Back to Thailand; Mae Sot, Chiang Mai and Pai

We crossed the ‘friendship bridge’ into Thailand, feeling exhausted from travelling for two days straight and also I still felt feverish so kept popping the paracetamol. Apparently there was a bus straight from Mae Sot, the border town on the Thailand side, to Chiang Mai where we planned to go. Unfortunately we had no idea where the bus went from and what time it left- there was a few reports online of it leaving at 12 or 2pm, and it was 12.30 by the time we crossed the border so we had no idea if we had any chance. But my fever was getting worse and seeing as we didn’t know where we had to go, we accepted the fact we would have to spend a night in Mae Sot. We took a shared rickshaw from the border to the town, and were dropped off in a fairly desolate road in the middle of the town. Meanwhile, I had retrieved the Thai Baht which we had left over from before we entered Myanmar, of which we should have had about 120 pounds worth. However, I could only find about 20 of this, and although I was fairly sure where I had left it I wanted to check the rest of my bag in the other places I might have put it. We walked for about 15 minutes trying to find a guesthouse but there did not seem to be an abundance of them. Finally we found one, but were told it was full. To save us both trundling around with our heavy bags for too much longer, Jonno left me with the bags while he went in search for one that had room.

About another 20 minutes later and he returned, 2 more places were full but he found one more that said they had a room for us. We walked 5 minutes further and put our bags down, relieved. But when we got to the reception desk, it was shut and there was nobody there, we called down the corridors but nobody answered. Ten minutes later and still nobody had showed up which was strange because Jonno had told them he would be coming straight back to check in. So Jonno went off again in search of another guest house in case we needed to go elsewhere. In this time a member of staff from the hotel showed up so I checked in, and was given the option of the air conditioner or non AC room. When I asked to see the non AC and was shown a room with an air conditioner unit on the wall, the man told me that if I wanted to pay for the AC room he would give me the remote. I figured we could try without and demand the remote if we needed it. After a thorough search of my bag and still no sign of the missing Baht, our only guess is that it had been stolen while we were in Myanmar, as there were a few times it had been in one of my bags that I had left at the reception at hotels between check out and one of the buses. Anyway, there was not much we could do about it so had to accept this was money we had lost.

Jonno returned and as we were both very tired, we spent a few hours resting before venturing out for dinner. Jonno had been craving a Pad Thai for the past week so this was what we went in search for. However, no Pad Thai in sight and there wasn’t many options at all for restaurants. We found one that had noodle soup, and even though we were very bored with noodle soup we didn’t have the energy to hunt further.

After a much needed sleep and a few night time trips to the shared toilet which included jumping over cockroaches along the corridor, I was still feeling awful the next day and decided the best plan was to recover before moving on to Chiang Mai. So the whole day was spent in fitful sleep, and Jonno making trips around the town to bring me back fruit. We researched it and apparently there was a few places to visit if we hired a moped so we thought we could stay another day and see what is around before leaving.

Multi-purpose shrine and cat house

The following day, a little better but not feeling up to any day trips, we took a walk to try and find the bus station to book our bus ticket for the next day, and were sent on a wild goose chase to various bus parks and random roads. I felt pretty rubbish so Jonno carried on the search, to find the bus booking place about a minute away from where we had been turned around by a lady boy in a shop. I went to sit outside the guest house to get some fresh air, and ended up meeting a guy we spoke to in Mawlamyine in Myanmar, and a few other people on the way in and out of Myanmar. A few of the people trying to enter the country had asked me if we had any problem crossing, and I wasn’t too sure why until another set of people said that the road we had taken out of Myanmar had been closed because there was fighting. Apparently the government and the rebels had been in dispute over ownership of the road, and people had been killed in the fighting. Luckily we had managed to avoid any of the conflict, but it explained why a lot of the guesthouses were full as there were lots of people waiting until it was safe to cross the border.

The next day we took the bus to Chiang Mai, a fairly uneventful journey, and arrived there at about 4pm. We checked a map and noticed that the town had a square network of small roads in the centre so headed towards that. We found a nice guesthouse and treated ourselves to an air conditioned room. However we didn’t have much time to rest as we had been told there was a Sunday market happening (it was a Sunday) and we didn’t think we would be there another week so we had to take the opportunity. We ventured out into the ‘Sunday walking street’ and were met with market stalls on both sides of the street, selling clothes, food and souvenirs. After battling through crowds and making a few purchases, we found the Pad Thai that we were so craving and went back to the guesthouse for an early night.

Sunday market

The next day we spent exploring Chiang Mai- and the conclusion is that it is another town to cater for the needs of tourists- there was a McDonalds, a Starbucks, lots of western bars and travel agencies offering ‘authentic’ and ‘off the beaten track’ tours to ‘become an elephant mahout(trainer)’ or visit the ‘long neck’ tribe which I had heard some not great reviews about. Jonno did need to top up on his supply of contact lenses so we went to one of the Thai optician chain stores. He also wanted to check his prescription was the same so he asked them for an eye test too. He disappeared into the eye test room only to emerge a few minutes later with the huge metal glasses frame that they can slot various lenses into on his face, and they asked him to look at the road and see if his vision felt the same when looking out onto the road, a very accurate measure. He wasn’t quite sure, so instead we managed to bring up an eye chart on one of our phones, I held it and he stood a few metres behind to see if he could read it. There we were, in an opticians, having to do a makeshift eye test. Anyway, after doing a marvellous job at being opticians, we decided that we didn’t think his prescription had changed and ordered three months worth of contacts after some haggling, and were told that they should be ready in a few days.

