I fell in the Pai hole and never wanted to leave! From Chiang Mai I headed to Pai for a few days. It was the perfect opportunity to chill out and just soak up life in Thailand. It’s true what they about when you come to Pai you’ll fall in love with it, I did just that. It’s such a small town and community that you always feel connected to everyone and it was a perfect opportunity to take some steps back from sightseeing and embrace the lifestyle here.

I’ve combined my Pai and Chiang Rai blogs because quite frankly, I didn’t really do a lot in Pai, I spent three days just chilling out and enjoying the atmosphere. Part of me feels like I should have gone out and seen some of the sights that people go to Pai for, like the Canyon, and the Big Buddha, but really I just wasn’t feeling it. I’ve seen and done a lot since I’ve been gone and everyone was telling me that Pai was the place to chill, and as soon as I arrived, I felt that, and was absolutely ready for that.

I chilled out, hung out with other travellers on Walking Street, sent a postcard home from the Postcard Café, drunk a bit, checked out some really cool bars, ate loads of incredible street food, listened to some live music, wandered to the Bamboo Bridge and soaked up some sunshine by the pool at the hostel. It felt so nice to hangout and not have an agenda each day of things I had to see and do. Pai didn’t feel like that, yes there was opportunity to see and do stuff but as said, I wasn’t really that phased. I really enjoyed completely slowing down and feeling like I’d refreshed a little bit, along with eating some really nourishing food, doing some yoga and taking part in some Muay Thai.

I also had my first encouter with Thai Medical Professionals in Pai, when one side of my body started appearing in patches of blistering rash over the course of three days. It wasn’t great, but they were super helpful and despite the langugage barrier, I managed to get some advice, and some cream to hopefully help what was happening! I’m still not sure what it is / was, but seems like it was an allergic reaction to something, somewhere, from what I understood, but it slowly started disappearing after a few days.

I headed back to Chiang Mai for a night to break up the journey going further north in the opposite direction. The journey to Pai has 762 turns and even for those that don’t suffer with travel sickness, it’s a killer! It was then another 4 hour journey to Chiang Rai and the connections aren’t guaranteed in Chiang Mai due to traffic etc so I figured as I really enjoyed Chiang Mai, I’d just spend the night here before heading to Chiang Rai the following morning. I didn’t end up doing anything extra for my one night in Chiang Mai, I took two travel sickness tablets before leaving Pai and by the time I arrived, I was super sleepy and ready for a nap. I ended up just grabbing some dinner quickly and then had a chilled evening.

The final stop on my northern Thai adventure was here! I’m not gonna lie, right now, I’m craving getting south to the beaches and sea. I haven’t been by the sea since I was on the islands in Cambodia, which feels so long ago now (it is well over a month ago), and it still felt a million miles away as I had another stop in Bangkok, and maybe another somewhere further south before I get to the islands, to break up the extremely long journey (Thailand is huge!). After a relatively simple journey (and much nicer than the one to / from Pai!) I headed to my hostel and made a bit of a plan of action for how I wanted to spend the next few days.

There was a few things I wanted to see and do whilst in Chiang Rai, some insane temples, night markets (of course, I feel like it’s a must in every location), and some other exploring of some different places both in and out of the main town. After getting here I headed to the night market (to get sticky mango of course, and one of the best I’ve had), and then to meet up with some pals I met in Siem Reap in Cambodia. Grabbed some dinner and had a few drinks and a catchup which was super nice. I’ve met lots of cool people but when you can reconnect with people you’ve got on really well with, it’s a lovely feeling.

My first full day here and it absolutely poured it down all day. That was not the plan. I was gutted as I was feeling ready to go but everything I wanted to do was outside, so it was pretty much a no go. I ended up doing some planning bits that I’d been putting off like booking accommodation for the next few days, booking transport (all really boring stuff) and then headed out in the late afternoon to the shopping centre nearby to grab some dinner, and have a wander round. I picked up a facemask and some other little bits so that I could have a bit of a pamper night when I got back, which didn’t end up happening! I met a cool girl from Australia and we were chatting for the evening and before I knew it, it was 11pm, so I just headed to bed.

Finally I got an exploring day and boy was it busy! An early start and out at 7:50am (wow) and I was visiting seven different things today, how I have no idea, but I was ready for it. Because I only had two full days in Chiang Rai and the first was wet and rainy, this was the best way to see all the highlights, and a little bit more! It was still a little bit rainy today but nowhere near as bad as yesterday, and it was meant to clear by mid-morning, and it did. So it was all good.

