Thailand 1: Piece of Pai

Our flight between Tokyo and Bangkok we finally get seated next to each other…the problem was that we were in the middle of a row of four meaning we have to jump over the aisle seats to go to the bathroom and on a 6.5 hour flight this means 4 or 5 times.
Once boarded we were told that the flight was going to arrive in Bangkok 35 minutes early but then we sat on the tarmac for an hour squished in between our neighbors. Regardless, we did make it to Bangkok for the original time of 11:30pm. We cleared customs without incident and went to the baggage carousel to claim our bags. At that time an announcement came over the intercom saying there was a problem with our flights baggage and it would be an hour before the bags started coming out; however, one hour turned into two and we didn’t find ourselves in a cab headed to our hotel, the Grand Watergate until 1:30am.
Because we slept on the plane and in the baggage claim area we went for a walk upon arrival to our hotel. The first thing we noticed about being back in Bangkok was the smells and after being in Japan the dirtiness.
The next day we decided to treat ourselves to a glorious 2 hour massage which ran us 300 baht which amounts to $10 CAD approx. It was heaven.
The second thing we noticed was the price differences
- Massages
- Manicure pedicures ran us $10CAD
- Food and drinks; an average meal costs us $2-3 CAD and is delicious
- I (Lindsay) bought a super nice bikini for $7.50
- Cost of transportation and getting around the city and country

We chose to eat at a lot of street vendors and try Bangkok’s finest; this can be construed as scary but it really quite good and quite inexpensive. One sad thing we should mention is the amount of wild/stray animals roaming about; many are loved pets but many are fighting for food and hanging about….makes us miss our beloved pets back home

Before we begin our beach adventure, we decided to head North for a taste of Northern Thailand and a trip to Laos for the river rafting in the town of Viang Vienne. We purchased a $20CAD ticket for the sleeper train headed to Chiang Mai, an easy access route to the Laos border.
We were given seats and beds number 13 and 14; this is cool because my favorite number is 13 and used to be my Dad’s basketball number and Kathy’s favorite number is 14 and is her soccer number. On the train Kathy learned how to play Gin Rummy for the first time and a Canadian girl Melanie came to join us so she could eat at our table. Why you ask, because at 7:00pm Melanie went to the bathroom and returned to her seat to find it had been made into a bed and she had not yet had dinner. We asked the train hostess ( aka Train Nazi) for a bedtime extension and we were given until 8:30 pm before our table and chairs would be converted over. We tried to tell Train Nazi that only children under 10 go to bed before 9:00 pm; however, she did not care. I guess our lucky numbers didn’t help a delayed bed time. The Food and Beverage (F&B) workers on the train told us that Nazi is always in a bad mood…no kidding. One of the F & B sales girls befriended us and told us something shocking about their working conditions. They work 3 months on with 10 days off in between. They get 9 hours in between shifts for sleep and personal time and this is spent away from home and their sleeping quarters represent that of a park bench. They are only paid in commission of 10% of the food and beverage sold on the train and these prices are 50% higher than that sold outside. We had brought our own food and drink as had many others on the train. We bought two Spy wine coolers to do our part.
When we arrived in Chiang Mi it was pouring rain. We sat in a breakfast spot and went in search of the cheapest, fastest and best way to get going to Laos leaving that day. The breakfast spot had WIFI or at least an unsecured network we could log into. At that time we discovered that Laos was pouring also and would be for 7 days; this would not work as the town we were headed towards is all dirt roads and the highlight for going was the river raft tour. After further research we found a cheaper and easier route into Laos from Bangkok so we decided to stay in Chiang Mai and to visit Pai and we would possibly hit up Laos at a later date.
We found a nice hotel (Lanna House) in Chiang Mai for approx $22 CAD with a stay 3 nights get the fourth for free deal incl breakfast so we are paying $7.50 CAD per person a night. Despite the rain (which only lasted a day) we decided to tour the town on foot and find a few fun activities to do. Here is what we found and decided to do:
- a Thai cooking class
- Flight of the Gibbons as featured on Amazing Race…this is a New Zealand run event which is many ziplines and abseils through the Northern Jungle. It was here we met Ang and Holly, two Aussies on holiday and Kim the Canadian who may meet up with us later…oh yeah and 6 Israelis. The two guys were nice but the 4 chicks were kinda moody. One of the girls was wearing 4 inch wedge heels and a bar like outfit to do a jungle ziplining activity. I know you don’t believe us when we tell you this so we have the video to prove it
- On our walk we met 2 guys; one from Texas and one from Amsterdam who had just got back from 4 days in a monastery doing meditation with monks. This has now become an interest and will be pursued before we depart Thailand. It is not supposed to be fun but it helps with concentration and centering, two important factors for benefitting us in the upcoming school semester.

