HILLTRIBE TOUR
A big blog this one - covering our 5 day Hilltribe tour in Northern Thailand.
This part of our trip is something special that we planned as we wanted to see a different aspect of Thailand away from the tourist areas and open the kids’ eyes to how other cultures live day to day. The hilltribes who live in the mountains in Thailand are very poor with very little in the way of wealth. They mainly still live a traditional life with very little western influences. The duration of the tour was 5 days, 4 nights and also included staying in different small towns the other 3 nights.
DAY 1
We were met by Pat our guide and Winai, our driver at our hotel in Chiang Mai at 9am. We knew today was going to be a lot of driving because we were headed for Mae Sariang which is about 4 hours drive away up into the mountains.
We drove for about an hour and visited Wachilatarn Waterfall. The waterfall was absolutely amazing, the power and amount of the water was astounding and even though we have seen Niagara, this was still a sight to see. The kids couldn’t believe it, there was a wind through the sheer force of the water and we were wet through just by standing watching it because of the spray.
We were then driven to the top of the mountain, the highest in Thailand and the gateway to the Himalayas. It was absolutely pouring down though. We had left our rain macs in the case at the airport which we stored in a locker because we thought that they were too thick for this heat and we would buy ponchos.
Even though it’s the rainy season (or lainy season as Pat used to refer to it!), Pat said that this type of rain is unusual! So even though we were at the top of this mountain with supposed fantastic scenery we could have been anywhere, Richard likened it to when he was training for the 3 Peaks and got split up from the others at the top of a mountain in the Lakes – all you could see was thick mist!
As we progressed further into the mountains, the houses became more like little shacks and there were random water buffalo and goats just buy the side of the road! We stopped off at a shop to buy Longen fruits for the children in the school we will be meeting tomorrow.
We arrived at the hotel at 6pm, we were expecting a not so clean small guesthouse type hotel and had pre-warned the kids that there wouldn’t be internet in the mountains and that there would be no luxury and maybe not even western toilets! We were pleasantly surprised when we drew up at this lovely small hotel which was very clean and welcoming and had internet!
Pat and Winai came to collect us to take us to dinner at Pat’s favourite restaurant – Sawadee, which mean Hi/hello in Thai. Again we were pleasantly surprised it was so lovely, really chilled playing music we recognized in the background and aswell as tables there was a raised, chilled out area with cushions and beanbags and people were on the internet!! So it was great for us as the kids could go on ipods touch’s and computers and we could talk. The food was amazing also.
DAY 2
We were picked up at the hotel at 9am after a funny type of breakfast , we didn’t eat much! We went first to buy thicker ponchos as it was pouring down again(yesterday our thin rain (lain) ponchos let the rain right through! We then went to the market to buy some food for tonight’s meal.
Pat then took us to a coffee place which had a great view and a playground for another hilltribe community.
The rain had stopped so the children were able to have a play on this unusual playground.
Next stop - Emily had really wanted to be able to work in a paddy field, but Pat was concerned that this may not happen because of the floods everywhere.
As we were driving through the foothills of the mountains, we saw some people in the fields taking out the rice plants. They were some way off and we had to walk on the very narrow raised areas to get to them. Because of the rain, these walkways were really slippy (or another one of Pat’s words ‘slippely which schoolchildishly made me and Rich always laugh!) and made of clay like mud. In the end, after battling with the mud we found it was easier to just take off our shoes.
We just thought lets go for it! The Thai workers were taking out the rice plants in order to re-plant them in areas of softer soil. The children helped them and when Daisy got bored she made mud faces in the mud with Winai!
The Thai workers invited us to have lunch with them. This consisted of rice and Thai veg, etc which they had brought a a picnic but they also rice they cooked on a little fire. We ate in little stilted huts made of bamboo. Every so often you would see these little huts in the middle of the paddy fields. Although there was a language barrier, these people were very friendly and welcoming and we felt like we had just enjoyed another fantastic (and cultural) experience.
