Pai

3rd March

Took the bus to Pai - it was a small minibus - they had to strap the luggage to the roof. We had allocated seat numbers - I was sat next to a young girl from Southampton. One girl was asking if she could sit up front because she got motion sickness, but the tour operator lady wouldn't let her.

I'd forgotten that it had warned, when I bought the ticket, that you may need travel sickness tablets as the road was extremely winding - 762 bends - none of which, did the driver slow down for.

I don't think our seat was properly fixed to the floor and kept moving every time we hit a bend. I moved to an empty seat half way through the journey, and thanks to the driver AKA 'Thailand's answer to Colin Mc Rae' we arrived an hour before the scheduled time.

It's a 'hippy vibe' kind of town - verging on the pretentious - green goddess Buddha bowls etc........

But it is set amongst the mountains and greenery, which I love, and its is quite a cute place, and a little cooler, since it is at a higher altitude.

I still don't quite have my appetite back, and my stomach is dodgy.......moan moan.

Some pictures around the outskirts

The bamboo bridge which is very wobbly

The streets

and a second hand book shop! - I got a new book to read - The Catcher in the Rye - although I think I might have read it before, a long time ago mind.

And here, I have my own room, as no hostels came up on booking.com, although there's loads here. I'm beginning to wonder about that site.

But it is only £12 a night and it's pure luxury to have my own room & bathrooom - even a veranda to sit on, although - like Chiang Mai - there are so many mosquitos!

I had an iced coffee and ate a cheese omelette which weirdly was the only thing I fancied - something sort of plain I suppose. 

Later - I wanted to see the Lunar eclipse - but I was feeling disappointing as I couldn't spot the moon as I went around the town just after dark.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_2026_lunar_eclipse

Of course it rose eclipsed - which was probably why I couldn't see it at first, but then I spotted it across the road behind some food stalls, up over the mountain - The 'Blood Moon'

I believe it is an important Buddhist event and coincides with the end of the Chinese New Year Period - although no-one was particularly noticing - other than me. I enjoyed watching it though and I pointed it out to the two Thai ladies at the place where I'm staying, and they came out to the street to see it too - it was a nice moment. I think they liked it - one of them was looking it up on the internet.

I guess this would be how it would look in a 'perfect world'

We certainly don't have that. But it was exciting, all the same.

I walked round to the temple, by which time the moon was full again and there were some other people taking photos.

It made me feel a lot happier that I didn't miss it.