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Published: March 4th 2007
Rock and Roll
Me on my 'pink pistol'. hardcore man.Unfortunately the railway from the south ends at Chiang Mai, therefore the only way to get to Pai is by road. During our many an hour at the local internet café we noticed a poster offering a VIP aircon minibus to Pai and at 250 baht it sounded like a steal. We wasted no time in booking it up for the following morning.
We boarded to join one other couple and our initial thoughts were that for the first time in South East Asia we might even get the luxury we were promised! We set off and after about half an hour of winding through the warren of tiny streets that make up the old city, stopping every so often to welcome additional passengers, we found ourselves once again shoe-horned into a mobile greenhouse, sweating our arses off! Despite the misleading advertisement however, there were no complaints. We had all learnt by then that it was par for the course in Thailand. Besides, in some ways the poster was correct, it was relative luxury in comparison to some of our past grueling journeys.
3 hours travel through mountainous terrain and one obligatory pit-stop later, we arrived and began our
search for cheap rooms. Our initial disorientation was short lived as Pai is a very small place. I think it’s a great little place. It’s around the size of a large village in England and is so laid back it is unbelievable. It strikes me as the kind of place that started off as a sleepy rural village and as more and more backpackers traveled through, each one fell in love with its relaxed atmosphere, friendly locals and readily available drugs, and never left. The reason for saying this is that everywhere you look you see middle-aged Western hippies who obviously came to visit in their 20’s, did one too many mushrooms and decided to stay here for life! This however is by no means a bad point; it is what gives Pai its charm.
We knew that Deano was around somewhere and had the rough name of a guesthouse that he was staying at. We arrived, and after a 15 minute laboured conversation, the owner managed a vague recollection of ‘the Englishman who like beer’. Due to the fact that they had no triple rooms, the place looked like a mosquito haven and that the above mentioned recollection
was far from concrete, we decided to find somewhere else.
After a lot of walking, heavily laden with rucksacks resulting in aching shoulders and a few snappy remarks, we eventually checked into a nice little place called Bonanza. The first plan of action after throwing down our bags was to tend to our empty bellies. We had been recommended a place along the main street of Pai that was supposed to do the best burgers in town, therefore we decided to bless them with our presence.
I have to say that the burger was absolutely amazing, however somewhat tarnished by the over zealous American waitress asking us all 3 times during each beer whether we would like another. With no word from Deano we decided to take matters into our own hands. Now if you know Deano, then you know that, not unlike any true Brit, he loves a good curry. While eating our burgers and being asked for the 500th time if we would like another beer (aw, she was just trying to be attentive bless her!), we noticed and Indian across the road. We all agreed that we had to check, so we made our way
across the road and stuck our heads round the door. Sure enough there he was, sitting at a table laden with the remnants of a vegetable curry and naan bread, with a bloated belly, Chang beer in hand and, as usual, a toothy grin from ear to ear. With the greetings out of the way he kindly offered to take us on a tour of all the best places in Pai (it goes without saying that all of these places were in fact watering holes, but we certainly weren’t arguing!). Before long we began our crawl.
There are a handful of bars in Pai, and we picked a select few that made up our regular nightly route. The first stop would be Shisha Bar. This place is pretty self explanatory; it’s a small open-fronted bar where we would usually kick off the night with a few beers and a chat over a shisha pipe. Once we were well on our way and getting lively, we would head up the road to Bebop bar. This place is quite a phenomenon in Thailand. It is a properly laid out bar, not unlike those at home, and best of all it had
live music every night. Until then in Thailand I had only been to bars that played CD compilation albums or badly mixed pop music, so as you can imagine it was a welcome change. The only problem was that the same band played the same set every night which, after a week, got a bit tedious! A few more buckets and a good dance would bring us through to the early hours, and closing time at Bebop. Now obviously, being fully-fledged alcoholics at this stage, we were only just getting warmed up at this point in the evening and adopting the philosophy of ‘you snooze you lose’, we needed somewhere to feed our habit until the sun came up. Luckily it seemed there were others like us and the bar that catered for us reprobates was called Bamboo Bar. The Bamboo Bar, once again is aptly named. It is an open air bar made of Bamboo perched on the bank of the river. This was usually where it got messy until the sun rose and we all scurried back to our rooms for fear of seeing what the girl we’d been trying to chat up all night actually looked like!
One night in Shisha Bar I was chatting to a Northern bloke who seemed familiar. I thought nothing of it at the time, then the following day when I went to top up my ipod the same guy was working behind the bar at the internet café. He greeted me by name and asked if I remembered him (which I clearly didn’t). It turned out that he was a guy known to me only as ‘Crusoe’. I originally met him at Coral Bungalows on Koh Phangan 4 months earlier - small world eh? The reason for the name is that after a night on Haad Rin beach we were back at the hostel chilling out and trying to get our heads together, when a disheveled looking character with a mess of long hair walked up from the beach to join us. He had no wallet, no bags, no money, not even any shoes! He was actually stranded on Koh Phangan due to coming on a day trip from Samui and losing his wallet which contained his cash, his cards and his return ticket! From then on he was dubbed Crusoe, come to think of it, I never did find
out what happened to his shoes!
The only way to travel in Pai is by moped. We had heard of a nearby waterfall that was worth a look, therefore we hired a trusty steed each and made our way out of town to have a look. I must admit, I was quite upset to find that I had been allocated just about the only bright pink moped in the whole shop! Being a hardcore biker and all, it didn’t really do much for my street cred! The waterfall was worth a look, but wasn’t really much more than just a waterfall (see pictures). On the way home we drove past what could only be Pai airport, pictured above, so me James and Deano stopped to watch a plane land, Rich however rode off ahead. Once the plane was safely on the ground we set off back to town, only to find Rich a little further down the road struggling to pick up his bike from the side of the road. The poor old chap had turned around to come and find us, only to lose control in some sand and crash. Luckily there were no serious injuries or damage.