As those of you who are dim sum fans know, you get uncontrollable cravings for this Cantonese specialty so we found a place. Dim sum here is a buffet but by buffet, you order whatever you want off the menu and they make it fresh and bring it over, you can order more if the first round doesn’t fill you up or in our case 3 rounds and we only left due to time constrictions with our zip line excursion. The cost is approx $12 CAD /person.
At 7-11 we noticed that the liquor section of the fridge was covered and therefore no liquor would be sold for 2 days due to a Buddhist holiday. We only mention this because you would think this is why we go to bed at 10 pm every night but it’s not, we are tired regardless and therefore spend no time partying even though we plan on it every night, we have yet to do so. We claim to not be jet lagged but only blame the fact that we wake up at the crack of dawn every morning for our early bed times. Another craving kicked in for pizza and in the monsoon that came in for 4 minutes we went to the “best” pizza place down the street from our hotel. And it was the best; it was by far the best cardboard I have ever eaten. If you know anything about Lindsay you know my love for pizza and you know how bad it must have been for me to throw it out because it just wasn’t worth it. That’s right I threw out expensive pizza because it just wasn’t worth it, it didn’t matter because there was honestly no flavor. Kathy and I covered it with salt, Italian herbs, and hot sauce oil….nothing. We won’t stray from Thai food again
The sex trade is prominent even up North; it seems more so up here because the size is much smaller. For instance in the evening the local bars have young cute Thai girls working to draw in men. They are dressed for sale, literally. You will also notice a gross amount of old white men (60 +) with young Thai girls (not older than 20). If you want to get under Kathy’s skin this is the situation to do it with; she has been known to yell her displeasure to me on the street about it. Once The Aussies had mentioned they met a girl who was sold into the trade at 14 and was now 17 and they witnessed her turn down 3 East Indian men because they are often rough and wanted to go three at a time. This makes us very sad and damn proud to be Canadian. Say what you want about Westerners but we have it quite good. It should be mentioned there are individuals who are offering assistance to young girls to get out of this industry. Many young women take the help and are taken to remote places to stay hidden and to get an education; however, those that don’t take the help do not because they wish to remain close to siblings or friends trapped in the trade. There are many massage parlors catering to men on men, women, and lady boys. Although the names are funny (i.e; One 2 Come, New Climax) the context really isn’t but the rooms offer private showers. We did not patronize any such parlors for the record, settling only for a clean massage by women costing $4 CAD for an hour.

Our trip to Pai..
We took a mini bus to a very small town further north called Pai.. To get there from Chiang Mai is 130 km (4 hours); 40km is regular highway and 90 km is the world’s windiest road with 1000 “s” like turns. It is not for the weak stomach or the hungry. Pai is a quaint lovely town with only two traffic lights and you can walk anywhere although locals will insist you need a motor bike or taxi because no one walks anywhere in Thailand it seems. We decided to rent a motor bike to go outside of town to the waterfalls. Rachel suggested renting the motorbike because she said that there is little traffic so therefore safe. Rachel lied….Kathy drove without problem to the waterfall even though a small amount of rain came down.We sand Jo Dee Messina’s Heads Carolina, Tails California all the way up; we did this because 15 years ago we used to drive around in lindsay’s BMW listening to this song and claiming we would one day fulfill the words and flip a coin todecide which route to take and here we are, doing it. The way back it was Lindsay’s turn to drive ….big mistake. We had to go down a mud hill to get to the road and we were but 7 feet from the parking lot when a Mercedes was coming up the hill. I moved over to the shoulder to let the car pass when the bike tire augh on wet mud causing our bike to go over and us to go with it; thank God we were coasting and not on the gas. Needless to say Kathy got out without a scratch and Lindsay got a scrape on her ankle and elbow and a giant patch of scrapage taken out of her thigh, not to mention a large tumor bump on her shin. It is fair to say a piece of me will always remain with Pai. Advice from a local pharmacist has helped heal the injuries quite well within 2 days.
We have a train ticket from Chiang Mai to Bangkok for the 12th so we can meet Kathy’s dad there before going south to the ocean. We returned our $5 CAD motor bike (that includes insurance which was invaluable) ….best $1.50 we spent yet and headed to the local bus station. The bus pulls in and can only be described as a chicken bus. The seats looked like those old school bus seats from being a small child and were full so they wanted us to stand for four hours…yeah right, we got off and went to find the higher price option also more comfortable with guaranteed seating. On our way out of the bus station which actually looks like a residential bus stop in Calgary we me One (not sure about spelling) One informed us he had to go to Chiang Mai as well and would drive us there right away for the same price. So, we jumped into his ’72 chevy and coasted outta there. The car looked like an old muscle car, was dark green and spray painted with I love Pai in yellow (picture to come) This turned out to be a great thing to do as One really ggave us great insight into Thai culture and was informative about things you woyuld see along the way but never guess what it really was. For example, what looked like workers on the side of the road was really locals hunting for crickets. This iis apparently a delicacy they fry up with garlic, onions, chilies etc for food and is quite popular. This is our favorite fact to share. This ride was extra good for Lindsay and her wounds because she could take over the whole back seat and was much more comfortable than our ride out there with very poor cushioning.
We write this blog on another sleeper train to Bangkok and we fly south to Krabi and te island on Koh Phi Phi tomorrow.
Look forward to Thailand 2: Sun N Fun coming next week…ish.