Then it was time to start our journey into the mountains. First stop was a school. This consisted of a series of buildings and ranged from kindergarten to about 16 years old. We noticed that the kids wore scouts uniforms which were worn at school. Most of the children live too far away to go home at nights (about 10k), so with no transport available they stay all week and go home when their parents collect them on foot on a Friday.
We had taken lollypops for them all. They were so funny, they just giggled and were really shy. Me and the children gave the lollys out and each child bowed their head and put their hands together to say thankyou, a common sight in Thailand. We went to all the classrooms and the kindergarten one was just so cute. They all stood up and sung us a little song in Thai complete with actions.One of the older girls asked me what Oliver’s name was, much to his embarrassment.
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Next stop, a coffee/cotton weaving co-operative which has been set up by the government. Unfortunately the coffee machine wasn’t working so we weren’t able to sample it!
Pat showed us the coffee plants and different stages of the coffee beans. This co-operative produce coffee for Starbucks!
There was a little old man who was there and he has his picture in a magazine featuring Starbucks coffee which he was proud to show us and had his picture on Starbucks calendar last year!
The Homestay
It was then time for what we had all been waiting for – to go to the family’s house that we would be staying with. We felt a bit apprehensive but also excited and privileged to be doing something so special.
When we drew up outside the house, some of the family came out to welcome us. There was Oom, a girl aged 14, Ann, a girl aged 10, Dom, a boy aged 7 and email, a girl aged 2! They also have another girl, Janjira who is 17 and currently studying in the high school. Janjira really wants to be a doctor but to be able to work as a doctor to these hilltribes if and when she qualifies. Because the school is so far away, she cant come home at night until the weekends and the family have to try to support her to stay in a house in the village near to the school. What a lovely girl she was. Her father went to collect her (an hour away) on his moped so she could be here for our homestay. She spoke very good English and was such a lovely, switched on girl.
Everytime we got on a Quantas plane, they gave the kids a stationery set, so we saved them all up so we could give them to these children. They were delighted with them, especially Dom, who was up early next morning to play with his! We gave Janjira some money towards her education to which she was extremely grateful!
We felt really sorry for them though, because of the stormy weather, the power line had fallen down so there was no electricity. We had to light candles to cook the evening meal over an open fire in the middle of the room (no chimney!). We helped to prepare the meal, Daisy smashing up garlic in a pestle and mortar, Richard making a type of mashed potatoes, the girls and I peeling pumpkin leaves!
The food was set out on the floor in one of the rooms, there are no chairs, you just sit on mats on the floor. The food was absolutely delicious! After dinner, the children played some games, Daisy had a ball playing with them. We sat in the kitchen area and chatted with Pat who translated for us to the parents. Janjira spoke to us in English. At school she gets access to internet and Im now friends on Facebook with her!
When we went back into the other room where we had eaten our food, they had set some little ‘bedrooms’ up for us like the inner part of tents which were mosquito nets. So lovely and we didn’t expect anything at all. The family sleep on the floor on blankets and don’t have beds and we had the same. We slept ok ish, I was in such a deep sleep until Daisy had a bad dream then had difficulty getting back to sleep. We awoke to very noisy pigs and cockerels
The family has a pig which has a baby, they use them eventually for meat. We had been invited to Winais parents for breakfast and were a bit nervous about what would be on offer to eat! It was rice…yet again but with bits of pork in and egg. Daisy wouldn’t eat hers, Oliver did really well, despite not liking it, Emily left hers too and Richard and I ate what we could politely.
We then walked back to the homestay, through random pigs and chickens in the ‘road’ a lady with a pipe and a baby strapped to her back stood near the house, this is just everyday life for these people! We said our goodbyes to this lovely family and it felt a bit sad really.
DAY 3 – MAE HONG SON
After breakfast we went to visit the local silversmith where the girls and I made our own silver rings.
