The Wonderful World of Pai

A very windy road leads through the mountains from Chiang Mai to Pai, and the minivan speeds rounds every one of the 762 bends. On arrival I trek out to Spicy Pai backpackers, it's just out of town and set in a rice field with a beautiful panoramic view of the mountains. The buildings themselves are constructed of bamboo, woven palm and leaves!wow it's gorgeous!
The days in Pai are slow and lazy; the hammocks at Spicy don't help! On my second afternoon I go with some guys I met at the hostel;
Liam, David and Liam to a waterfall. We ride on motorbikes through the Pai countryside to a pretty little fall with pools you can swim in but now it's in the shade of the mountain and looks freezing so I don't jump in! Pai is a small town set in a valley below rolling hills. Cute little villages perch on the hillside while their residents tend cows and crops. In the evening I wander through Pai's walking street where a nightly market full of wonderful things takes place. There's trinkets and souvenirs galore, retro indie images
of Pai splatter the stalls on badges, stickers, keyrings and allsorts. there's also food stalls with delightful treats.I get 2 delicious curries with rice; green chicken and a pumpkin and tofu! Yum! My third day in Pai calls for some more sightseeing and I hop on the back of Grant's scooter and we set off into the countryside. Our tour begins with a bridge built in world war two by forced laborers, we wander across it as a farmer is leading his cattle to the river below. From here we go to Pai 'canyon' as my '' would suggest it's not really a
canyon but there's a lovely view across the valley. After stopping at a funky place with hanging chairs the next stop on the tour is a Chinese village. I'm sure there are chinese people living here somewhere but all we see is a tourist attraction. There is an awesome manual ferris wheel thing. Some local boys push me round on it and I giggle like a little girl it's great! We head back to town for some lunch and get a tasty local noodle dish in curry sauce called khao soi. There's a three day Reggae festival in town while I'm here which I'd heard is pretty good. Turns out to be overrated; the first day is a big disappointment.
The third day isn't much better even though job 2 do is playing, there's a lack of atmosphere from the depleted crowd.