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PAI. excuse the pun, but it's a true slice of heaven. The village of Pai is a small town in the northeastern part of Thailand which is surrounded by breathtaking mountains which hold a number of treasures - waterfalls, canyons, kilometers on end of hiking trails, and ofcourse...the hill tribes (everyone must have seen pictures of Thai hill tribes nicknamed the 'Long Necks' due to the gold rings they have around their necks).
The bus from Chiang Mai to Pai took approximately three hours. That was a three hours during which I was extremely grateful for a stomach which can handle twists and turns on small mountain roads. Definitely not the ideal ride for those with motion sickness. The drive felt a whole lot shorter thanks to a fantastic Welsh man who entertained me the entire trip with hilarious travel tales.
Once I arrived in Pai, I began to search for a guest house. Gal had joined me on the trip, and on the bus I had befriended an american guy named Greg. So the three of us headed down the main street...looking at the different guesthouses. After a big of searching, we opted for bungalows in a guesthouse
named 'Villas de Pai'. Very friendly staff, free internet (which ended up being down during 90% of my stay in Pai...hence the gap in blogs), and free water.
That first evening we went to dinner together, bought a detailed map of Pai, and made plans for the next day. The next morning, Gal and I headed up to go on a hike up to see a waterfall up in the hills near the city. During the walk there were some spectacular views around the surrounding hillside, and we were even accompanied by two stray dogs (regular readers note that this is the second time this has happened).
The hike was fantastic, the weather was perfect...but we never reached the waterfall. I'm still not quite sure where we went wrong, but what we reached was an undoubtable dead end. Even the dogs agreed.
I'm sure by that point Gal and I were both more than happy to turn around and head back to have a nice dinner of thai green curry with sticky rice & mango for dessert! Greg joined us for dinner and raved about going around the village and its surroundings on his automatic moped.
That evening it rained heavily for HOURS. There was a power-outage, and the streets looked flooded. When the rain DID subside, we ventured over to the restaurant next door and watched the England vs. Portugal game. I´m not quite sure whether it was the mango sticky rice or the way England was playing,...but I started to feel a bit ill at about half time. This feeling was more than familiar from my time in India, and I quickly opted to go lie down and take no chances and fight the sickness with a good night's sleep.
The next day I decided to rent a moped with Greg. Gal has a bit of the 'grumpy morning syndrome', and although I should be very compassionate since I have a 'slight' problem with cheerfulness prior to having my Cornflakes (as my parents will vouch...from about 9:07AM 08.11.83), I could not handle another mood swing. So Greg and I spent a wonderful day travelling around the outskirts of Pai.
We went to see the hotsprings (200 Bht entry, so we were content with the mini hotspring outside the gates), the Pai canyon, and a beautiful waterfall. The canyon was beautiful, I'll be
sure to add a picture when I find a card reader, but it wasn't only the view which made it so special. It was the peaceful, quiet, meditative air. It's the type of place where you could sit for hours, and wonder why anyone would choose a life of stress in an overbearing city over a peaceful existence in a small town with such a view only a few minutes walk away.
After lunch (getting addicted to mango/pineapple/banana shakes), another american guy from our guesthouse, Gab, decided to come along as our guide to a waterfall. So we squeezed onto our single moped...creating an amusing to watch, painful to partake in, Finnish sandwich.
The rain started once again on the ride over to the waterfall, but I didn't even notice it...the view was so amazing (or maybe it was because I didn't feel any of the rain because I was tightly surrounded). The mist had lowered to just below the tops of the hills, and so any light entering through the clouds would create beautiful rains onto the green landscape.
Gab turned out to be a connoisseur of the waterfall, and instantly showed us the best ways to slide down them. This consisted of wetting the rock, sitting down, closing your eyes, sliding down, and inevitably landing quite painfully on your arse (Gab insisted the water was much higher the last time he was there). We amused ourselves at the waterfalls for a good few hours, sliding, laughing, and analyzing dead snakes.
That evening Greg and I met an Israeli girl who joined us at the Doi Dom Cafe for a few sunset drinks (just...you guessed it, Pineapple Lassi). We then headed back to the guesthouse where we watched 'A Very Long Engagement' and then decided to head to B-Bop, the most happening bar in town. Turned out the music in this bar was extremely loud, it was impossible to socialise, people were quite pissed, and when the chance came to leave...I took it. I got a ride back into town and packed for my early departure the next day.
At 8:00 the next morning I met Greg for some breakfast and by 9:00 I was on the bus on my way to Chiang Mai. On the bus I saw two girls I had bumped into quite frequently around Pai and an American guy. All of us were headed to the Laos border. In Chiang Mai we jumped on another bus which had been invaded by the Irish. There were three guys and three girls (they didn't all know each other OR come from the same town ). The 6 hour bus ride went by extremely fast, with everyone talking and laughing throughout the trip.
Tomorrow the trip continues into Laos. We're booked onto the 8:30AM slowboat. The trip takes two days, but the surroundings are supposed to be breath taking. Hopefully I find internet cafes in Laos, but if not, there might be a slight silence. It's not that I don't care, I promise.
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