Pai - not just a tasty pastry covered snack

So I arrived at Pai after an uneventful minibus ride through the hills of Northern Thailand, and me and Peter promptly found a bamboo hut next to the small river that floats through the town in one of the most stunning spots in Thailand, with the sunset over the hills reflected by the water. Deciding that the only thing for it would be to get very drunk, we moseyed into town to find out about the bars there. A leaflet advertising Retox bar (10 large bottles of beer in 3 hours and they're all free!!) was promising, but the bar was shut. No matter. We trawled through many other bars and bumped into Tommy again. A good night was had, from what I can remember. The virtues of 7/11 was promptly discovered when, at ridiculous o'clock, we realised it was open 24 hours a day And it sold toasties. Amazing.

The next day, to relieve our hangover somewhat, we decided to find a much talked about swimming pool we had heard rumours of the previous night. We found it after walking around in the midday sun for about an hour (not fun) and finally found the fabled pool. It was indeed great, complete with bar, a ledgendary owner called Soi who had quality music blaring out at all times of the day (he really was cool. He didn't even mind when we confessed a few days later that a group of us had climbed over the fence at 3 am to go skinny dipping), amazing food and quite a few other hungover travellers, all looking mildly relieved at having a place with hammocks by cool water. Amongst others were the two (completely unrelated) Stephanies from Vancouver, Tommy, two Germans called Chris and Marvin (who was the spitting image of Splinter from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), Richard the mildly psychotic South African, and many others from that varied and slightly strange group called backpackers. Also that evening I met Liam, 3 huts down from us, from Ireland who I have again met in Sumatra.

Pai itself cannot be accounted for day by day - I spent 9 there on my first visit, and after about day 5 I think I would run out of adjectives to describe the pool and the bar scene. However, one event that did become routine was a campfire at Mt. View lodge, Soi's set of huts just outside Pai. After hearing a few tunes on guitar Liam (who could talk all 4 legs off a donkey) told Tommy, who wasted no time in getting a crowd of about 30 people to come up for a bonfire with guitar and drinking. I wasn't informed until later on at about 4.00, but it was pretty awesome and soon had become a regular predrinking ritual. Pai was indeed amazing for just chilling. In addition to the pool and bars it had an internet cafe with private movie rooms, the best pad thai in Thailand just opposite the police station, served from a tiny incospicuous stall. To prove just how good it was, I started talking to a girl in lake Toba, several thousand kms away, about Pai, and she immediatly mentioned the same tiny noodle stall. I didn't leave for 9 days, at which point I had met several other travellers including some crazy Germans that knew Tommy and a girl called Cat from England who was doing some volunteering an hour away. Eventually, after over a week of chilling as hedonistically as possible, I went back to Chiang Mai again with Liam and Tommy (Peter had left half way through to meet the second half of the dutch double (or should that be double dutch...) act in Laos). We spent a week in Chiang Mai, complaining how Pai was better, playing pool and meeting more girls before returning. As well as meeting Cat again at Chiang Mai, I also started talking to 3 English girls (Rosa, Arrie and Dani) in rooftop bar (name dropped especially for Lucy to feel even more jealous :P) who were heading to Laos after Pai, which gave me and Tommy (Liam had left for KL) the perfect excuse to revisit. We only stayed there 2 nights this time before heading back to Chiang Mai to get a bus to the border, with the notable exception of Tommy who could not be found in the morning having absconded with an American girl and in fact stayed in Pai for more then a month, going as far as renting a house there. I caught the bus to Chiang Khong (the border town between Thailand and Laos) and waited for the girls to join me - a mix up with tickets had meant they had to take a bus the day after. Chiang Khong was pleasant enough though, with a good view of the Mekong river which seperates the two countries, and I spent an enjoyable day in a bar drinking Leo beer and watching various movies there. Finally the girls turned up, and we all confirmed our tickets to Laos on the Mekong slow boat, ready to leave Thailand in the morning.

Laos will have to wait for another day though m'afraid...

