Day 131: Pai

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Pai is a laid back town in northern Thailand, surrounded by beautiful waterfalls, rice paddies, caves, hot springs and canyons. I was there in 2007 and it seemed like it was a bit more touristy and expensive this time around, but the motorbikes are still only 80 baht (about $2.50) for a 24 hour rental. We spent our first few days just driving around on a motorbike to some of the local sights. The roads are nicely paved and the scenery is amazing.

One day we went piranha fishing. Yeah, you heard me. A friendly english guy (I think his name was Dave) came up with the genius idea of throwing a bunch of piranhas in a pond, and charging people to fish there. There are actually now 17 kinds of fish in there, but we were after the piranhas. Dave warned us that the piranhas are lazy this time of year, but we decided to go for it anyway. Neither Steph or I have really been fishing, so dave gave us a 5 minute lesson and set us off on our merry way. After about 15 minutes, Steph caught her first fish. Not a piranha, unfortunately, but it was still a fighter. We were so excited that we forgot to get a good picture of it before we threw it back. But maybe a half hour later I caught a fish, and it ended up being a piranha! This time we got a picture (see below). We stayed for quite a while after that, hoping to catch another one, but no luck. Steph caught one really small fish, so we got her picture, but thats it. Still a real fun time though.

Another day we took a cooking class. We'd been seeing them all over throughout the trip, and steph finally broke down and made me take it with her. I guess it wasn't so bad... we did get to eat what we made. It was 5 courses, so we did three in the morning and came back in the evening for dinner. All of the stuff we made tasted really good, so I guess it was a success, but I don't think I could do it on my own without my Thai helper lady.

During our break from cooking, we went on an elephant ride. This one ended up being waaay crazier and fun than the one we did in Laos. We had the option of riding either bareback or with a chair, and of course we chose bareback. This was probably a mistake, because the elephant's spine moves back and forth when it walks, and it hurts pretty bad. It also makes it hard to stay on, especially when all you have to hang on to is a rope tied around the elephant. At one point the elephant freaked out and started running off the path, through a little canyon full of brush. The elephant trainer (who rode up on his neck) was hitting him with his stick and yelling, but the elephant didn't care. Finally the elephant calmed down, but not before we were covered with leaves and stickers. Our elephant trainer just laughed and said that the elephant was scared of dogs. I guess a dog had barked and scared him. After that the elephant was on better behavior. We rode down to the river, where the elephant sprayed us with his nose water for a while. Then he got all the way in the river, and on command he'd dunk us in the water. Here's videos of us getting dunked

Steph:
Gabe:

Pai is also famous for its natural hot springs. One day we drove there, but decided not to go in because they charge 200 baht just to get in. That's 6 bucks each! Who do they think they are?? Then we drove to the "Pai hotsprings resort", just to see how much that was, and it was only 50 baht, so we went there instead. Maybe it wasn't quite as authentic, but the tubs were really nice, clean, and they had hot water fountains shaped like fish. We ended up going back a few days later to use their cold pool, which is a super nice infinity pool. It is also way nicer and cheaper than the more backpacker-visited and trendy Fluid, which we had gone to a few days before. I guess some backpackers just don't know how to shop around.

So, good times in Pai. Here's some pictures:

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Comments

[Matt Potterton]

Am I starting to notice a theme?
Are you trying to get pictures of you in every body of water you visit with your feet in the air?

[gabanie]

pretty much