Raming Lodge

Chiang Mai, Thailand Travel Guide

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Raming Lodge

Area: Just east of Chiang Mai’s Old City near Tha Phae Gate

Review: The Raming Lodge in Chiang Mai is excellent. For such a great hotel, its rooms are incredibly inexpensive (book through Agoda). Chic and central to most everything in Chiang Mai, the Raming Lodge is really the only hotel I would recommend. I did not stay at other hotels or guesthouses because the Raming Lodge was so charming.

I’ll start with the initial contact via email regarding airport pickup, which cost 100 Baht (a tuk-tuk may pick you up or drop you off for 50 Baht). The hotel staff quickly and politely emailed me in a professional manner. At the airport, the driver waited just beyond the baggage claim with a sign that spelled out my name and Raming Lodge. The van was large, though it did not have an electric lift in the back. If you are in a motorized wheelchair, I would suggest emailing the hotel so they can provide you with a van that will accommodate electric wheelchairs.

The driver was friendly, professional and enthusiastic, making me feel very welcome in Chiang Mai. We drove to the back entrance of the hotel (I tipped the driver 30 Baht after he carried my luggage to my room and showed me all the amenities of the hotel). The back entrance of the Raming Lodge hotel does have a ramp but it is a bit steep and the glass door at the top is situated right at the peak of the ramp’s incline.

Do not fear though, because the front entrance is extremely wheelchair accessible as their is no step or ramp.

With 5 floors of hotel rooms, the Raming Lodge takes its style cue from traditional Lanna fashion – from the cute, quaint front entrance courtyard to the rooms themselves. Yet, Raming Lodge has all the modern amenities a traveler could ask for. The courtyard entrance, lined on either side by the excellent Raming Lodge restaurant and a tailor and shop, is comprised in the center of foliage and a Buddha statue with wooden tables and chairs. The courtyard gives the hotel an immediate resort feeling. One or two doormen are posted at the front and back doors. The hotel’s elevator is large and fast.

Raming Lodge’s hotel rooms have a dark, wooden decor furnished in traditional Lanna style. The rooms are enormous, pristine and exotic. You can place your luggage in the closet and your personals in the safe box or keep your luggage on the wooden bench near the door. Make your way past the queen or king sized, comfortable bed or the two full-sized beds and you’ll see a large window sill next to the bed with dark shutters. Open the shutters and there’s the bathroom. Or, go through the wide door of the bathroom. The bathroom is large and spacious; you can do a 360 in a wheelchair and not bump into anything. The counter height is perfect as you can wheel under it. You see nicely rolled towels. The shower is pretty large but there it is not a roll-in shower. It’s sectioned off by a threshold about 5 inches high with a curtain. The shower head is removable and I did not have a problem transferring to the shower floor, which is clean.

The staff – front desk clerks, manager, cleaners – at Raming Lodge know how to take care of their customers. Towels in the bathoom are placed high so I asked the house cleaner to daily put them on the counter for me to be able to reach them easier. The front desk clerks also provided me a room on the second floor at my request overlooking Loi Kroh Road.

Breakfast buffets are served until 10:30 every morning. The Raming Lodge meets most of the criteria for wheelchair bound tourists, except the lack of a roll-in shower. Again, the bathroom is large and so is the shower if you can transfer out of your wheelchair to a plastic seat or sit on the floor.

Raming Lodge had a mix of customers ranging from families to groups of European and American women to couples. And there was another traveler in a wheelchair! The only drawback is that Loi Kroh Road, being one of the most popular streets, does have a mix of bars and girlie bars, so it may not be for families.

Location: 17-19 Loi Kroh, Chiang Mai 50100
Site: www.raminglodge.com
Email: info@raminglodge.com
Phone: 66 53 271 777

Rates: $25 – $45

Accessibility: The Raming Lodge is wheelchair accessible.
Front Door: Wheelchair accessible with no steps and doormen
Ramp/Step: Yes, ramps
Elevator, Lift: Yes
Rooms, Bathrooms: The rooms are large and spacious. The bathrooms are similarly large.
Bathtubs with Handles: No
Roll-in Showers: No. The showers do have about a five inch threshold to contain the water but the bathroom and the showers are large. You can get out of your wheelchair and get into the shower. Because of the size of the shower and bathroom, I rate this hotel as accessible.

Features: Free breakfast buffet, restaurant, shops, nice bathrobe, massage and sauna, tour guide booking and concierge, airport transportation, safe box