Pai in the Sky

Holy crap that was a shitty trip. We arrived in Pai after a bus load of puking jews. I guess Jill rote about that in her last post...

Pai is a total hippie commune in the middle of nowhere thailand. It is actually pretty great. A beautiful mountain village at the intersection of burma, thailand and china. But, it took us a bit to get settled. Let me start at the beginning...

Back in Chiang Mai, after our super awesome cooking class, we asked our "teacher" about recommendations for a place to stay in Pai. She said she would take us to a friend on the way back tour hotel who would help us out, who knows about Pai. "Sweet," we said. Of course, that was our first mistake.

She took us straight to yet another travel agency. Her travel agent friend (named Meow, "like a cat") suggested a place called Muang Pai. This was actually the second time we heard about this place, as our hotel lady had also suggested it. "Hmm," we thought. "Since it has been suggested twice maybe it's really good. That was our second mistake.

So, it was bound to happen. But, we got suckered. We got pressured into it since our friend the cook had taken us there. It didn't occur to us at the time that maybe this place gets suggested so much because it gives the biggest commissions, not because it is actually good.

A few minutes before the bus came to pick us up at our hotel, i asked the receptionist how we can get to Muang Pai from the bus station. "You need to rent a motorbike," she says. So, i guess it's not walking distance form town. But, at least I get to rent a motorbike, right?

When we finally arrive after our arduous journey, we rented a bike (which was pretty sweet) and took off to the hotel. It was about 10 kilometers from town! Not too bad, except it was in the middle of nowhere. Our room was probably one of the worst we have seen.

Jill has a paranoid habit of checking under the pillow every night for bugs. We laid down to take a nap and there acutaly was a big spider! I couldn't believe it.

So, what to do? We are stuck in this resort. The only other people staying here are a group of oversized german tourists (farangs in Thai). If we bike to town for dinner, I can't drink. And, I'm not super psyched about driving back in the dark, sober or not.

My crack MBA training kicked in: This hotel is a sunk cost. We puked our way over a mountain to get here and we're not going to let this mistake ruin our visit to a cool place.

We lo0oked online for some alternatives and called up the Blue Lagoon. They said they'd hold a room for us. So, we got on our bike and rescued our crappy day from turning into a crappy evening.