The musings of a Thailand traveller

So, I left Bangkok with a raging hangover and an iced coffee addiction (probably brought on by going cold turkey on the chai). The question that I had been struggling with for a few weeks was where to go in SE Asia. Since I'm writing this with the benefit of over a months hindsight, I can be fairly sure that my overall route is about set now, but back then I was left with several very tempting options to fill in 110 days. I could;
1) Do the "Lucy" route with added Cambodia - the classic 'backpacker' circuit of SE Asia that begins in Bangkok and follows a loop through N. Thailand (with maybe a dash of Burma along the way?), Laos, Vietnam (north to south), Cambodia and ending in the islands of Thailand (my flight back is from Bangkok).
2) Head straight southwards through the Malaysian Peninsula, maybe stopping off at a Thai island or two and perhaps dallying for a little while in Malaysia before exploring Indonesia
3) Do the first bit of the circuit in 1 before deviating off in North Vietnam and peruse through China
4) A mix of any of the above depending on what I feel like from day to day, who I meet etc etc.

As it quite predictably has turned out, although I started out with the not so noble intention of slogging my way round Asia's party circuit, I got pleasantly sidetracked in Laos, having been persuaded by 3 girls to go to the 7th June full moon festival in S. Thailand, and so ended up breaking free of the circuit and making a mad dash through Malaysia to absorb as much of Indonesia as is possible in less than 2 months. But, I'm getting ahead of myself here...As I was saying before I wildly deviated off course, I left Bangkok nursing my brooding headache and vowing never to touch a bucket again (or at least for a day...). I took the bus north to Chiang Mai, Thailands second city, and its cultural capital. I ended up staying at a place called Julies guesthouse which, if you ever happen to be in that neck of the woods, is the place to stay. I went there on a glowing reccomendation from Lucy, and it was an awesome hangout whilst I was there - there was a huge area for backpackers to talk, drink, play pool, chill and do whatever, and the food there was amazing. Plus it had its own travel agency to arrange tours, treks and courses. Whilst in Chiang Mai I did a cooking course (also recommended by Lucy) which included a trip to the market, cooking some really good food (thai fish cakes are worth killing for) and an absolutely crazy instructor called Miow. Chiang Mai also has a huge Sunday market in the evening, which me and a Belgian guy I met named Tommy walked through for several hours, trying everything available on the food stalls from Noodle Soup to Fried Insect Larvae (which just tasted like incredibly salty, slightly sour fish). Tommy and several other people in Julies had mentioned plans to go to Pai, 3 hours north west of Chiang Mai, a place I had not thought of visiting before. However I decided it would be worth checking out and left with the intention of staying a day or two. I left with one of the dutch guys I had been drinking with in Bangkok. I met both of them again in Julies, and although they could bring me no more clarity about what had happened to me that night ("Um... You wondered off after a bit. I think. I can't really remember though") they none the less filled me in as to what they got up to that night, which involves a Subway, an angry policeman, Khao San Jail and a 300 Baht (6 pounds) bribe. One of them had lost his passport and so had to head back down to Bangkok, giving Peter (the slightly less crazy one) some time to kill, so we left for Pai together. The many shenanigans of Pai will have to wait for another day to be told however, as the suns just come out and the coral reef here (Pulau Weh) is looking pretty snorkalable right now. Ciao.

Bangkok

Alright alright?

The flight from Mumbai to Bangkok was uneventful, and I touched down in Thailand at about 6am. Took a bus into town from the very impressive airport (well, compared to Mumbai Airport anyway) and arrived just outside Khao San Road, the centre for backpackers not just in Bangkok or Thailand, but for all travellers in SE Asia. I was immediatly shocked by how clean and quiet the city was; after spending time in Mumbai (hectic), Delhi (noisy), Varanasi (dirty) and Kathmandu (a mixture of all 3) it was odd to be in a city where you weren't going to contract a lethal disease or get run over by a truck just by trying to walk down the mainstreet.

Despite guesthouses all vying for attention by butting larger and larger neon signs outside, it took me over an hour to find a room. This was not through lack of availability, but because I was still looking for the budget accomodation - all the guesthouses were well above the standards set by the Indian Subcontinents many hostel owners. Eventually it dawned on me that maybe I would have to adjust a bit, and found a guesthouse on Soi Rambutri (a road just off Khoa San0 with a swimming pool (!) for 6 quid. Having sorted that out, I wondered about, ate some pad thai from one of the many street stalls lining the pavement, before a wave of tiredness hit me (I hadn't managed to get to sleep on the plane) and I returned back to my room at 1pm. I woke up again the next morning, having succesfully slept for 19 hours.

