Post Christmas & New Year

I think our last posting talked about how we spent Christmas Day with Nancy Peters in the mountains of Phu Kha. From these mountains we drove to another range and a popular Thai tourist attraction called Pu Chi Fah (1700 meters). This formation is on the border between Thailand and Laos. It is a place where people go to see the "sea of clouds". You climb to the mountain before sunrise with hundreds of others and watch as the sun comes up revealing the sea of clouds below you and showing peaks of mountains showing through the clouds. Of course, it is spectacular and lots of fun to be there with so many Thais and Chinese tourists who are taking pictures like crazy. There are also painters doing their thing.

The overnight accommodations prior to the early rising were humourous. We passed on a place that had bungalows that were quite close to the road and a little higher than we expected to pay. I didn't go in the next place we stopped but David and Courtney came away a bit horrified because there was going to be just one big bed for all five of us! We went on to the next place only to discover the same situation. It was getting dark and it didn't seem that we were going to be able to find anything but this particular kind of room. So we bit the bullet and signed in for 4 people in one bed (10' by 6') - Nancy, Courtney, Elaine and David! The driver decided to get his own room. What a riot. One big bed filling up almost all the space in the room. Very dark with one faint flourescent bulb and one red bare bulb. You sleep in a row with a blanket for each person - the blankets were all pink and cutsie - teddy bears and clouds. We just laugh and slept well except for all the times someone knocked on our door to wake us up in the wee hours thinking we were someone else. We got up at 5:30am hours to quickly get dressed to drive to the location and hike a bit to get to the top. But it was all worth it.

From there we spent 3 nights in a small town (pop 9,000) called Chiang Chong. Nancy had to go back to Chiang Mai to check on the Trent students - as it turned out they were all fine although they actually witnessed the tsunami in Krabi.

Chiang Chong is on the Mekong River and Laos is on the other side of the river. We had a room with a balcony just outside the door of our room and it overlooked the river - wonderful choice by Nancy. We spent three days there watching river life and getting some extra rest. We ate most meals in small restaurants which were also right on the river. At night we could hear the disco music in the border town on the Laos side - that's how close it was.

From there we took a local bus to Chaing Rai (pop 40,000) where we are still staying. We were here for New Years Eve. There was a wonderful parade yesterday. It was some kind of Buddhist festival. Lots of buddhas were paraded down the street, plus many groups in various traditional dress and playing traditional music and dance. Hope we got some good pictures. We hung out at the night market listening to more music and watching more dance. Headed back to our guest house and at midnight there were lots of fireworks although the Thai government has foregone official celebrations of New Years this year due to the tsumani. We also saw many floating lanterns set off into the sky at midnight. They were like yellow stars floating in the sky.

We have just been to the Hilltribe Museum here in Chiang Rai. It's very interesting to learn a little more about the many ethnic groups here in the north of Thailand. Many are nomads who travelled down from China. The Chinese influence is quite strong here in Chiang Rai.

Haven't made any definite plans for what's next but we'll keep you posted.