Pai

Hello! We are now staying in what the Lonely Planet refers to as "the sleepy town of Pai." It's great. Sort of a laid-back hippie feel and the town is surrounded by beautiful countryside that is easy to see by "push-bike". Even though Chaing Mai had a much more laid-back feel from Bangkok, Pai really tops it. We have found that the more effort you make to get away from the big cities, the better it is because you get more of a feel of Thailand. It took 4 hours to get here on a very windy road (sort of like heading to Fort Bragg) so that maybe why it's more deserted than other places we've visited. We are staying in a bungalo guesthouse called "Edible Jazz" (appropriate) where they have live music every night and then play jazz CDs the rest of the time. Love it! The entire city is only a few blocks in either direction, but is packed with little charmingly decorated Thai restaurants, boutiques and bars. Yesterday Sara, Kristine -a dutch girl we met during out trek who decided to come to Pai with us, and I rented bikes and spent a few hours riding around the countryside, which was BEAUTIFUL. There were lots of little houses spread along the outskirts of town and we passed many adorable little old Thai ladies sontering along the road who would slowly nod and smile at us,"soadikah" (which means "hello" - it's one of two words we've been able to learn, that and "thank you" - Thai is hard!) We stopped on the way back at a little outdoor restaurant for some of the best Pad Thai we've had yet and then we got oil massages that were amazing! What's not to love about Thailand - really?? Last night we shopped around a bit and listened to live music at our guesthouse. Today we're just taking it easy and tomorrow we head to Laos. We are on the search for a lonely planet guide to Laos cause we don't actually know too much about it except that it's been recommended to us on numerous occasions. Oh well, it's an adventure!