The next day I met Steve, someone who was in Pokhara at the same time as me. He was leaving to go to the islands on the night bus that night, but we caught up over pad thai and iced coffee (which i was quickly becoming addicted to). Steve left to go pack, and I went shopping on Khao San, buying an awesome hippy band and a pair of plastic rimmed aviators to replace the destroyed ones I brought trekking (sunglass count = 4). That night was my first night out in Bangkok, and I cannot remember much of it. In SE Asia they sell alcohol not in glasses but in buckets that probably hold 3-4 pints. Into this they add LOTS of whisky, coke and thai red bull which is so strong its illiegal in all other countries. In hindsight, having 4 in an hour was not a good idea, but it seemed like a brilliant one at the time. I remember starting drinking with two dutch guys on there gap years, but could not remember what had happened to them.

I woke up with the worst hangover in the world. It was - if anyone had invented a machine to measure them, be assured that my face would have been in the Guiness world records book. I suffered on through the day, drinking a lot of iced coffee and water. I had an early night that night.

The next two days were an almost exact repeat of the previous 2.

Exit India

So I left Delhi for the last time this trip, looking forward to get to Mumbai, which is overall a much better city - its livlier, more culturally rich, there are better traveller hangouts and after seeing Slumdog Millionaire in Nepal (if you haven't watched it yet, then do it now!) I was itching to get back and take another look at the place, this time not as a green newbie to backpacking but as someone who had survived the trial by fire that is travelling through the subcontinent. When I got to Mumbai I checked in at Red Shield Dorm, the place where I had stayed most nights in Mumbai last time, and where I knew I would meet other travellers. I checked in, dumped my stuff under my bed (padlocking it to the underside) and set off in search of a good dosa, one of South Indias best foods - a savoury pancake often 2-3 ft long stuffed with a masala mix of curried potato, dates, dried fruits, nuts, paneer (Indian cheese, a bit like cottage cheese), Dhal and other seasonal vegetables. I found a good place to do them, and was soon full up. Headed back to the hostel and got talking with an English guy called Anthony. We went out for Beers at Leopolds, an old colonial bar that most of the foreigners in Mumbai seem to inhabit, and then made our way back. Halfway to the dorm, we were met by one of the strangest people I have met travelling. He first offered to sell us a dog. Then half a dog when he realised we weren't going for that sales pitch. Finally, he claimed he was a pirate. That got our attention. Ant cut in
-What do you want??
The guy, who was not much over 5ft5 and did genuinly look like a pirate with long greasy black hair and beard, and with half his teeth missing, casually informed us that
-I can take you on the most magical trip around this city. Show you things you've never seen before. Literally, it will turn your head upside down.
Great, I thought. We've met a pirate LSD dealer. But no, he was actually a tour guide, and rattled off a list of places he could show us, most of which I'd never heard of. He also had an impressive grasp on his English skills, so we asked his price. It was reasonable enough, about 6 quid each for a day, and if he stayed this loony it would be money well spent.
We met him the next day, where he happily informed us that he had felt a bit ill that morning so had had half a litre of local spirit (which is, I'm informed, around 70%) and was now pleasantly drunk. We caught a taxi (another thing I loved about Mumbai - all the taxis were old ambassador 1940 style cars) and visited a multitude of places (and bars along the way, turns out this pirate liked - and couldn't really hold - his drink) including the meat market (think of a scene out of texas chainsaw massacre, with added rats), the laundry sector (about 10 acres where people just did the laundry for everyone across the city) and the slums where the Slumdog Millionaire was filmed. By the end of the day he was wasted, absolutely trolleyed, and could barely walk. We gave him his money and watched him stagger into a liquor store and immediately spend it all. We then went to Leopolds and got slightly drunk ourselves with the rest of Red Shield. My final day in Mumbai, I slept in before doing some last minute shopping for Indian souvenirs such as sunglasses and pirate CDs. We (about 10 of us from Red Shield) went for my last Indian meal - a Lebanese. It was, in all fairness, very good. After that, realising that I had slightly stayed to long in the resteraunt, there was a mad panic to get my stuff, get a taxi and get to the airport. I was leaving India. But I was sure I'd be back.

