4x4's, Elephant's and near death driving experiences.

Day 11
Packed everything up and were out by 10am to go pick up our rental truck. The day was filled with crazy adventures. First of all Chris had to adapt to driving on the other side of the road and shifting with his left hand.

It seems like just driving on the opposite side of the road wouldn't be that big of a deal but it totally throws off your driving concentration and I found myself going towards on coming traffic a few times when I let my guard down. Combine that with shifting a manual transmission with your left hand made the truck extremely awkward to drive and I had to be in 100 percent concentration all the time.

Once we got out of town and into less crazy traffic. We took Mea sae road which had all sorts of tours and shows that you could see. Our first stop was a park with ten waterfalls you could walk up so parked and took a trail to the falls. The water was very brown but the falls were beautiful. Chris and I not the biggest hikers made it to the seventh waterfall and turned around to head to another destination. Got back to the main road and stopped at the Mesa Elephant Camp and watched a elephant show. I was amazing it was probably the coolest thing ive ever seen. They did all sorts of tricks like playing the harmonica with their trunks, spinning hula hoops, kicking soccer balls and painting pictures. It was awesome! Each elephant had a Thai trainer and caretaker who seemed to all have a personal relationships with their elephant. Afterwards we really wanted to go off-roading so we took the first dirt trail we saw and zipped down a narrow jungle road looking for fun. Explored the country side and went where most tourist don't because only Chris would decided to go up a washed out muddy road with deadly cliffs on the side. Ended up in the middle of farming village and from the looks on the locals face I'm pretty sure we were the only white people they had seen in a while. Took pictures and enjoyed the freshness of the air compared to all the exhaust fumes that overtake you in most cities. Decided to head north towards Pai, a mountain village where Shea and Jeanie had gone by shuttle earlier that morning. The roads were insane, people passed whenever and where ever they want. Chris got the hang of driving quick but it was a very stressful drive passing on curves and trying not to run over motor bikes.

This was probably one of the most stressful drives ever for me. The road has 762 sharp curves and cars and bikes are passing on blind corners constantly. They seriously have a death wish and we saw so many close calls and had a few ourselves. There really is no lane divider and you just drive where ever on the road you can with no regard for anything. After a while I started to get more confident and made some pretty sketchy passes around huge trucks which could of easily ended in disaster.

After the driving insanity and the distance seeming much further then we expected we arrived in Pai exhausted and in serious need of showers and food. Parked at a temple, grabbed our bags and looked for lodging. Walked down the street still in a daze from the days events. With our luck we see our girls walking the street and were just as excited to see us as we were to see them. They led us back to the hotel they were at, we got a bungalow, showered and went out for dinner.
Bottle of rum, new backpacker friends and great times. A group of us went in search of a bar with live music and one girl Eva and I went in and started dancing. It was a while before we realized that the rest of our group we had walked with never even came into the bar after us but we did not care and had a great night. The music was not so good but we overtook the dance floor that was empty. The music ended and I walked her back to her hotel.
Sat in front and talked for quite a while about travel, life and our passions. It was late, I was super tired, drunk and at this point realized I had the key to the room and Chris may be stranded so I said good bye and tried to make my way back to the hotel. I was totally lost and went up and down the streets without a clue to where I was. I asked for directions but didn't know what hotel I was in so that did not help. I only had the room key with a C on it and that was not enough info to lead me home.
When I had almost given up hope I see in the distance Jeanie and Shea walking towards me, my angels of the night and they took me by my arms and led us back and off to bed. I really love those girls.

After Zev left with another group I met some a group of five guys from Australia and we headed out of town a bit to a bon fire I heard about. They told me about their trip here and it was crazy. They drove the same road up here as I did and hit two motor bikes making them crash. The police came and they had to pay each of them 10,000 baht for the damages. When they got into town one of them accidentally broke a awning on the street and it turned into a shouting battle with a local guy.
The police ended up arresting all of them and threw them in jail for the night, right before this one of them had left their backpack with all the passports at a restaurant as well. What a disaster. They were still in high spirits though and we had alot of fun just hanging out around the fire until I decided to turn in.