My time in the hippy haven of Pai

Parisa, Leisa and I waved goodbye to the amazing Stella and jumped on the bus to Pai, Super excited to meet up with the rest of the lovely ladies we met in Bangkok/Chiang Mai. The bus ride from Chiang Mai is awful. I mean really really bumpy and the bus is old and rickity, the road is extremely steep, awfuly treacherous, and has 762 turns. The driver also spent most of his time looking at his phone and not the road which made me very nervous.

Having survived the bus journey unscathed we settled into our hostel ‘common grounds’ and headed out for lunch. Here we met up with Marieke and Lisanne. Pai is a tiny little village in the mountains, where the locals are friendly and most of them have dreads . The next day we decided to rent scooters to explore the many waterfalls, hot springs and the famous Pai Canyon. Let me stress that I have never rode a scooter before and I cant even drive! So I was super nervous as I handed my passport over to the rental company. I paid $100 baht for the day and $40 baht for insurance. Unfortunately as the instructor was ‘on his lunch’ one of the girls had to ‘teach’ me how to drive… I viciously veered into the mad traffic as I first took off. But after a few minutes I was used to the bike and was taking in my beautiful surroundings. My Transport for the day!

It was such a lovely experience being on the open road in the middle of the jungle. Hakuna Matata! We visited the hot springs, waterfall and watched the sunset at Pai Canyon. With no major fatalities, the day was a great success and surprisingly I stayed on my bike all day!