Around Annapurna

We did it! We hiked 21 days around the entire Annapurna Curcuit and absolutely loved it. Such an adventure has its ups and downs, of course, quite literally. We trekked from 860m up to 5430m, back down 1000m and then back up again to 3048m and down again to 1012m. And that is just the major climbs, not including any of the endless ups and downs along the way. For us, it was a major accomplishment. We hiked 211km in total, carrying all of our own stuff, managing not to get lost, anger a yak (that we know of), or fall off a cliff. Phew.

One of the most amazing things about the Annapurna Circuit is that not only is the landscape overwhelmingly superb, but the scenery is so diverse that every day you are hiking through (up and over) different terrain. We started off on Sept 25th, the very beginning of the short ideal trekking season which runs through October and November. The day before we left, and all night, it poured and poured. The world weather is changing, as we all know. 'Usually' by the end of September, the skies should be clear blue and the rain long gone. Anyways, needless to say, we were a little worried. Tramping through the mud on slippery trails would be very little fun. Probably, it would suck.

Thankfully, the rain itself wasn't an issue at all. Really, what the rain meant to us, we discovered, was leeches. Totally gross, slimy, stupid, sneaky, little, black, leech-y leeches. And suddenly, our relationship shifted to a whole new level. Survival. Picking leeches off each other. Ok, well maybe this isn't exactly how it went. Maybe it went more like this:

K: Ok, let me check you for leeches, again. (This occurred approx. every 5 minutes- every time after crossing a flooded area of the path. I was obsessed)
J: (who is wearing flip-flops- sighs) Fine. (And he dutifully lifts up his pantalon legs and twists his ankles around until either, I've declared my inspection is complete, or I've spotted one of the little buggers)
K: (GASP) There's one! Gross! Get it GET it! GET IT!!!!! (I would shriek, waving my arms like a chicken trying to fly and hopping around in a circle splashing the leech infested water everywhere. Essentially just being completely unhelpful. 'EWWWW! SO gross!' (I, needless to say, did none of the 'leech extracting' myself. I was more like the fog horn, alerting to the trouble.
Even worse was the couple of times that a nasty little slime-ball somehow found his way inside my shoes and was attempting to steal my blood through my sock. This seems completely unfair. Leeches should not be able to penetrate Goretex shoes. But they did. If I was freaking out because a leech was trying to suck my husband's feet dry, you can imagine I was a tad bit more, I'll say, "enthusiastic" when they started kissing my own precious toesie woesies. The most I could manage was ripping my sock off and throwing it at Jonathan to deal with the blood sucker. (J: If I had a choice, I think I would choose the leech over those socks!)

There are so many highlights from the trek. We loved being up with the sun and watching the spectacular show of its first rays basking the mountain peaks in a sublime gold. We loved being the first ones out on the trail every morning, cherishing the quiet mountain stillness that we had all to ourselves. We loved the daily exercise, how great it felt when we reached the top of whatever daily climb we accomplished, the friendly locals, and of course, the spectacular, ever changing Himalayan scenery. We loved staying in the smaller towns enroute as opposed to following the suggested hiking itinerary in the popular guidebooks, and ending up where everyone else did every night. Not only were we almost always rewarded with cheaper prices, but usually friendlier locals, hotel owners and fellow trekkers. Plus, it meant that there were far fewer people starting their day's trek from where we were and we were much less likely to be caught up in the middle of a trekking tour group, or whatever demographic that you would appreciate avoiding for that matter (If you've hiked in Nepal- you know what I mean).

When we weren't trying our best to avoid all other Westerners, we actually met some pretty fantastic people. Topping our list are Michael and Amy, a couple of Brooklyn-ers whom we coincidentally started the trek with, and then continued to meet up with often enough over the next week that every time we saw them it was like running into old friends. 'The Foursome', as named by us, an enthusiastic and fun group consisting of a couple of Brits, a Torontonian and a German, Martina, a wonderful Swiss woman we had the pleasure of hiking with for a couple of days, our Aussie couple, Marc and Claire, who we loved chatting with, and Dima and Tamara, a friendly Israeli couple that we once saved from hiking down a no-longer-usable path were also all great folks that we hooked up with along the way. (Two side notes. One: For the ridiculous 'conservation' fees Nepal charged they really could have put up a sign up at that path junction and Two: We met more than a couple really friendly Israelis- surprising, but true story).