Adventures in Nepal

Kathmandu turned out to be my favourite city yet visited on this trip. There was so much to see and do, yet also lots of bars, cheap resteraunts and bearable accomadation. The 5 of us got to a guesthouse in Thamel, the backpacker area of Kathmandu, and me Neil and Paul got a room between us, paying the equivalent of 70p a night. We spent 5 days in Kathmandu in the end. We visited the Monkey temple, a buddhist stupa famous for the many monkeys loitering there, as well as Boudha stupa, a huge building that looks like a cross between a temple and a gigantic laser beam. We also visited Kathmandus durbar square; the royal courtyard full of temples. However, even just walking round the streets of Kathmandu, you would always come across an interesting temple, stupa, statue or old Newari style house. There was also lots of shops selling very very cheap North Face gear, as well as Tibetan objects and Gurkha Knifes. The bars were great and often had loud live music and cheap beer. There was also Cheers Bar next to our hotel, which would put on pirate DVDs in the evenings. I could have spent a month there easily. However, after 5 days I left for Besisahar, the start of the Annapurna circuit, whilst the others left for Pokhara to do some rafting (I was tempted to go, but was not sure how long the Annapurna circuit would take, and was not sure if I had time - in hindsight, I did). My last day in Kathmandu I got some mild food poisoning from a bad chicken chow mein, and spent the night being sick, not a great start for the trek. I had left my big backpack and guitar at the guesthouse in Kathmandu, and carried only my small backpack for the trek; that contained a change of clothes, waterproof gear, hat and gloves, first aid kit, toiletries, map, guidebook, wallet, torch and emergency space blanket. And a towel, which was the most important item. The trek was over 300 km, and reached a high point of 5416m at the Thorung La Pass; the guidebook advised 14-16 days to do it in. The first day, I walked the distance the guidebook recommended, still ill, and got to my destination, a village called Bahundanda, at 1.00pm. It thunderstormed for the rest of the afternoon. The next day, I got to that days destination (according to the LP guide) by 10.00 am, so continued on and did almost 2 days in 1. The terrain was getting more and more spectacular with every gorge I turned into and every mountain pass I trekked on. I went through pine forests and passed raging rivers, I saw the worlds 8th highest mountain. This was all incredible. The storm had taken all the dust out of the air so the views were superb. I was also, despite my fears of being unfit, doing far more then the guidebook thought doable at a faster pace, overtaking the other trekkers I saw. I got to Manang at just over 3000 m after 5 days and spent a day acclimatising there, and watched Slumdog Millionaire at a ver basic cinema, which consisted of a projector, some pirate DVDs and a man giving free Popcorn and cups of tea. From Manang, I walked to the next town at 4000m, from here I spent a day going up 1400m to the Thorung La pass and down 1600m to the next town. This day was arduous but also one of my favourites, there was a real sense of schievment getting to the snow covered top, surrounded by swirling prayer flags, huge cairns and great views. The remaining part of the walk to Naya Pul should have taken 7 days but I pushed myself to do it in 3, including walking 32 miles one day. This was not all downhill either, on the 2nd day I ascended up to Ghorapani, a climb of 1500 m, more then the day I climbed to the Thorung La! Finishing the trek was amazing, I had done it in 10 days (including one acclimatisation day) and felt ready for a good rest. I met some great people on the trek as well, whilst I usually walked alone (so I could go at my own pace) the lodges themselves were really social places where everyone relaxed after a hard days trekking with a cold beer and hot food. After the trek, I took a bus to Pokhara.

Pokhara was very very chilled out, like the Nepalese version of a cross between Varkala and Pushkar. It was a town by a lake, with lots of bars, cafes and cheap accomadation, as well as very little traffic. I checked into a dorm, and met a canadian girl who introduced me to some aussies that were in Pokhara. I also met Paul who was in the dorm next door coincedentally, the others had gone trekking but he had stayed and so I spent a lot of time over outside that dorm drinking and playing an Irish guys guitar he had brought (mine was still in Kathmandu). I spent 4 or 5 days in Pokhara, but really didn't do much, I played poker quite a bit, drunk a lot, celebrated Nepalese New Year (2066! I was in the 60's....) and slept. I felt I had earned it after my trekking. I am still on a net profit from my efforts at Poker over the course of travelling, so its all good.

