubble with tail, and we call our milk tea drink as “Sperm Drink” as the bubble look similar. 🙂 Welcome to Dozy House…
Hi Jina, Thanks for the great place to stay! 🙂 That’s funny about the bubble milk tea. We didn’t have the opportunity to try it when we were there! You can be sure everyone who sees your bubble milk tea truck will remember it. And probably post photos of it on the internet! Very clever! 🙂
Sawasdeeka Khun Jina & Khun Kevin,
Please kindly send us telephone number of Dozy House for booking a room.
Kobkhun mak ka,
Ployboon
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