While trekking we saw so many amazing things. Of course, the mountains were stupendous, but we also loved catching a glimpse of the mountain village life. The further we hiked away from the road, the less kids begged for 'sweets' and 'school pens' (annoying) and the more people were friendly and welcoming just because it was their nature, not because they were hoping for a handout. We passed porters carrying enormous loads through the mountains, shockingly some even bigger than the backpacks that tourists had their porters carting around. We saw Nepali porters carrying loads as big as refrigerators on their backs! Women too- transporting ginormous baskets of hay or produce that looked to be bigger than they were.

We ate dahl baht almost every day. Dahl Bhat (24 Hour Power, a t-shirt read) is supposed to be what the locals eat. Dhal Bhat is 'bottomess' meaning, they will serve you continuous portions of rice, dahl and curried vegetable until you can longer cram another grain of rice into your mouth. Tourists, of course, are only allotted two servings and then the food magically 'runs out.' Except of course, the person at the next table is getting served their dahl at that exact same moment as the server claims all the food to be gone. And, although it is probably true that dahl baht is the local food, I highly doubt that locals pay the ridiculously inflated prices for their (unlimited) servings that we (two serving) foreigners do. There are signs everywhere that say N.E.P.A.L= Never Ending Peace And Love, as an acronym for their country. Three weeks hiking around Annapurna and we made up our own (slightly more cynical) version. N.E.P.A.L = Nice Except Prices Are Ludicrous. Anyways, all the complaining aside, the food was always very tastey and filling, and really, even if I tried I probably couldn't have eaten more than two portions of dahl bhat anyways....

Another interesting tidbit that I discovered is that I am married to a donkey. Again, surprising, yet true, story. No matter the incline, no matter the elevation, how many hours we had been hiking, how long it had been since breakfast, how hot it was, how cold it was, how many leeches were taking a free ride- J just kept on trekking- consistent and constant- just like the pack donkeys we passed (ok, usually they passed us) on the path. (Side note: There was one pack of donkeys that we actually were quicker than. Before we realized this, we stopped and let the pack pass us only to discover that we were then riding right behind its caboose donkey. Jonathan's allergy thing aside, this probably wouldn't have been too problematic; except that is, for one thing: the caboose donkey was the fartiest steed in the whole Annapurna. Eventually J said we had to hang back because his throat started to feel a bit closed. If you ask me, though, I really think he just wanted to distance himself from Donkey's nerve gas.) This was never more evident on the morning we hiked up and over 'the Pass.' 'The Pass' is the event of the Annapurna trek. Trekkers fret about it for days and have nightmares about it afterwards. Really, its quite a big deal. (For everyone except my donkey husband). People have died trying to cross the pass (J: Its true, but it is people making very silly and very avoidable decisions). First, you start the morning off at about 4400m. That's high. Its cold, the sun isn't over the mountains yet. There is very little oxygen and you are hiking up- pretty much straight up, for 1000m. A whole kilometer up! Generally, at this altitude you can only safely gain between 300-500m in elevation per day. Trying to gain more altitude than this in a single day is really, really dangerous because your body can't acclimatize properly, your brain enlarges, fluid fills your lungs and blah blah blah, you die. I know all this because I went to the 'Acclimatization Talk' high up in Manang and volunteer American Dr. Dreamy, ahem, I mean Dr. Noah told me so. But, this gain of 1000m is ok because you hike up and then right back down the other side. But still, some people have serious and sometimes fatal reactions to this type of elevation gain. Aren't you glad you didn't know all this before we did the trek, Moms and Dads?

