The Wonderful World of Pai

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Hello everyone!

We are currently sitting in Thaton in northern Thailand waiting to get on a longboat to take us down the river to Chian Mai. Our latest adventures all took place in Pai, northwest of Chiang Mai.

The road to Pai is interesting, it is quite possibly the curviest road I've ever experienced. 762 curves, 95% of which are hairpin in nature, combine that with some crazy driving and it made for an interesting ride in.

Pai was the town we've all been waiting for. It is a quite, chilled out town on a river full of bamboo huts, hippies, markets, and restaurants. We stayed across the river in our very own bamboo hut which was reached by crossing a rickity but apparently stable bamboo bridge. The hut was awesome except for the fact that it got quite cold at night so sleeping and showering (basically outside) was a bit chilly.

We rented scooter-bikes in Pai and toured around. Our first stop was the Tha Pai Hotspring which was awesome because it has been very minimally altered by humans. The damned up a stream with boulders and some sand bags to create a series of pools which varied in depth and temperature. You still sat on the sandy bottom so it was much more natural than Radium. At the uppermost pool, which is 80C, you could apparently cook eggs. Matt and I tried but they just turned sort of gelantinous, I couldn't eat mine, Matt drank his - yuck.

Then we stopped by Pam Bok Waterfall which was amazing. It was a thin, high waterfall that came over a cliff into a steep sided gorge. We swam in the pool at its base and under the fall itself. I've always wanted to do that! Mor Paeng Waterfall was the last stop of the day but after Pam Bok wasn't very exciting.

That night we bought paper lanterns and set them off, very powerful experience. They go amazingly high, thousands of feet, before they sputter out. The sky was full of them, very pretty.

We had the bikes the next morning too and Matt and I attempted to get to Mae Yen Waterfall but it was a 7km hike in and we had a bus to catch at 2:30 so we didn't quite make it. The walk was still amazing though as it was through real junlge with weird plants and birdsong. We were the only people on the trail. You followed the river and had to cross it numerous times, quite refreshing.

We spent the night of the 16th in Chiang Mai and came up to Thaton yesterday (the 17th). We are off really soon to head to Chiang Rai, will update soon.

Hope everyone is enjoying the cold weather, I'm sitting in the sun and it's lovely and warm!

Rae

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