Mae Hong Son

I'm in Mae Hong Son after hundreds more corners from Pai!

The night time view from the guesthouse in Pai with the fog rolling in. It was 11 degrees that night.

In Pai I got up and started packing but I had to collect my freshly washed clothes, so I went down to ask about them but they had only washed them that morning and they were hanging out to dry. Sigh, if they weren't washed I could have just packed them. They knew I was checking out that day, so I just sat around for ages at waiting for clothes to dry. Luckily I only had a short distance to go that day.

A HDR I processed while waiting for clothes to dry...

The shirts in Mae Hong Son say 1864 corners, but I'm not sure if  that's the total loop, or just the section from Chiang Mai to Mae Hong Son via Pai. In Pai they had shirts that said 700 or so corners. It certainly felt like that many.

About 30km out of Pai is the Kiu Lom Viewpoint:

From Kiu Lom viewpoint, looking back towards Pai.

More Kiu Lom, looking towards Soppong 

More more more Kiu Lom.

Like everywhere in Thailand where people can potentially get out of their cars there are market stalls here. And there are also kids dressed up in their traditional clothes walking up to everyone with a camera trained to say "You want photo 10 baht your choice". I made the choice not to which confused them I think.

The locals use this road too...

There were a lot of local bikes up here too, even a few Ducatis, but I didn't see that many on the road. It's a rather quiet road really, but very decent quality. If only Laos had invested a little bit of money in the roads it would be a much more preferable destination than here.

At this point I remembered I had a GoPro, so I stuck it on my helmet for the rest of the trip to Mae Hong Son. I've got 1.5 hours of HD video, which I timelapsed down to 7 minutes, which is here:

It's not that clear because it's moving too quickly. I have another one that's about 20 minutes long that I'll upload when I have better internets. Or I could upload the full 10gb video at 720p 50fps quality!

Pangma Pha viewpoint

Finally I made it to Mae Hong Son.

The default Mae Hong Son photo.

The Panorama of the Lake.

I'm staying in Johnnie Guesthouse which backs onto the lake just on the left side of the Panorama. Cheap fan room for 300baht with my own bathroom, hard mattress and hard pillows. They've got cheaper dorm rooms or rooms with shared bathrooms for 150baht.

Temple with the night markets.

Strange tour sign.

Default photo in the morning.

Yesterday after drinking coffee and lots of tea I decided to go up Doi Kongmu to visit the temples there.

I found the stairs...

It's a long way up, at least it felt like a long way up. It doesn't look that tall from the lake. At the top got to Wat Phra That Doi Kong Mu

Serpenty stair thingy.

Chedi/Stupa at the top. These are painted white like how they are in Myanmar apparently.

Freaky lion thing with mini lion foot growth.

Once I got up here I felt like Tuesday too.

Mmmm polarised sky, white and gold. Also, very impressed with how well the camera is focusing with my lens.

Looking south from the top.

Looking north.

This was just above the other stupas, proof that I almost got to the top, the actual top seemed to be fenced off :(

Liony, with my reflection in the eye.

Colourfuly.

Looking back down over Mae Hong Son, it's not a big town.

Guarding the view.

The guesthouse is just on the top left of the lake.

Lonnnnnnng lion is long.

The view from the lake of the temple at the top of the hill.

Sensible HDR sunset over the hill.

The lake at night.

More temple and lake. Exceptional focus here, the live view makes that easy!

Today my task is to go and visit the long neck village in the hills nearby. 

Pai!

Well Pai is disappointing... Not one Pie anywhere that I could find!

I'm staying in the Darling View Guesthouse, which is on the hill just across the river from Pai. There's a little dirt track down to a bamboo bridge across the river so it's not far from anything. When I arrived here the owner showed me a room which was 500baht/night, which I thought was a bit expensive for what it was (3 double beds, next to each other along one wall, with a toilet and hot shower). So I told him I'd think about it, even though it's got a good view out over Pai. I went for a ride to look around some more, and then got some money out, and by then it was getting getting late and I gave up looking for somewhere else so I came back. But this time he had a room available for 300baht/night (That's more like it!) which had 3 double mattresses on the ground next to each other along one wall but with a shared bathroom. I took that one, not realising two things... a) it was near the fire which they play loud music at until 1am, and 2) it was right above where people eat breakfast in the morning. So I didn't get too much sleep. I think tonight most of the noisy people have checked out though, but we'll see how this works tomorrow...

So here are more pics from today around Pai!

Another river picture from the bamboo bridge, on my way to get breakfast.

A temple on the main walking street. I don't know the english name of it.

Everyone ignoring the helmet law.

Shiny.

Colourful statues along the fence.

A chedi (I think)

The view from the guesthouse in daylight.

It's like the Thai authorities have a time machine and can predict what's going to happen in the future! I sat in the bar near the corner for a bit and yes. there is most likely an accident a head, probably from whiteys on bikes.

More river, from the non-bamboo bridge, at sunset.

Where I ate my Pad see ew in the markets, 35 baht! Bargain! But then I went and had some spring rolls (20b), a sausage (20b), and a ham and cheese potato thing too (40b), all for $4.

These things need to be in any future cupboard I own. They are, in a clockwise direction: ground peanuts, vinegar and bigchilli(tm), sugar, fish sauce and littlechilli(tm), dried chilli. There's a careful balance of the chillis that I'm perfecting, so far it's about 1 spoon of littlechilli(tm) to 3 spoon of vinegarchilli(tm). In the south they throw fried garlic into the littlechilli(tm) too.

Reflections of the light on the river.

So tomorrow it's off to Mae Hong Son. No Idea what's there but according to the shirts they sell here it's another 400 or so corners...

Chiang Mai to Pai!

Yesterday I traveled from Chiang Mai to Pai along the 1095, or part of the famous Mae Hong Son loop. I'll do the rest of the loop over this week and then head back to Chiang Mai to get a new chain and sprockets. And then Cambodia.

So after buying this new camera, I've been experimenting with taking photos, but I don't have too many keepers to show for it. I've loaded on the Magic Lantern firmware which adds a whole bunch of other functions to the camera and I've spend a lot of time playing with that too. I'm really liking the live view for manual focusing.

Here are some examples:

Tha Pla gate. Over the moat on the eastern side. There are a lot of hotels in this area.

The Moat.

Tuk Tuk. That guy in the middle of the photo spotted me and would call out "Tuk tuk?" as I went past.

Playing with night time photos.

ISO6400! I didn't have that before, it is quite noisy though.

Where I had lunch the other day.

A lamp... (see, told you I was playing with photos)

Red Curry Fried Rice

The tan line that has developed on my arm because there is a gap between my jacket and gloves.  I tried putting sunscreen on it back in Australia but the jacket just rubs it off.

Then it was time to stop messing about and head to Pai.

After a somewhat suggestive breakfast from Riders Corner in Chiang Mai.

A look out along the 1095.

I took a look at the Pong Duet Hot springs along the way. There was a 200baht entry fee for Foreigners, I think that's more than other national parks in the south.

The Geyser

And now, because the new camera does video you can enjoy the badly edited shakycam of the geyser!

A little stream running though the park

Then I arrived in Pai. It looks like it's trying to be a more upscale Vang Vieng... It even has tubing down the river (not sure if there are bars along it).

Sun Disappearing.

Down the road from the guesthouse I'm staying in. 

Lots of guesthouses in this area.

Coconut curry and brown rice. And beer.

The night markets along one of the main roads.

More markets.

Night time view from the guest house balcony over Pai.