After Pokhara, I went to Royal Chitwan Park, a national park in the Terai area of Nepal. I did an elephant safari (riding on a howdah), slept overnight in a watchtower in the jungle, and canoed down the river there. I saw 10 Rhinos, a Marsh Mugger, lots of wild boar, deers and elephants, but no TIgers or Leapoards unfortunately. I also swam in a river with a herd of elephants, I rode into the river on one whilst it squirted water at me with its trunk, then I jumped off and swam around for a bit, clambering on and off the elephants. It was amazingly fun, one of the best things I did in Nepal. After a few days in Chitwan, I left for India. I met some other travellers on the bus to the border, one an Aussie called Kate. The two of us were the only ones going to India that day so we took a bus from Sunauli (the town at the border) to Gorakhpur, which I can safely describe as a hole. We both went to get Indian currency out of an ATM (we were using Nepalese before) only to find none of the ATMs accepted Kates card, despite the fact that she had been travelling in India before Nepal for 2 months. I was going to go to Varanasi that night, but ended up staying to help her out, as she had no money at that point. It took us a day to sort it out, none of the cyber cafes had skype headphones to contact her bank (and none of the electrical stores) and the payphones were to expensive, as the bank kept on putting her on hold for ages. Eventually, around midday the next day we persuaded the bank to let us use its phone for free, and got the problem solved (the card had been flagged for visiting too many countries). That left us free to move on, which was a great relief as Gorakhpur had nothing in it at all. We arrived in Delhi, which is where I am now. Kate has gone to Rishikesh, and I have an overnight train to Mumbai later on this afternoon. On the 28th April (5 days) I have a flight from Mumbai to Bangkok, and am very excited about leaving the Indian Subcontinent to start my travels in South East Asia!!!

The road to Nepal

From Auli I went back to Rishikesh, the bus journeys actually made the trip worthwhile anyway, even without taking the sledging into account. I spent the night in Rishikesh, and the next morning caught a bus to Delhi. Spent the night in Delhi, then took the night train to Varanasi the next evening, and met a French anthropology student who was doing a documentary in India for her university. She was going to meet her sister in Varanasi though, so I went to Shanti Lodge, one of the best places I have stayed in India. There was a dorm on the 8th floor, with wire mesh instead of walls on two sides, and loads of mattresses just scattered randomly inbetween plants around the room. The view was amazing, and two floors below was the resteraunt/bar which had a free pool table. I met a Welsh guy at the dorm called Jimmy, he had just come from Nepal but introduced me to two guys from England, Paul and Neil, who were leaving Varanasi for Kathmandu the next day, which was my plan as well. Got talking to them, they had also arranged to go with an American guy called Matt and his Polish girlfriend Anja, so the 5 of us got train tickets to Gorakhpur, the nearest Indian town to the border that had a railway station. Varanasi was really intense, incredibly dirty but fascinating as well, its a holy city on the ganges, and where the Hindus go to burn there dead. There are multitudes of holy cows, funeral processions and priests roaming the narrow streets. We took a boat ride down the Ganges, which gave a good view of the ghats, and saw all the India people bathing in the Ganges - not a good idea, the water is so polluted there its septic and has 1.5 million faecal coliform bacteria per 100 ml, where in water safe for bathing there should be less then 500 bacteria... Enough said. We left for Gorakhpur at midnight, and from arrived at 6.00 in the morning. Got a bus to Sunauli which was very crowded, cramped and noisy. Temporarily put off the prospect of public buses, we hired a jeep to take us to Kathmandu, we managed to haggle one down to a price only 100 rps each more expensive then the bus (less then 1 pound).

In search of snow

Now in Shimla, my plan was to find a place in the Himalayas to ski. According to my Lonely Planet book, there were 3 places - Manali in Himachal Pradesh, Auli in Uttarankhand, or Golmug in Kashmir. It was mid March at the time, the book said that the first two had snow til the end of March and the latter had some into April. However a guy in Shimla told me that Manali's snow had all melted, but that Auli should still have some. Whilst in Shimla, I also walked to a famous Hanuman temple and generally chilled out. To get to Auli, I had to go Shimla->Delhi->Rishikesh->Joshimath->Auli. This sounds a lot but Rishikesh was a good place to break the journey, it is a holy town on the Ganges that the Beatles visited in the 60s, and is full of Ashrams and hippies. I stopped there for a couple of nights, met some other travellers, and didn't do to much, which was fine by me. The bus ride from Rishikesh to Joshimath was stunning, it followed the Ganges through the Himalayas for 9 hours along a high, steep gorge past huge statues of wierd Hindu Gods. I got to Joshimath around 4.00pm and from there took the cable car up to Auli, at 3000m. I got there; there was no snow on the slope. Not one snowflake. I went to sleep that night pretty disgruntled. The next morning, I woke up and looked around. There was snow nearby, The top of the mountain that the resort was built on had some, I could see. I decided to walk up there, however couldn't get any ski's to take up with me (the receptionist at my dorm looked at me like I'd gone mad when I asked). It took me 4 and a half hours to walk up to the top, there was quite a bit of snow. I was determined to get some winter sport done, and so took off my backpack, put my legs through the straps, sat on it and sledged down. Mission accomplished. I walked down tired but happy.