Pai

---

We arrived in the bohemian town of Pai via the best bus ever! Our little minibus driver kept shouting 'I love you' to random people in the streets.. Beeping and slowing down and just shouting’I love you'! This put us in a good mood from the off. We met a couple from Derry Laura and Liam who are also on their way to Australia. We discovered that they were also going to Charn Chai Muay Thai Boxing training. So we bagan the next day. Training consisted of going for a run at 7 30am if you wished to then two hours of training finished off with lots of kicking and a core strength session! Then the second session last from 3-5pm and it was more of the same. Bee is the owner of the gym. He is a former champion (I think I have that right!) which equates to an All Ireland medal in Ireland.. or an Olympic medal maybe! The training is tough going and completely different to what I’m used to. No matter if you get it right or not you still get whipped by a bamboo stick which would leave welts across our legs/arms/ass and tummy for days haha. Ont he Saturday night everyone meets up at the gym (which is a boxing ring and equipment on the surrounding cement floor-and it's outdoors) for a BBQ and poker.. Then it's off back into town to a pub or 3! I don't think drink friving is illegal here and everybody rides motorbikes.. so at the end of the night I didn't really think much of jumping on the back of one of our trainers 'Tree's bike instead of walking home.. thinking about it he had at least a litre bottle of whiskey in him lol..not to be repeated although it was actually quite safe!We planned on staying there for a few days but ended up doing that for the week! Pai is a really chilled out and relaxed place. It’s quite small but has one street with markets and street food. The bars are mostly blasting out Bob Marley and Jack Johnson, which of course I was delighted with! It’s so small that you actually bump into people you are training with at the gym without having to plan on meeting them! At the moment it is touristy to an extent but its small and out of the way, about 3 or 4 hours from Chiang Mai on an awful road so that puts a lot of people off but it’s well worth the trip!

---