Today we left Chiang Mai for the long journey north to Pai. The jorney is around 4 hours long and mostly on winding roads. To break the journey up our guide made a number of stops. First stop was butterfly farm and orchid farm. Opportunity to test out our new camera with lots of close up nature shots.
Next stop was view point on top of one of the hills. We could see across lots of other hills. The whole area is heavily forested with very few build up areas, mostly small villages of the Karen tribe. We are now very close to the border with Myanmar (Burma), less than 25 km.
We also stopped for lunch in a little village.
About mid afternoon we stopped on the side of the road and met up with our trek guide and chef. Our luggage was transferred to a 4 wheel drive truck so that it could be taken ahead of us to the village in which we were staying that night. The roads are too rough for our regular bus.
At this point we met a Danish family that were also doing the walk and were staying in the same village. We'd have some one else to have a few drinks with on Christmas eve.
We then started treking with our new guide leading the way. It took two hours of walking through the forest and fields to reach the village.
The village was very small, perhaps a few hundred people living in bamboo huts and a small school. Their main income is from farming crops such as rice, corn, millet and garlic.
We had the special guest hut. This was simple bamboo hut with leaves on the roof. It was built on stilts so about 6ft off the ground. The animals live underneath the hut. There were lots of chickens, pigs and dogs running about.
The first thing that happened after we arrived was the local women set up the market (just for us). I think we managed to buy some thing from everyone. Fortunately the Danish family also turned up at this point and helped by also buying some things.
Dinner was served on the veranda of the huts. Our chef cooked an excellent meal for us using wok and open fire.
After dinner the Danish family joined us (they spoke good english) and we had show laid on by the young girls of the village. We had brought some coloured pens from Japan to hand out to village children and the other family had some balloons which went down very well.
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| The butterflys are turned into brouches for sale to the tourist. I guess they are also used to pollenate the orchids. |
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| Neve in row of orchids. The orchids are hanging from wirtes. The roots are not in soil |
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| Felix trying to look cool despite being given a flower to wear |
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| View from top of the hill |
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| Start of the tour. Our trek guide made bamboo walking sticks for everyone |
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| Climbing bamboo ladder to get up big rock |
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| We are following the Danish family through the fields |
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| View of the village we stayed in. Little different to Tokyo |
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| Neve and Julie investigate a termite mould |
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| This is our bedroom |
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| I think we had 12 women set up stall at the market where we were the only customers |
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| Soup for starters |
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| Show from village girls. We had to sing a Xmas carol in return. We picked Rudolf the red nosed reindeer. Fortunately Julie remembered all the words |
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| Singing our song |
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| Playing with the balloons brought by the Danish family |
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| Felix joined the village boys playing with the fire |
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