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Published: April 27th 2011
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During my winter vacation of 1967 Darryl arranged a job for me with Philco-Ford. For $.95 per hour I was the rodman-chainman-instrumentman on the survey crew that conducted the topographical survey of the top of Doi Inthanon, the highest mountain in Thailand.
I flew to Chiang Mai and was greeted at the airport by Thai dancing girls. I'm pretty sure it wasn't for me. I spent a couple days there before climbing the mountain. While in Chiang Mai I contacted Ed, a friend who was a pilot with Air America, to see if he would fly me over the mountain so that I could see what was the best route for a road to the top. However, Air America wasn’t contracted to do this sort of thing.
I took a bus to Chom Thong, where I met the rest of the party including two American surveyors, Bob and Earl, and porters who would carry our tents, food, and other supplies. We were escorted by an armed police sergeant who was there to protect us from communist insurgent and wild animals. Tigers were common in the area known as the Golden Triangle. By late morning we started our two day
hike to the top of the mountain.
The trail started near the waterfalls at CHom Thong, and followed a stream for the first half of the trek. As we climbed higher, we came across Karen hilltribes villages and their recently harevested rice fields. I slept in a hut on stilts that the hill tribes used when planting and harvesting their crops.
Once to the top (at 2665 mters) we chopped down a couple tees and cleared the underbrush of the heavy jungle for our camp. Besides our tents, we constructed a rudimentary shower stall. I had a shower on every Monday at noon, when the temperature warmed up enough. The temperatures would dip below freezing at night and would warm up to the 50/60's during the day.
Our camp was right next to a pile of rocks under which the ashes of King Inthanon were deposited. This was presumably the highest point in Thailand. As we began our surveying which started with the backbone of the top of the mountain, from which we would branch off down each side of the mountain, I discovered that the next ridge over was actually one meter higher. We decided not
Ta Pae Road in 1967
It sure had changed...for one it would have many backpackers walking the sidewalks. to move the stones and ashes.
Our porters became our labor force for clearing lines of sight through the dense jungle. The two American surveyors taught me the skills required, and over the weeks I graduated from rodman to chainman and finally to instrument man. We worked seven days per week, 12 hours per day.
I also learned to cook with ingredients from various cans of food. My favorite was the mixture of cream of mushroom soup and shrimp, with paprika and other spices added to the mix, which was then poured over rice.
I was also responsible for logistics as neither American spoke Thai. One day I had to take a break from surveying to see if I could locate the generator and fuel that was supposed to have arrived by elephant. I climbed down the mountain, and soon found the generator in the middle of the trail. I then found six hill tribes porters who were taking an opium break. Marijuana was the other drug commonly available with plants everywhere along the trail. They explained that the elephant refused to go beyond a certain elevation, and so they were forced to carry the heavy generator
up the mountain. I soon had them on their way, and we eventually made it to the top. The generator was needed to power the SSB radio which we used to communicate progress reports daily to Bangkok.
When it was time to return to Bangkok in mid January 1968 to go back to my last semester of high school in Malaysia, I ran down the mountain in one day, and got to the Chiang Mai airport in time for the evening flight to Bangkok. I hadn’t showered in a week, and my clothes were filthy. The other passengers must have wondered where I had been!
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