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.