We had supposed to be going the night before but couldn’t go because of the electricity being off in the whole of the village!
Silver rings sorted, we left La up village and went to visit a blacksmith. He must have been so hot, he had a fire by the side of him and was pumping bellows by his foot. He was dripping in sweat but making a fantastic job of making a rather large knife which are used for work on the farms mainly. This farm grew mangoes and sweetcorn and another type of corn called sticky corn. We tried them freshly cut from the plants.
Lunch next and we went to a place at the foot of the mountains and tried a fish cooked in the traditional thai way. Just barbequed with the skin on, not gutted or filleted and covered in salt, the skin is quite tough but when you dig in the flesh inside is succulent and tastes lovely! It was quite a long drive again today but we would every now and then stop off at certain viewing points – when they weren’t covered in cloud that is!
We stopped off at a little shack in the middle of nowhere which sold fabulous coffee, it was a really chilled out place with a lovely view over the mountains.
It was unbelievable how many curves there were where the road had been cut out through the mountains, so we were all feeling a bit sickly by the time we reached Mae Hong Son.
We later learned how many curves there actually were and we had only been through part of them! But more tomorrow and on the way back to Chiang Mae too!
DAY 4
After breakfast we visited the Karen Longneck village by a boat. It took about 15 minutes on a traditional Thai longtail boat to reach the village.
The women in the village traditionally wear brass rings around their necks in a kind of coil. These rings are really heavy and generally weigh up to 5kg. We were able to pick one up which weighed 2kg and it was really heavy. They also wear rings around their knees and elbows and a traditional dress and head-dress. Our guide Pat told us that the reason that these rings are worn are to protect against evil spirits. The traditional faith of these peoples is animism where they believe that non-material things are spirits ie thunder. There appears to be a lot of controversy as to the real meaning behind them wearing them and some websites point towards it being to protect the women from the bite of a tiger whilst the men are out hunting.
Pat seemed very annoyed with these ‘false’ claims and another website points towards them wearing these to beautify them to attract a good husband.
Although they are called longnecks, their neck is not actually elongated by the rings but it’s actually an illusion with the rings pressing down onto the collarbone making it seems as though the neck is really long. Whatever the reason, they are mighty heavy and hot – but hey, great for the posture!!
These peoples traditionally come from Burma and are an ethnic minority of Thailand fleeing the war in Burma as it’s very near to the border with Thailand. What is quite sad is that this tribe traditionally hunt and are rice growers in the jungles but being ‘refugees’ their only means of income is to let tourists come into these villages to ‘look’ at them and once you arrive you are greeted by them each having little stalls where they sell souvenirs. There is also a donation box.
First impressions for us felt as though this was a little bit staged but when you dig a bit deeper, it appears that someone ‘controls’ these people in order to make their own profits and there are other ‘villages’ which have been set up where villagers have been ‘kidnapped’ and made to live in another village to make money selling souvenirs and having a donation box. It appears that these tribes receive very little of what income is generated but receive an allowance of rice and small amount of money. They have little in the way of options because to go back to Burma would possibly result in death from this war torn country, but by living here they effectively do not exist in the Government’s eyes because they are not officially refugees. To make this happen, they would be put into UN refugee camps and the ‘moneymakers’ would not benefit anymore. Whatever the real reasons are, I think it seems very sad that this tribe cannot live their normal, traditional lives but have to find a way to survive for themselves and their future and that their culture has already been partially dessimated already by having to lower themselves to open up their village to be a tourist sight!
Another part of the Karen tribe adorn their ears with large earrings, they are called ‘Big Ears’ but not as in Noddy!
Buffalo riding - Next stop in the busy schedule was buffalo riding! Surprisingly the kids really loved it. The buffalo are on a farm where they help harvest sesame seeds. It was still raining and I didn’t fancy it after already changing my clothes once but Richard had a go!