The bike was pretty much unscathed apart from a few scratches and Rich had a deep, but not life threatening cut in his shin. To top it all off, about 10 minutes later he pulled away too quick and went careering into an a-frame shop sign on the roadside! All in all not a good day!
After our day’s adventure, Rich went to the hospital to get himself cleaned up and James went online. Myself and Deano knew that if we didn’t do something constructive we would just end up in a pub spending our hard earned cash and punishing our already shriveled livers, therefore we decided to make the most of our mopeds and go in search of a second waterfall that we had heard about. We arrived at what the map clearly showed as this ‘waterfall’ only to find what looked like some sort of dried up mountain stream. Slightly bewildered, but by no means surprised, we went on our way. Although the waterfall was a slight disappointment, the views on the way back made up for it.
That evening we stuck gold in the form of a great restaurant. It is called The Drop Inn.
It is owned by a Swedish guy and serves the best Western food out of anywhere in South East Asia. They’ve got all the classics: Bangers and Mash, Pie and Chips, Lasagne, Bolognese, Bacon and Cheese Burger and all come in Hungry Horse sized portions. Needless to say, this became the eatery of choice for an afternoon hangover cure.
One of the main reasons for coming to Pai was for the Elephant trekking. We had the opportunity to do it in Chiang Mai, however were told that the elephants were badly treated. Also you sit on a bench seat strapped to the back of the elephant, whereas in Pai you ride it bareback. This was a big attraction for me as you feel so much closer to the animal. We booked up through Thom’s Elephant treks (recommended by Paul and Angelina) for the following day. We had to make our own way there, so I once again climbed onto the pink pistol and we set off along windy concrete tracks into the surrounding countryside.
We arrived and to our amusement were greeted by the youngest of the elephants playing a harmonica! We then spent a while feeding them
bananas and generally getting acquainted. When it was time to go we mounted up by putting our hand on the elephants eyebrow and our foot on its trunk. Once in this position, the beast effortlessly raises its trunk into the air sending you skywards where you have to clamber onto its back. It was then that I really got an idea of the strength of these creatures. Off we trundled and I have to say that I had never felt so unstable in all my life! I was sitting at the front, right on the shoulder blades, meaning that every step the elephant took nearly sent me toppling over the side! Considering it was about a 10 foot drop either side of me it was a bit worrying!
Riding an elephant is an amazing experience, however it does have its downsides. One of these was that because I was gripping on for dear life, the wiry hairs on its neck caused some serious chafing of the inner thigh! Now I know what it must be like for any poor girl that lets my hairy arse into her bedroom! The second is that elephants are huge beasts that understandably get
very hot in the Asian heat. The way that they combat this is by spraying snot over their flanks in order to cool themselves down. Unfortunately if your legs are dangling either side of its body, they too get covered in slime!
The trek was two hours long and took us through some beautiful scenery until we eventually arrived at a river. This was when the fun began! It started off pretty tame with the elephants spraying water over their heads, then as it progressed it became apparent that the elephants had been trained to play games in the water. It was a kind of elephant rodeo! They would sway their heads from side to side, then roll onto their sides in the water dunking your head underneath. It was great fun, and what struck me was how gentle they were. When it rolled onto its side my leg could have been crushed under its hulk of a body, but it eased off to ensure this didn’t happen.
All in all a great afternoon. I would definitely recommend Thom’s. The elephants are so tame, the guides are very knowledgeable, and most of all, you can see that they
really care for the elephants. Before I went I was worried that they would be really badly treated. I had heard stories or guides drawing blood to discipline them, however I saw none of that at all. To be honest it looked like a pretty sweet life to me. Every day being fed hundreds of bananas by various tourists, then going on a nice long walk through the countryside, then finishing it off with a nice refreshing bath in the river! The only gripe that I did have was that I would have preferred us all to have an elephant each, but hey, you can’t have it all eh? Unfortunately all good things have to come to an end, so we got on our stylish sports bikes and made our way back to town after arranging to meet up with Anne-Sophie and Maria, two German girls who shared our experience.
At this stage Deano had not been seen for a few days and we were getting slightly concerned as to his whereabouts. That evening our questions were answered when he pulled up next to James and I on his moped with a local Thai girl on the back! A
short conversation ensued and we were introduced to his new friend who went by the name of Cake. Whenever we tried to initiate conversation with her all she did was repeat the last word that we said, we both looked at each other and thought exactly the same thing: ‘so you’re not with her for her personality then Deano!’ We wished him luck (he was probably going to need it!) and went on our way. It turned out that when we left Pai, Deano stayed with Cake for about a month afterwards! We reckon that he was being held prisoner up in the hills and being used as her sex slave! Sorry Deano, had to mention it!
As our time in Asia was dwindling, we had been discussing what our future plans were. We decided in the end that we would travel back down South, stop off at Kanchanburi, then all the way south to Malaysia to see the Perenthian Islands (obviously stopping off at Coral Bungalows on the way through to say hello to a few people). With our itinerary agreed, we booked ourselves a mini bus back to Chiang Mai in order to catch the train back
down to Bangkok.
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mummy
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jumbofun
(...and i remember KISSING that dear little silky baby bottom!!) The elephant experience looked/sounded excellent! I can see why you want to revisit Thailand before coming home -loveyou,mumx