Day 5 - Locating the off-switch

13:45
Getting a touch bored of this now. I’m wide awake just after 05:00, and zero luck trying to get back to sleep. The upside, if there is one, is that I’ve woken later with jet-lag than the previous few nights, so am progressing. I completely forgot to take a Zopiclone last night, so will do my damnedest to remember tonight.

I get up around 07:00, make a coffee, and head for my hammock. I’m enjoying the gentle swing while I read my book, when I realise I’m being set upon by a million mossies. The riverside location of Pai Loess is beautiful and peaceful, but it does come with drawbacks…

I’ve not eaten since our cookery class yesterday afternoon, and by 09:00, am properly peckish. I ping Felix to see if he’s up and about, and give him a generous 10 minutes to reply, before heading to grab something to eat. While I’m eating, I’m in touch with a car rental place just outside Pai. I figure this might be the most convenient and cheapest way for us to get around today. The company will happily drop the car over to us, but it needs to be before midday. As 11:00 approaches, I’ve still not seen nor heard from Felix, so tell the car rental dude that we’ll pass. Finally, he emerges. I’d begun to wonder whether he’d headed back out last night in search of rave based fun, and thus had a late one. Nah. It transpires he’s just had a REALLY good sleep. This irks me, given the paucity of my own. I’m heading back to bed to try and catch up a bit, so we agree to head out around 14:00.

22:30
We hire a driver to take us to the hot springs, a short drive North of Pai. It’s a Song-Thaew. For those that don’t remember / haven’t read my April Thailand blog, this is a pick-up truck, with a metal structure in the flatbed to accommodate passengers. There are no seatbelts. The seats are a pretty basic bench. It’s highly advised to hang on tight - particularly up in the mountains, where there are countless twisty turns. Felix and I are engrossed in conversation, so much so that we kind of miss that we’ve been driven into the middle of a rainforest. We’re surrounded by thick forest, huge green bushes, and can hear the sound of running water not far from where our driver has parked.

The springs themselves are a fab way to locate the off-switch. I’ve seen pictures of the springs completely rammed during the peak season, but there are perhaps 10 people in the pools when we arrive. There are several hot springs in the area surrounding Pai, but this one (Sai Ngam) is said to possess the clearest water, the prettiest surrounding, and the least sulphuric smell. It’s also at a consistent temperature - a pleasantly warm 40C. Some of the others are as hot as 85C, and visitors have the option of boiling an egg in the steaming pools. Neither of us has brought appropriate water shoes, so dance the dance of ‘ooh-aah’ as we walk to the pool across a rocky surface. Sliding into the water, it’s a blissful sensation. I don’t know that these particular springs are meant to have any healing properties, but I’ll pretend that they do. We spend time chatting, watching dragonflies, taking in the peaceful environs. There’s a group of western travellers - I suspected Spanish, but Felix thinks Italian - who briefly crank up a bluetooth speaker. Thankfully, they’re in the process of leaving, so it only interrupts our peace for a brief moment. We stay in the pool until pruned, exit to more of the ‘ooh-aah’ dance, dry and dress. I’m mindful to spend a little more time watching the world go by on the drive back to Pai, and am glad I did so. It’s a painfully pretty part of the world. We’re in a valley surrounded by peaks which are shrouded in cloud, and through which crepuscular sun rays are breaking…

Back in Pai, Felix is feeling ready for a nap, and I’m looking forward to chilling for a couple of hours with my book. We head out around 18:30, only to find the restaurant we’re aiming for is unexpectedly closed today. We head a little further down the road to the Gorilla Café. I have my first Pad Kra Pao - a stir-fry of minced pork, Thai basil and red chilli, simply served with steamed rice and a fried egg. It’s awesome. Hot and sour, with (I think?) some sweet soy sauce to temper the heat and bite. Felix opts for some tempura chicken and some spring rolls. I think the spring rolls he made freshly yesterday were a little better. Our dinner bill is comfortably under a tenner.

Felix has heard about a fire show happening tonight at a bar a little walk out of Pai city centre. We head in that direction after we’ve eaten, walking along a large-ish road, then a smaller road, then an earthen track between agricultural fields. I can feel the mossies landing on me while we walk, despite bathing myself in bug spray before we left. Arriving at Paradise Bar, we’re both immediately struck by how stereotypical it is of backpacker tropes. They sell weed and mushrooms at the bar, there’s a guy with an acoustic guitar running an open mic session when we arrive, there are man-buns everywhere… Felix suggests this is where backpackers come to get trained, and this very much tickles me. We can see some of the ‘Circus’ performers warming up before the live show. For the last couple of songs for the open mic, a guy accompanies with some beat-boxing. It is, let’s be clear, not good. He then starts up a little solo beat-box session, the highlight of which is stopping for a second in the middle of his ‘song,’ and exclaiming, “I’m losing my breath!”

We watch the first few performers of the fire show, and honestly - they’re a lot better than I’d perhaps assumed they might be. There’s definitely a grace of movement associated with the art form. With the right musical backing, it’s actually pretty bewitching. I’m pretty jaded though, so hit the eject button a little after 21:00. We walk back to town - around 15 minutes, and I leave Felix in the centre of town while I head back to Pai Loess. He’s meeting an old friend of his, who is incredibly randomly also in Pai at the moment. He (Ben) has been travelling for a while, and it’s pure kismet that their paths are crossing here. Back at my bungalow, I crack a beer, journal for a while, read for a bit.

DON’T FORGET YOUR ZOPICLONE.Weiterlesen