Another amazing weekend has come and gone. This weekend I very much felt like a true backpacker. We started the weekend by taking a 14 hour night train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai. It was actually a lot better than I thought it would be. We were a group of seven so we stayed entertained for hours playing cards. I managed to meet a Canadian who was three bunks over from us who also joined us for the activities for quite some time. My only complaint with the train was that it was way too cold to sleep comfortably. But I would definitely travel by train again, just for the fact that you truly do meet some really cool people on there!
We arrived in Chiang Mai Friday morning and met up with my neighbours from Nonsi, who were also in the city for the weekend. Two of us spent the day visiting temples and walking around the Old City while the guys rented scooters and headed straight for Pai, a small town about four hour north of Chiang Mai. We took the bus and met them there later Friday night. Overall Friday was fun, but we were very tired from the train ride and then the bus. So Friday night I passed out as soon as we made it to our rooms. Speaking of rooms, our guesthouse was not the nicest place I've ever stayed. But it was right off the main walking street which becomes a food and shopping market at night. I actually loved Pai, the atmosphere there is so chill and relaxed. And we met some amazing people throughout the day who we would run into on the streets at night. We made really good friends with an English guy who now has plans to visit us when he makes it to Bangkok. I even met a girl from Ottawa at this tiny little strawberry farm on the outskirts of town. This is definitely my favourite thing about travelling, meeting people from all over the world and becoming instant friends.
Saturday was such a jam packed day. We headed out on scooters and first visited a Chinese village on a mountain that overlooked Pai. As we were climbing the mountain to reach some viewpoints we got stuck in a rainstorm and took cover under this little hut. We then sat in this restaurant atop the mountain and took in the view while we made more plans for the day. We next headed about 10km away to a canyon. We read that it is the supposed Thailand version of the Grand Canyon. While it wasn't near as big and exciting as the Grand Canyon, it was still very cool and my favourite thing of the day. We hiked up to the top and had again a wonderful view of the mountains in Pai. I just loved seeing all the greenery and breathing in clean, fresh air. The canyon was fairly large, but to see the best parts of it you had to do some tandem climbing, which of course we did! At one point we climbed up part of and realized we might not be able to get back down. Moving extremely slowly, we somehow managed to climb up and down some steep hills with not much traction. I've never used so much upper-body strength before, but it was so worth it. The adrenaline and the views made it all worth it.
Our next stop on our jam-packed adventure-sight-seeing day was a waterfall. We drove up some winding dirt roads and came across a small waterfall. Two of us jumped in to cool off for a few minutes and it was so refreshing. We were starting to get on a time crunch so we didn't have long to enjoy it. Getting back on the bikes and going back along the dirt road, we found our next destination: a land crack. Hiking up a hill on the mountain again, we were able to see two natural land cracks, one from 2008, and one from 2011. It wasn't as cool as we thought, but the guy who owns the property made up for the lack of excitement from the land. He provides all guests with fresh fruits and vegetables and juice, all for a donation. He was so nice to us and sent us home with a bag of fresh bananas, but not before he insisted we try his homemade wine, which was delicious. I actually wish he had bottles for sale.
Finally, to end our day, we drove to a large temple in the hills and climbed what felt like 30 flights of stairs to watch the sun set over the horizon. I'm sure you can imagine how beautiful it was. We finally made it back to our hostel to quickly clean up before hitting the walking streets and bar once again.
Sunday was a relatively chill day as we spent a better part of it travelling back to Chiang Mai. Once we all arrived, we did another night market until we got rained out and had to take cover in a bar. There, we found some of the backpackers that we met two days before in Pai, so we spent the evening drinking beer and playing pool with them. Monday was our final day, so we visited one last temple on the outskirts of town that overlooked Chiang Mai. We then took a river boat tour of the city where we learnt lots of the history of the city and were then treated with fresh fruits and the best mango sticky rice any of us have ever tasted. Our tour guide was so energetic and enthusiastic that he automatically put us all in a good mood and made the tour so much fun. If anyone ever goes to Chiang Mai, I would highly recommend taking the river tour with Scorpion Tail cruises.
After a long weekend away, and sleeping in less than ideal beds, it was definitely nice to return back to my home away from home in Bangkok. Until next time Chiang Mai!
~Ally
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