Thailand — The Mountains
This post is part of a series on my time in Thailand, focusing not so much on chronology but various themes of our 3 week in the Northern part of the country, including Chiang Mai, and the Northwest mountain areas. I’m currently in George Town, Malaysia, enjoying some cooler weather (think 90 degrees vs. 98–101. Its a big difference).
Our time in the Mountains was going along the Mae Hong Son loop, named after the town nestled deep on the border of Myanmar. We headed first to Pai, then to a tiny village called Soppong, and finally to Mae Hong Son itself. The road was quite windy heading there, so we opted to hop on a short flight back to Chiang Mai before heading onwards to Chiang Rai and into Laos.
Pai
From Chiang Mai, many people head to Pai, which is known as a Backpacker’s paradise, with all the carefree living of the Thai beaches, but replaced with a mountain backdrop instead. But getting to Pai was another story entirely. The road there is infamous — Route 1095’s 768 curves to Pai are so renowned that folks were selling T-shirts as a testament to the windy way there. We heard that vomiting on one of the public minivans was common so we thankfully opted for a Taxi who was able to stop for us when we needed to break from feeling carsick.
We got there and got dropped off at Famous Circus Hostel, which was a party hostel. We soon regretted it, as there was music blaring until 12am right outside of our room. We made the best of it, carrying on and playing trivia with everyone else, and made friends with a Austrian who was visiting the country. We soon moved to a much quieter accommodation, cheesily called Pairadise, but it was comfortable and had a pretty pond in the middle of things.
As far as things to do, Pai has quite the number, almost all only accessible by motorbike. This included Pai Canyon, Chedi Phra That Mae Yen, and the nearby Chinese Village. My favorite was the Chinese village, as it felt like a mini Disneyland, complete with a rideable windmill, replica Great Wall of China, and even an assault weapons shooting range (so maybe Disney-like in entertainment, but not in the activities themselves. It was a blast motorbiking through the mountainous terrain, and Pai is known for some of the best mountain views in Thailand, if not across the world.
Soppong
While most people head straight on to Mae Hong Son, we decided to split up another windy drive by visiting the small village of Soppong. Not many tourists visit there, so few that one woman at the Pai bus station looked at me incredulously when I said I wanted to go there, and then told me not to go because I was either crazy and/or stupid. Thankfully, it was worth a short visit, which was highlighted by the most loud cat I have ever met and visiting Lod cave.
We stayed at Soppong River Inn, which had a fun view of the river (read:creek) below, and soon met this cat that would yell and yell. He soon entered our room and started jumping and going everywhere, and even took a second to fix a picture frame that was crooked. He then found a decently sized spider in our room, killed it, and then ate it whole in front of us. We named him Spy, short for spider. He later ate a whole cricket that night. Though, he was super friendly and ended up taking a long nap while we relaxed for the afternoon, but was nowhere to be found while we looked for him the next morning.
Sightseeing wise, we saw the popular Lod Cave about 10km outside of town. Motorbiking was extra adventurous as our bike was mis-aligned and always wanted to drift left, but we made do. The cave was pretty cool, but nothing compared to our fantastic caving experiences in Phong Nha, Vietnam. A guide was required, though she spoke very little English, just enough to point out the various animals and shapes that the cave formations looked like. She also had a kerosene lantern, which greatly added to the experience. It also seemed like it was a popular guided day trip from Pai, as there were many westerners there that were not staying in Soppong.
Mae Hong Son
Only an hour and change from Soppong, we headed to Mae Hong Son, which is as isolated from society as can be. Miles from the Myanmar border, it only has one road in (from Pai) and one road out (heading South), and no border crossing exists. The town was pretty sizeable, about 7,000 people, much bigger than Pai and much less touristy. We were lucky enough to score a stay at Fern Resort, a lovely eco resort whose claim to fame is that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie stayed there multiple times while they were helping refugee/disadvantaged children.
Beyond that, it was quite a lovely place, as it was a government initiative to have an eco resort with as little carbon footprint as possible. It also had two pools, one of which was an infinity pool overlooking some of the nearby mountains. I really enjoyed the pool, playing some good music and enjoying the views and tranquility in the afternoons.
One of the perks of the resort is that it is attached to some neighboring nature trails. What was even better is that one of the resort dogs happily accompanied us the entire time on our morning hike, easily leading the way and making us look like greenthumbs for stumbling along the trail. We got to see waterfalls and other flora on our trip before heading back.
We also got to see Wat Phrathat Doi Kong Mu, another temple. (As you can see, there are many, many temples to visit in Thailand). A highlight was its hilltop location and vantage point across the town and mountainside surroundings. We then headed onto the very cute airport — it only has one flight a day (the other flight was cancelled in recent months) to Chiang Mai.
Our mountain adventure through Thailand had ended, but the mountains had just begun, as I’ll talk about soon when I talk about the next country we headed to: Laos.
