Sawasdee Ka - Pai !!!!!

Saturday - 28 June 08

Well another fantastic day in Pai, what can we say except anyone who travels to Thailand, Pai is a must. One more day and we have to pack up and leave and it sucks big time. Today was another easy day, which is the norm for Pai. We were up and about early as we don't want to waist one minute of time here.

We headed off to Pai country house restaurant for brunch and we took the laptop to use our last lot of time on our internet card and do the usual emailing and blog. We then dropped the laptop back at the bungalow and decided a long ride was in order. We headed out on the bike along the road to Mae Hong Son to see whats doing out in the hills, we probably could have gone all the way to Mae Hong Son like a lot of travellers do but not knowing the roads and how long it would take to get there by motorbike we thought, nah! Mae Hong Son is only 111 kms from Pai but it is up and down mountains and we are not that experienced. We did manage to ride about 35 kms out of Pai and it was through the mountains, curvy roads, hairpin bends, up hill and down dale and it was fantastic, got some excellent photos. We passed hilltribes working their fields in traditional dress, the men digging their fields on side of huge mountains and getting up the mountains on the bike was hilarous with us two fatties on the bike we could have pushed it faster that it was going. We got to the top of the ridge of the mountains at a lookout where you could see over both sides of the mountains, the rain clouds were covering the top of the mountains and the views were fantastic. The hilltribe people have stalls there with all their colourful bags, scarves and souveniers as you could buy a drink and something to eat. These people have it all worked out where to set up shop in places they know people will go, good on them, an opportunity not taken is an opportunity lost.

Well that was as far as we went on our ride and coming back down through the mountains was wicked, of course we went as slow as we could around the curves and bends and everyone was overtaking us but hey we weren't in any hurry. It was enjoyable and picturesque and thats what counts. What was left of the arvo we spend sitting on the verandah of our bungalow and enjoying the peace and quiet and the cool breeze. We met a couple around our age that checked in yesterday and are staying a few days at Baan Suan bungalows, they are fom Melbourne and we chatted to them for quite a while on our way out to dinner.

We did the Thai thing for dinner tonight at our usual restaurant and were so full we thought we had best walk it off, so we looked at some shops at clothes, we found this cool little shop and the Muslim lady was lovely, I found some wicked hippy pants that I just had to have and Rick even bought himself a nice hippy shirt made from cheesecloth which will keep him nice and cool when we are down south. Rick managed to barter the lady down to 150 baht for his shirt as he told her that was all he had left after he paid for my hippy pants that we bartered down from 380 baht to 350baht.

Happy with our purchase we stopped of at 7/11 to grab some supplies and stamps to post the postcards and headed home. It was almost 10 o'clock by then and we were buggered. All in all it was another fantastic day in Pai.. I still can't believe tomorrow is our last day here!!!!!

So until tomorrow! Kob un Chai