Trekking in Chiang Mai

So we left Bangkok in the dark on the overnight train and woke up at dawn to see a whole new world going by...lush, green, hilly, the occasional workers in rice paddies, etc.

...arriving in Chiang Mai around noon. More on Chiang Mai in another post, but a day later we embarked on a 3 day (guided) hike with a group of 9 into the hill country stopping overnight at hill tribe villages, sleeping in very basic bamboo huts. Don't worry, there seem to virtually no mosquitoes around. In fact in the whole 3 day hike all the wildlife that was seen was one small snake. I guess between the deforestation (which was halted in the 1950s....I guess the forests are just starting to grow back now) and the 750 thousand hill tribe villages hunting there is basically nothing left living in the forests around here.

Temperatures up here are a little cooler (22 night and 31 day) and a lot drier so in fact except for a couple of hours at the height of day are quite pleasant.

Our hiking group was mostly young backpackers and the huts we stayed at were well supplied with beer so things got rowdy at night and it was a bit disappointing in terms of seeing/learning about the life of the hill tribes.

Nevertheless I learned a lot, not realizing there were 3500 villages of 100-200 persons each up in these hills of northern thailand. Most seem accessible by motorbike and in some cases basic roads). The villages we saw had homes equipped with solar panels (govt supplied) and seemed to be reasonably self sufficient with rice farming and some cows, pigs, and chickens which seemed to be basically intermingled with the humans

The tribes are animistic/ancestor worship in practice but with buddhism creeping in and in some cases Christian influence. In the 1st village we were in a church was near completion in construction so it seems that there are some missionary groups active in the area though we were unable to learn any more about this aspect of life in the hills.

As always the kids are incredibly cute, shy, but in one case we managed to play with them. Sharing some potato chips and then later when one of the guides gave them a bag of treats they were quick to come over and put some of them into our hands.

On the 2nd night we were both awakened around 4am with itching all over our scalps and necks. A look with the flashlight revealed tiny little bugs by the hundreds crawling everywhere. Lori loved that. Well, we didn't sleep too much thereafter but I am happy to report that so far we seem to have suffered no lingering effects

On the last day we were brought to the usual 'tourist trappy' stuff like an elephant ride, tho I have to admit it was a bit interesting. Of course they sell you every 50m a bunch of bananas and the animals stop every 2nd step and reach their trunks up for you to deposit another banana. There is quite the blast of air coming out of those trunks. Beautiful animals they are. Apparently there are a large number of them that were trained for use in the logging industry and of course which by now have become redundant and because they live for so long, these animals are still around with many of their owners being unable to feed and care for them. Amazing to think they used to roam free and wild in this country!.

So it's back to Chiang Mai to discover what this town is all about.....