6 Best Sights in Northern Thailand, Thailand

Nan has one of the region's most unusual and beautiful temples, Wat Phumin, whose murals alone make a visit to this part of northern Thailand worthwhile. It's an economically constructed temple, combining the main shrine hall and viharn, and qualifies as one of northern Thailand's best examples of folk architecture. To enter, you climb a short flight of steps flanked by two superb nagas (mythological snakes), their heads guarding the north entrance and their tails the south. The 16th-century temple was extensively renovated in 1865 and 1873, and at the end of the 19th century murals picturing everyday life were added to the inner walls. Some have a unique historical context—like the French colonial soldiers disembarking at a Mekong River port with their wives in crinolines. A fully rigged merchant ship and a primitive steamboat are portrayed as backdrops to scenes showing colonial soldiers leering at the pretty local girls corralled in a palace courtyard. Even the conventional Buddhist images have a lively originality, ranging from the traumas of hell to the joys of courtly life. The bot's central images are also quite unusual—four Sukhothai Buddhas locked in conflict with the evil Mara.

To get a sense of the region's art, visit the National Museum, which occupies a mansion built in 1923 for the prince who ruled Nan, Chao Suriyapong Pharittadit. The house itself is a work of art, a synthesis of overlapping red roofs, forest-green doors and shutters, and brilliant-white walls. There's a fine array of wood and bronze Buddha statues, musical instruments, ceramics, and other works of Lanna art. The revered black elephant tusk is also an attraction. The tusk, about a meter (3 feet) long, weighs 18 kg (40 pounds). It's actually dark brown in color, but that doesn't detract at all from its special role as a local good-luck charm.

Small yet spectacular, the rather gaudy Wat Hua Wiang Tai has a splashy naga snake coiled along the edges of its roof and boldly colored murals painted across the viharn's exterior. Come by in the morning to experience the hustle and flow of a nearby market as well.

With its all-white exterior Wat Ming Muang strikes a dramatic pose offset slightly by the exterior's surfeit of intricate carvings (photo ops galore). The wat contains a stone pillar erected at the founding of Nan, some 800 years ago. Don't miss the interior murals, some of which depict life here in days gone by.

One of Nan's oldest and most historically significant wats, Wat Chang was built at the turn of the 15th century, right across from what is now a National Museum. True to its title, the "elephant temple," its large chedi is propped up by 24 stone pachyderms, protecting the country's largest ho trai (scripture library) and a rare solid gold Buddha image from the Sukhothai period.