Pai

We moved to one of Thailand's most northern towns; Pai, the minibus ride there was along rumbling roads that snaked through the hills and mountains. When we arrived at nightfall it was such a relief to step into the fresh cool air (one of the girls next to us had been spewing vomit all the way up into whatever she had, hat, bag, crisp packet) Pai is a fairly small town situated close to the Burmese boarder, it was hit badly by the 2005 floods, but was slowly bouncing back. The first place we stayed Twin Hut were akin to those of the hilltribes we had stayed with during trekking, but still they were comfortable, a guy we went trekking with was staying there too, but probably not by choice. He had come off his scooter the day earlier whilst trying to avoid a dog, now he had to visit the hospital for fresh dressings on his wounds for the next 7 days. this made the third person I had met that had crashed their scooter in Pai.

The next morning we rented scooters! we had another traveler tagging along with us an Australian called Kath, this seems to happen quite a lot but its refreshing to have someone new with you for a few days. Cruising through the meandering roads we reached Pai Canyon. there are thin walkways on top, but  many of these had crumbled into the creek below so after hours of rock climbing I was covered in a fine coppery dust and lost a pair of ray bans. There were waterfalls nearby too which I also tried to climb but just resulted in me being drenched. After watching sundown over the canyon we drove back to the town, all journey back we had occasional glimpses of pretty big insects swooping past your face, enticed by the headlight.The evening was for relaxing so we kicked back with beer and pool, a Thai Pai dude in the corner reeling off half decent renditions of Dylan, John Denver and the Beatles until the early morning.

Today we are caving, this involved a good 5 hour journey so we started early. The roads on the way were incredible, the best I have ever driven (which isn't saying much) but so many of hairpins, spectacular views and wide yawning corners. At the cave mouth we were lead by a lantern to a bamboo raft that took us into the vast depths. It was surprisingly humid inside and the pungent smell of bat poo persisted throughout but the sheer scale of the cave was impressive. The water below us was rippling with shoals of large fish, some a good half meter in size. Occasionally we would get off the raft to walk up steep rickety wooden steps lead by our lantern guide; a withered old lady could only say 'o.k' whenever we wanted to ask any questions.  the journey back was largely uphill so Andy managed to overheat his scooter resulting much cursing as he attempted to push it up the hills and glide down on the occasional slope. He did manage to get it started before dark though and we made it in one piece to our new hostel SpicyPai; the beds in this place were suspended by bamboo and wood and you had to climb makeshift ladders this hostel was a lot busier than the previous and we went out with a bunch of people to a few local bars, I got chatting to a few hippies who tried to explain to me about aura and stuff. I still don't really get it and some of them were quite pretentious. A dog that stayed at the hostel followed us around the whole night.

So this marks our last day in Pai. We decided to make a trip to the natural hot springs the town is famous for and unwinding, we scooter'd along some dirt roads and farmland to discover what was essentially a bunch of rocks and steaming water, the eggy smell of sulphur wafting with the heat. not quite what I'd envisaged. hoping from rock to rock was like a serious game of "dont tread on the lava" because the water beneath was 95 degrees. On the way back we found the national park hotsprings which were much better, human beings can actually sit in these miniature waterfalls and not be scolded to death, I wish I could have said the same for the boiled frogs that littered the pools. After feeling throughly relaxed I headed back to Pai town, hauled on our backpacks and got a minibus here I met two girls Katie and Tish, both from Hampshire and were doing pretty much the same trip as Andy and I and for pretty much the same length of time. We were dropped off in a mouse ridden riverside hostel, lucky it was only for one night and there was nothing to do but get some sleep, in 3 hour we would be getting a slowboat down the river and across the Thai-Laos border to the town of Luang Prabang.