Pai

Well folks as interesting as Chang Mai was I found it to be very busy and quite smoggy or fumy so we only stayed 1 night before shipping out. The night bazaar was a great place to shop and the food was good. However the Gecko bar was doing 3 large Changs for 119 B so you can guess what happened in Chang Mai. It was probably safer to leave!!

So we caught the Government bus from Chang Mai to Pai (pronounced as "Bye" in English). Was a funny old trip. The bus itself was antique and as we boarded I realised it had wooden chocks under the wheels to stop it rolling away - fantastic! We're taking a trip into the hilly mountainous North in a bus with shoddy brakes, who's idea was this?? 4 hours of rock hard cramped seats, lurching back & forth with each gear change, a ting tong Russian dude who'd obviously plied his brain with too much of something in the past and a pair of monks sitting next to me who eat sweets, drink fizzy and smoke. I was blown away by this, I thought Buddhist monks went without everything - apparently not. To say the road was frightening would be an understatement, so many twists & turns with sheer drops that would have killed us all. Thankfully the driver appeared to know the road like the back of his hand and the halfway stop was a welcome break for drink, food & ciggy. The wooden chock appeared again and now I was sure the handbrake at least was not quite what it should of been. Still, what do you expect for 80B?

So we're still in Pai - been here for a few days and it's a great little town with many people from different countries, faiths & cultures living here. Check out www.allaboutpai.com for some info on this wonderful oasis. First night was as usual an absolute smash up. There were several other travellers on the bus and we met a couple of guys from Grimsby (great lads) who took us on a bit of a bar crawl. All I'll say is that we were in 7-11 eating hot dogs at almost 5am on our way home!

Yesterday we hired some bikes and travelled up into the hills to find some fishing lakes we'd seen advertised. 7 bloody kilometres of uphill cycling interspersed with bouts of listing tentative steps and gasps for breath. Anyway we found the lakes and it is a great place. Run by an English guy called Dave who has been in Thailand for 7 years. His newly built house sits right on the edge of one of the lakes - It really is a smashing place, you need to see it to appreciate it. Anyway, it started to rain as we arrived so we sat out the rain at the side of the lake, chatting to Dave and supping cold beer. It must have rained for a while as somehow there were three beers consumed while sitting chatting and watching the fish. Dave allowed us the privilege of using his loo in the house rather than the ones for the fisherman. His bathroom was like utopia - I've never seen anything quite like it. A squat loo, a western one, a shower, a bespoke bath tub like a swimming pool, even a fish pond and beautiful hand painted scenes on the walls all accessed via a twisting staircase hiding behind a door off the living room.

Reluctantly we paid for our beers and concluded that we'd found the best bar in the world, bid Dave a temporary farewell (fishing Tuesday) and started the 7 kilometre descent back to Pai. Was like being a kid again. Rushing downhill with no hands and worse still, only a front brake. Another lesson learnt, check the bike properly as you're hiring it!

Will probably do another few days here but the visa is ebbing away and we need to allow for travel time to a border crossing which is a great shame as I feel this place needs more investigating. I moved hut today. I'm now closer to the river and have my own bathroom. The place where we're staying is accessed via a bamboo bridge and is just over the river from the main town, opposite the temple that pumps music through it's PA system every morning. Quite a soothing way to wake in the morning assuming you've not consumed too much the night before.