First up of the day was Wat Rong Khun, also known as the White Temple, and it was as stunning in real life as all the photos I’ve seen. It cost 100baht to get in to see it (around £2.50) and it was well worth it, the whole temple area was huge and there was so much to see. We also learnt a lot here too about how it was built, what some of the different parts of it meant and more. It was lovely to wander around as it all just looked so incredible. The architecture of the temple was insane and hearing about the history of it was just awesome, I’m so glad I got to visit here. Before heading to the next stop, we also made time to grab a coffee because mate I needed it. I had no time before leaving so as soon as I saw it, I was on it. It was such a good coffee too.

From here, we headed to Wat Rong Suea Ten, or more commonly known as the Blue Temple. This was also really cool, and full of so much colour (mainly blue, of course) but it felt really enchanting and almost like something out of a fairytale. We learnt that this is also a fairly new temple, only built in 2009. It is also a functioning temple within the local community so we could take photos inside, whereas most temples you cannot, and the Big Buddha inside was very grand, and it was another really cool experience.

Next stop was Baan Dam Museum; also known as the Black House. It’s a private art museum containing a mixture of traditional northern Thai buildings with unconventional and contemporary architecture, around 40 buildings in total, it’s also the world’s largest collection of animal remains made into furniture and art installations. It was pretty weird I’m not going to lie! Some of the art was insane, and you could scan QR codes on your phone which brought the paintings to life and made them almost 3D like which was really cool. It was also nice to be able walk between the different buildings and see some of the architecture. We went into this dome shaped building where in the middle we could hear ourselves speak, it was super strange, like heargin yourself as double.

A slightly cool but almost weird stop from here, which was Longneck Karen Village. I’m not sure how I felt about this. It was nice to be able to visit to explore and understand this tribe’s way of living, but part of me also felt like an observer on their life. We learnt a little about why they haev the brass coils on their neck and they told us about how it was because tigers used to attack their necks in the jungle so this was a way of preventing that, still not sure how I feel about it. Once the coils are on their necks they continue to add to it and they don’t take it off for their whole life. They had some souvenirs they wanted to sell us and it just felt a bit like they were relying on tourism to make ends meet, which I found quite sad.

We then stopped for some lunch which was yums. It was a Thai buffet filled with deliciousness, we’re talking green curry, pad thai, sweet and sour chicken, spring rolls, pumpkin, soup and more, with loads of fresh fruit for dessert. You cannot beat it, it tasted so good and was all freshly homecooked by some incredible people. It was nice to stop for a minute before carrying on our adventure in the afternoon!

First stop post lunch was Choui Fong Tea Plantation which was just stunning, the plantation had five-acres of land for growing tea and we got to try some lovely oolong tea before exploring the surroundings. I’m not a big tea fan I’m not going to lie, I think I said in one of my Japan blogs that it wasn’t my fave but after trying Matcha, I learned to try these things a bit more! The oolong tea was also really nice, super light and one of them was quite flowery and almost fruity too. We wandered around some of the plantation and took in the views, and was super tempted by some of the cake they had on offer too, but because we were still full from lunch we had to leave it.

Next stop, one which I was fairly excited about and knew I wanted to get to was The Golden Triangle; where the borders of Thailand, Laos & Myanmar meet. Super cool. There wasn’t really a lot there, in the sense of, you saw the triangle and you could see all three countries at the same time, there was some cool signs pointing out you were there, as well as a massive Buddha! It was a cool place to say ‘I’ve been there’ when you get home, I’m so big on just filling my life with experiences that not many people have done, and this is definitely one of them.

Final stop was the House of Opium which I actually didn’t know anything about before (teaches me for not doing research), but it was part of what we were doing. Anyway, it didn’t take me long to clock on what it was about. The Golden Triangle used to be a place where Opium grew which is used in hard drugs as well as some pharmaceuticals like morphine. We learned about the gangs, how it was made and weighed, distibuted, etc and it was actually really awesome to learn about, even though some of the models were far too life-like and realistic for my liking. From here we headed back to Chiang Rai city centre and I was ready to grab some dinner and head to bed! It’s travel day tomorrow.

Saturday quickly arrived and in the afternoon I was flying back to Bangkok to begin my journey to then South of Thailand, with a few days stop here too to do some sightseeing and all the things I planned on doing the first time I was here that I ended up doing none of.. more about that in my Bangkok blog next. Anyways, see ya there! Mads x