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Published: July 22nd 2006
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Since completing my China tour, I have spent most of my time in Chiang Mai. On the bus ride from Bangkok, I was asked by a number of tourists what the highlights of Chiang Mai were and what my recommendations would be. I could think of a few little things but nothing that I have experienced recently. Since my family moved to Chiang Mai several years ago, it has become a place to relax and chill out for me and I have done little in recent years to seek out the tourist routes. Since I am now travelling on my own, I figured it was time to make up for some lost time and experience Northern Thailand!
Most people who come to Chiang Mai or Chiang Rai end up going on some sort of trek and there are numerous package tours avaliable. Pakage tours make me cringe, but nevertheless I headed down to the night bazaar and had a look around. I have done several of the day tours out of Chaing Mai and there is the standard: elephant ride, bamboo raft, short hike to the waterfall to go swimming and then a chance to see a villiage, some which
seem to have been created for tourist viewing. I wanted to do something a little different this time and opted for the overnight hike, where you stay in a Lahu villiage, then get to still do the elephant ride and bamboo rafting as well as white water rafting which I'd never done before. So, I signed up for the next day.
Even though we were supposedly scheduled to leave at 0930, it wasn't until after 11am that we left Chiang Mai. It required a police check, stop off at the market to buy dinner's ingredients, go to a few places where nobody knew what was happening, change people from one truck to another and then we were on our way!
The tour guide told me the name of the area and I cannot remember it, except that we were about 30 km out of Mae Rim, about an hour north of Chiang Mai. We arrived in time to eat lunch and were devastated to find one truck after another pulling up behind us, laden with tourists. There were probably about 50 people at the lunch stop, however each group consisted of 10 or 12 and we managed to
Green
Hard to capture in these photos but the forest was such a crisp and bright green put some distance between us all once we started the hike.
Just as we set out, it began to rain. "Jungle Jim" was our guide, he was very animated and incredibly fit. He sang Bob Marley most of the way and taught us about the the plants and trees along the trail. It gradually got steeper, until the end when Jungle Jim told us there were two hills remaining. One was called "oh my buddha" and if you could manage that one, you then had to tackle "oh my god!" I was quite proud to have conqured both and our group agreed that these hill tribes should actually be called 'mountain tribes'.
The fog set in just as we arrived at the Lahu villiage and it was beautiful. We had a special 'farang' (tourist) hut, with one room for sleeping and another for eating. It was such a cool evening, getting to know the other guys and just chilling out there. Jungle Jim treated us to a few more Bob Marely songs and some Koreans from another hut came to visit and became the entertainment. Very funny guys. A few of the villiage girls did a georgous song
Jungle Jim
This was one of his educations sessions where he explained "you eat this plant, no boom boom". He offered it to several of the guys however none of them were happy to oblige! and dance and I think everyone really enjoyed themselves. And, if you can tune out chickens, dogs, frogs and rain, and find the rock hard mattress and pillow comfortable, you would sleep like a baby in that Lahu villiage.
It rained all night and Jungle Jim greeted us the next morning to say there was a change of plan, had to skip the waterfall and head down the road as the paths were much too slippery to attempt. The mud was incredible, even on the 'road' and we slid most of the way down. From there we got to ride the elephants but the scariest part for me was that white water rafting. I was lucky enough to stay in the boat the whole time and actually really enjoyed it in the end. The bamboo rafting seemed a bit lame after all the rapids. And then it was the drive back to Chiang Mai.
I really enjoyed the entire trip and would highly recommend it. Things dont always turn out as you expect but thats the excitement and quality of Asia. Hope you enjoy the pics...
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Amy and Lucy
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Fab trip diary!
Fame at last!! Thanks for adding our pic, yr diary is really interesting and a great record of our adventure!!p.s. other pics are wicked too!! Best wishes on your future travels, Love Amy and Lucy