Pai
On the way to Pai, I read in my Lonely Planet that Pai was a state of mind. A chilled hippy town in the mountains, it somehow encourages you to do nothing all day, eat good food at night, and not feel at all guilty about it. Carla and I indeed spent plenty of time doing nothing, and enjoyed the experience, but Pai was also the culmination of my scooter riding in Southeast Asia. I’ve slowly been growing in confidence since my first trial run with Luke and Nanna in Koh Mook, and since first renting my own scooter in Koh Lanta. I’ve now ridden in the quieter parts of Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, and in Pai rented a bike with confidence. So much confidence that Carla and I decided to behave like locals and fit two of us, two big backpacks and two small backpacks on to one scooter, and successfully rode to our hostel.
In the following days, we took the scooter to the white buddha statue, a Chinese village nearby, the Yun Lai viewpoint, the touristy bamboo bridge, and Pai canyon. It feels so freeing to be able to quickly ride around between places with the wind in your hair - albeit avoiding the rain which is less nice on a bike. With a few kilometres under my belt on mountain roads, I decided I felt comfortable enough to take on a bigger ride - a classic backpacker route from Pai to Chiang Mai. Carla and I sent our bags separately and headed off around mountainous roads with many hairpin turns. The whole trip took us about 5 hours including a coffee break at a stop known for its banoffee pie interestingly enough, and despite some obstacles put in our way (some heavy rain and the slippery roads that can create, squishy mud from small landslides, big rocks lying in the road and some stressfully busy main roads as we entered Chiang Mai) the ride was very manageable, and loads of fun. The dry sections were naturally the most fun, where I could trust the tyres would stick and enjoy the stunning mountains and forests we were driving through.
Reaching the end felt like a real achievement, having only ridden a scooter for the first time a few months ago. I had assumed travelling around Southeast Asia might lead me to find new water-based hobbies like surfing and diving, but unexpectedly I’ve found a new one in riding scooters. I have no idea if it’s something I’ll do again, but my time riding through the stunning scenery in this continent has been a real highlight of my trip.