The streets of Chiang Mai

By this point my fever had calmed down but I was still feeling weak and my skin felt prickly and itched like crazy, which was keeping me awake at night, so the following day we decided it was time for a visit to the doctors. But first, Jonno was also not feeling very well with his head problems and wanted to try a chiropractor to see if it was his neck that was causing it. We found an address of one, and followed the signs to a small road next to a hotel. We went into the door the sign was over, and entered some kind of workshop/jumble sale, with random dusty bits lying around everywhere. We asked tentatively for ‘chiropractor’ and one of the men behind the counter stood up and lead us upstairs. Apparently he was in fact the chiropractor, and the room he took us to was like an attic room with one bench in the middle. After he had cracked Jonno as much as he could crack but no mention of any major problem or further treatment, we were on our way and went to find the doctors. The first surgery we found had people queuing out of the door it was so crowded and we were told they could not see any more people, but there was another doctors down the road. So off we went to find this other place, and when we arrived there was a mere ten people waiting. We took a seat and waited for a while, until I was called up and gestured into a small room to sit on my own and wait for the doctor. He arrived a few minutes afterwards, did a few tests and told me I had dengue fever (for the second time possibly, I never got the first suspected case confirmed by a doctor) and the prickly feeling was due to having low platelets. He then stuck a large needle in me and gave me yet another concoction of drugs, charging me 40 pounds for this wonderful experience.

Since the Thai massage we had in Bangkok I had been considering the idea of doing a Thai massage course,, as it was something new and interesting I could learn and it is a bit like someone else doing yoga for you so it has many of those benefits too. I had heard that Chiang Mai was the best place for massage schools so went in hunt of some of the schools to look at the options. We searched around a little and after going through a few quiet alleyways we came across a place called ‘Wandee Massage School’. When we tentatively opened the door, a small cheerful Thai woman appeared and introduced herself as Wandee the teacher. As this was currently the low season for tourists she currently had no students, so if I wanted to learn I would get the bonus of one to one tuition. She recommended five days should be enough for me to learn the basics of Thai massage. Jonno was happy to have a few lazy days so I signed up to start 2 days later.

I think this dog has had too much protein shake

Jonno was still feeling pretty rubbish and we wanted to eliminate any serious causes, so we found a private doctors and asked them to do some general tests to check on his health. They poked him a bit and took some blood and aid they would check for various things and let us know if they discovered anything, at 100 pounds the initial tests were definitely not cheap but at least it might give us an idea of what may be causing his problems. As we had hired a scooter and had the rest of the day to kill, we took a drive up to a popular temple on the top of a large hill. Nothing spectacular about it, but it had some nice views on the way. We also found a sign to another waterfall, which again was a fairly standard waterfall for the area but it gave us a chance to have a walk around.

View of Chiang Mai

Another shiny pagoda

Someone has parent issues

On the way back to the guesthouse, we stopped at a night market and had a wander around there. We were getting hungry by this point and we spotted that in the middle of the market there were quite a few outside restaurants with sizzling domes in the middle of the tables, where people were cooking their own food. Intrigued, we investigated closer and it seemed easy enough- there was a buffet of raw meat and vegetables, you chose your food and once you have cooked it on the frying dome, its ready to eat. We could do that. So we were given a table, the waitress lit our dome and off we went to get our food to cook. We returned with a selection of items, placing them on the cooking area and waited for the magic to happen. However, we soon realised it wasn’t as easy as it looked. The meat which wen at the top had to be balanced carefully or it would slip down. And without oil or anything to stop it sticking it was creating a burnt layer over the dome. The dome also wasn’t very quick, and we got bored of waiting so were pretty sure food poisoning was imminent. And the bottom of the dome had a moat of water around it which we think was to boil vegetables (that’s what we did anyway) but this needed constant monitoring for topping up so it didn’t dry out and was also agonisingly slow. And then there was the eggs we had picked up from the buffet. How were we expected to cook the eggs? While I went for cracking the egg over the top of the dome which resulted in a burnt mess over the dome and most of it running down into the water, Jonno tried to hard boil his in about 2cm of water which after about ten minutes was only slightly better than raw. Anyway, the whole process was a struggle and we were definitely getting laughed at by the staff and other diners but it was an experience anyway.

The threat of food poisoning makes the meal more enjoyable. Notice the egg cooking technique.