It poured down again on our journey back on the boat so we had to get changed again because our clothes were saturated. After lunch we went to the ‘Fish Cave’ on the way to Pai where we were staying for the night. This was set in a National Park and there was a massive pond which was crammed full of fish. Pat had some fish food and as Daisy threw hers in, the ring she had made yesterday flung into the pond. We could see it, so Richard had to go in to get it, thing is though, it was deeper than it appeared, so he had to completely strip off, luckily he had swim shorts on!
After he we tried sticky rice and banana and sticky rice and mango which was wrapped in banana leaves and cooked on the fire – these were the most delicious things I have eaten whilst being here!
We were almost at Pai, but Pat wanted to show us a cave where he kept saying “birds go in, bats come out” I said to Rich “there must only be about 3 birds” because compared to all the wildlife we saw daily in Oz we have hardly seen any here! We ventured down to this large cave and as you looked up, swifts (not just 3) were circling above preparing to fly into the cave for the night. Eventually, they kept flying in to the cave and all of a sudden as this was still happening, bats were flying out for their stint at night! It was amazing! Oh and on the way down to the cave, I had a leach stuck to my ankle – ughh!
Pai was lovely and we wish we could have stayed here longer. It was a lovely town, alive with little market stalls, bars, eating places and lots of lovely coloured lights on the streets. We went to our hotel and we then went out for a meal without Pat and Winai which was nice to do.
DAY 5
We were looking forward today because we were going elephant riding! Pat took us to a lovely place for breakfast where the tables were all different, one had swings as seats and ours was on a raised area with cushions as seats, reggae type music was playing and the walls were made of wheatgrass – this place had very juice shot you could imagine with the option of wheatgrass!
Next we went to Thoms elephant farm. The elephants are just in the yard area and were so cute. They eat for most of the day, so the children were feeding them bamboo.
We had a couple of hours to wait before we were able to go so we went back into Pai and I had my first 1hr Thai oil massage (nearly every other shop in Pai is a massage place!) while Rich took the kids with Pat to a Chinese village and park.
Back at the camp, you were able to either sit on a seat on the elephant or ride bareback which is what we wanted to do. Richard, Daisy and I went on Ot (which means tadpole or baby frog) and Oliver and Emily went on one together called Pom Paem – which means lovely girl. We were going on a 2 hour trek, first up towards the mountains and then to the river. The sun came out for us (first we have seen since Oz) and the scenery was lovely.
The river part was the most fun. The elephants go right in and squirt you with their trunks. They then lie down in the water and if you want, fling you off into the river. There was another couple with us and that was so funny to watch. The Mahout (elephant trainer) kept ordering the elephant to fling them off when they were least expecting it. Oliver and Emily’s elephant got right down in the water with just the back visible and they were standing on its back, elephant surfing, we called it!
Daisy by this time was crying and frightened to death, so we told our Mahout not to tell our elephant to lie down in the water! We got wet through though by the trunk squirting she did! It was such good fun and we all had a great time, especially Ol and Em! Afterwards we were able to all go in our own hot spring mineral baths because the location of the elephant camp is next to hot springs and it was bliss to be able to soothe our very aching muscles!
After lunch, we headed back to Chiang Mai through another thousand curves in the road. Because the rain had cleared we were able to view some stunning scenery on the way back.
A LOVELY MEMORABLE 5 DAYS WHICH THE CHILDREN ENJOYED TREMENDOUSLY!!
(The tour company that we went with is run by Pat and his partner Mel. They offer private tours tailored to suit what you want to do and see. They are a responsible and sustainable company making sure the locals benefit directly from this kind of tourism, unlike some of the commercial companies. We were able to get off the beaten track and get under the skin of the real Northern Thailand and would highly recommend them)
http://www.thailandhilltribeholidays.com/index.html
We have also been eating out for much of the time because it seems cheaper to eat out than cook and the food is fantastic!
