Pai

We just got back from a brief sojourn to Pai, a beautiful little town only a 4 hour twisty ride from our home base in Chiang Mai. Pai sits in a valley surrounded by green mountains. We visited waterfalls, hot springs, went fishing, I even found an old inner tube on the banks of the Pai river that Maya and I used to float through town. We had so much fun our theme for the visit was, "whoopity, whoopity" from a an old Simpson's episode. Pai is pretty and peaceful and popular with tourists, most of them Thais in for the weekend. Every evening the main street is transformed into a walking market, complete with drink carts and live music.

Every night we dined on street food whose common element was that it was either served on a sharp stick or was intended to be eaten with a sharp stick. This created some element of danger for Maya who came close to impaling her soft palate on more than one occasion but disaster was averted in part because she gravitated toward safer food such as corn on a cob (which was also served on a sharp stick). We also enjoyed cuttlefish and corn roasted over coals, dumplings, and rotis (banana and/or egg fried in a thin dough wrapper served with sweetened-condensed milk and sugar). For drinks we continue to enjoy, whenever possible, the wonderful fresh-fruit juice shakes (no sticks there). One of my favorite foods was a kind of salad crepe that was prepared on what I can best describe as a steaming drum head. There are also, of course, pad thais, noodle soups, chicken and pork sates, hot teas and, interestingly, waffles. Zak’s favorite are small doughy-custard things cooked in little cups set into a huge cast-iron skillet.

At night we would float Kum Loi, large paper lanterns that would rise into the heavens when the torch at the bottom filled the lantern with hot air. We stayed on the Pai River that runs along town and the yellow flames of the burning lanterns drifting in front of the brilliant white stars was quite spectacular.

Our lodging in Pai cost 350 baht (about $10) for a raised bamboo hut facing the river. There were no screens so we slept under a mosquito net. You get to our place by crossing a rickety bamboo foot bridge from town to our side of the river and then a smaller foot bridge from the main group of Baan Pai Riverside "cabanas" to our place. We paid an extra 100 bhat for the river view, which was well worth it. An added feature was an attached bathroom. Any concern about men peeing on the seat was mitigated by the fact that on must conveniently lean the toilet seat against the bamboo wall when not in use. Like most toilets in Thailand outside of the large hotels, flushing was accomplished by a pouring a bucket of water down the toilet. At least the toilet had a drain (that went who knows where), the shower and sink simply drained to the corner of the bathroom floor and under the bamboo wall. We quickly learned to step back when rinsing our toothbrushes so that the drain water didn't splash on our legs. We loved it and we loved Pai. We also had some great neighbors. One one side was Jesse and Michelle from Vancouver. Michelle would play guitar while we sat around the campfire. On the other side of them were a couple of dreadlocked French guys, Stefan and Toni. Stefan had actually been backpacking for over two weeks with an excellent bottle of French wine in his pack and we were all kind enough to help lighten his load. God love the French. Americans are too concerned about carrying pepto-bismol and hand sanitizer to have room for wine. We were also joined by Troy and Chung, another couple of Australian hammerheads. Zak bought a 500 pack of firecrackers at the Chinese village and Troy, of course, had his own; I’m not sure which of two more enjoyed setting them off.