The following day was the start of my massage course. Sure enough, I was the only student and was presented with a workbook and a pencil. Wandee instructed me to lie on the mattresssed area, and started to massage me. Great, this was very relaxing and not much work at all! However, it was my turn next. I had to try and do the same sequence on Wandee with some bad sketches and some of my scribbled notes to help me. When I would put my hands in the wrong place she would grab my hands and put them in the correct place, and when I got it right she would make an ‘uuugh’ noise in approval. Her catchphrase was ‘strong and smooth’, and after a few hours of trying to maintain ‘strong and smooth’ my thumbs were aching and I was mentally drained from concentrating so much. But it was great to learn something new and at the end of the day I went back to meet Jonno and show him the techniques I had learnt. The next day continued in the same fashion, I learnt more of the sequence and then practiced it again and again. At the end of the second day Wandee said she thought it might be good for me to have a day off to take it in, and we would resume again the day after.

The next day was Sunday again, so after a relaxing morning we took another trip to the Sunday night market. We had been noticing that many of the hotels and buses in the area had signs up demanding that ‘no durian’ fruit is to be brought into the premises. This confused and intrigued us; why would a fruit be banned in certain areas? In amongst the other market stalls was a place that sold durian so we let our curiosity get the better of us and bought a small amount. It was wrapped in plastic, and when we unwrapped it we realised why it was not allowed in many places. The smell was foul, like rotting raw onion, and the taste was pretty similar- it had a mushy texture and tasted of creamy raw onion. I have no idea why anyone would choose to eat it, and after suffering a couple of mouthfuls each we threw it away. However, the aftertaste would not go away so we had the added torture of being able to taste it for hours afterwards. Definitely won’t be eating durian again in a hurry!

I returned the next day for my last three days of the massage course, and was joined by one other girl from Japan which meant we could practice the massage techniques on each other while Wandee adjusted and corrected us, and to show us where to put the pressure would every so often interject with a marker pen to draw lines on us (most of the time I forgot I was covered in pen and leave the school with red lines all over me). What I didn’t realise before is that the whole Thai massage sequence takes a long time. Most of the time it is shortened as most people don’t get more than an hour of massage, but from beginning to end it takes somewhere between 3 to 4 hours. It is hard work to go on for this long and wasn’t easy on my poor thumbs! On the last day as I was going through the whole sequence, a girl came into the school asking if she could have a massage for one hour. Wandee started as if she was going to ask the girl to come back later, and then changed her mind and turned to me and asked if I was able to do it. Even though I wasn’t feeling at all confident, I took up the challenge and went with some of the bits I knew better, and even though the feedback from the teacher was I should have ended it slightly differently, I did really well overall and the customer said it was great too. She handed over some money to Wandee at the end, who passed the money over to me. My first paying customer! It was only 2 pounds but that was enough to buy myself a celebratory drink that evening!

Look how tall I am! Last day of the massage course

We left Chiang Mai the next day, and got a minibus to Pai, a more rural town about 3 hours out of Chiang Mai. We had heard a lot of people raving about this place and wanted to see why. We arrived at the bus stop in the middle of the small high street, and soon found a cosy little bungalow for a decent price. We soon discovered that Pai is a smaller, more chilled out Chiang Mai but basically offers the same things. An abundance of restaurants, a few bars, a small night market and lots of travel agencies to book activities like trekking and elephant riding, the majority of it being for tourists. But we figured we would give it a couple of days as we needed to work out our plan from there.

Scenery in Pai

An advert for a restaurant and cooking school

With Jonno still not feeling too good, we took the opportunity of a few days in a chilled out place to relax and recooperate. We found an outdoor public swimming pool which was nice for a few hours, and the balcony on our bungalow was the perfect size for my yoga practice. When Jonno felt better we even went on a few runs together. We rented a scooter for one day as one activity that was recommended for Pai was to explore the surrounding areas, so off we set. After taking a few wrong turns and circling the town about three times, we came across a big Buddha statue, a fairly disappointing waterfall, a bleak china town area and a viewpoint with free green tea (which was not really free- there was an entrance fee) where one tourist was harassing a cat and tried to keep him from walking away by holding the scruff of his neck so she could get a nice picture. We also tried to get to another waterfall which was down a dirt track and when we parked up and saw the sign for the waterfall pointing directly into the river, we realised this maybe was a waterfall which was not accessible in the rainy season so had to give up on that idea. 

Definitely waterfall with caution

Another waterfall

Cat being held captive against its will for a photo

After a few restorative days and feeling a bit more energised, we decided we were ready to leave Thailand and continue our journey onto Laos. There were packages advertised by the travel agencies with combined bus and boat travel to Luang Prabang, one of the main cities in Laos, so we figured we might as well book that and take a few days on a slow boat down the Mekong river.

A nice way to spend a few hours

Our friend who we promptly un-friended when we saw he was into cannibalism..the dirty bastard

We left Pai the following day, took a minibus back to Chiang Mai where we changed minibus to take us to Chiang Khong where we stayed overnight. The bus had made a dinner stop at a fancy hotel/restaurant so we figured the accommodation which was included in the price ticket might be a treat, but when we arrived at the guest house at 1am we were greeted with a grubby room with extremely solid beds. We didn’t have much time to enjoy the filth though, as we had to get a few hours sleep before our 7am wake up and 8am departure. From there we were taken to the Thai-Laos border, waited around for a while for us and the rest of the group to sort out our visas and we had arrived in Laos!