Anyways, for the big day, you have to start early because the actual pass, at about 5400m, is really cold, and ferocious winds picks up around 10am, making it very uncomfortable. It takes most people between four and six hours to make the ascent. (If it weren't for J's sense of responsibility to me, being his (slow) wife and all, he probably would have been at the top in two hours. (Side note: How can someone who is SO slow at pretty much everything else be this quick at hiking up mountains?) We were, for the first time on the trek, the absolute last ones fed and out of the guesthouse. It was 6am. Most were on the path by 5-530am- when it was still dark! I have no idea how they did that because it was so, so cold when it was light out at 6:00. My bag was empty- I had every single piece of clothing I had brought with me on, including my sarong as a second scarf and three pairs of socks- and I still couldn't feel my toes until the sun finally (rays straight from on high, it felt like) came over the mountains and de-thawed me (J: Is it just me or does de-thaw imply re-freezing?). J, hiked up like he was on a Sunday stroll. I gasped for oxygen and pushed forward, each laborious step with no small amount of effort. Turns out its hard to hike uphill when you can't breathe. For me, and most other normal human beings. We hadn't even been on the trail for five minutes when we saw our first casualty. A middle age woman, flat on her back, first-aiders fumbling around her with oxygen tanks. Her porter was running around trying to calm everyone down by handing out free 'medicine.' His medicine turned out to be cloves of garlic, (haha-kinda funny, right? Is it rude that I laughed?) which locals say prevent mountain sickness, (or something). Apparently this lady didn't have enough garlic soup for brekky. Either way, I figured I didn't need garlic breath in addition to my gasping and (probably) blue frost-bitten toes, so I declined. After a good stop and stare, J, of course, just kept on trekking. The lady's husband decided that since she couldn't walk over the pass that they would just hire a horse to go over. The first of many stupid decisions we witnessed that day. The scenery on our way up the pass was just incredible. If I didn't have to stop and rest every ten minutes, (and take pictures) J probably would have just kept on trekking right past it all. Thankfully for him I am a high maintenance hiker (J: this is a considerable understatement).

I felt completely elated when we finally reached the pass. Despite being stuck with a break-happy wife, we still passed almost everyone on the way up and made it in under four hours. I was on cloud nine-and we were high enough to actually be on a cloud, so it worked out pretty well. We did it! I danced around a bit and took a hundred photos, completely ignoring the wind that had already started to howl. J, of course, was ready to keep on trekking. That lil' donkey of mine.

My favourite thing about the Annapurna was that every day we had new and exciting scenery to look forward to. The trek started in the lush rice terraces down a bamboo lined path laden with waterfalls and transformed into alpine forests and distant peaks and then really close peaks then barren, dusty desert scenery then a vibrant colourful autumnal valley and finally back to steep hills lined with rice paddies and tropical jungle landscape complete with rascal monkeys. Just amazing. And then, as if the last twenty-one days of hiking through all this wasn't adventure enough for us, I persuaded J to ride on the rooftop of the bus with me from the trek's end all the way back to the city. I can't imagine a better way to end the trek than watching the snow capped mountains and verdant green valleys drift further and further away from our breezy, bumpy, fresh and perhaps slightly dangerous vantage point.

Out of Office

This note is to inform you that we will be 'away from our desks' for the next month or so... trekking in the Himalayas!! We will be hiking the Annapurna Circuit, said to be one of the world's classic hikes! We plan to take it slow and enjoy the views and side trips. If there happens to be lots of time, as we are in such good shape (haha) we might also attempt the Annapurna Sanctuary Trek, although it is unlikely.

Worry not. We have post-dated blogs (about India) to cover our entire trek, so every few days, no matter what snowy peak we may be on, a new blog will pop up here! Exciting, right? The time on this trip that we are the most isolated from civilization will be the time when our blog is posted the most consistently. Go figure.

We plan to be back, enjoying the luxuries (eggplant pizza) of Pokhara by the 20th of October! Happy Trails to Us!

ps. Yes, this also means we will not be able to respond to any emails or even (gasp) facebook messages!

Solitude and Sweat in the Thai Hills

The adventure started with a multiple hour ride in the back of a truck. We were headed into the hills for a three day trekking trip to meet some of North Thailand's Hill tribe people, and as the images of 'isolated hill tribes' and 'north Thailand' may conjure, it was one bumpy ride. It would be a stretch to call the dirt path that was littered with boulders and ditches a road. But apparently that is what it was, as we were driving on it. The driver laid on the horn for a good five seconds at every turn. Mostly because the turns were 180 degrees around the edge of the mountain. I can't even count the number of times that I was absolutely positive that I was going to be sick. A bolt that secured the canopy over our heads rattled loose and fell onto my lap. And this is Thailand. Our little-truck-that-could climbed up, up, up into the mountains. Although I could have done without all the jostling and bumping, I was pretty happy that we didn't have to hike up these particular hills. The views were spectacular. The hills rolled in every direction, as far as we could see. Local huts sat on top of the hills overlooking their plot of land, which was usually a rice terrace. We passed tribe people in beautiful, bright patterned sarongs, crazy people on motorbikes and clans of stray dogs. If I wasn't fighting the urge to throw up every twenty seconds, it all would have been very nice indeed.

Before we turned off onto the most 'fun' section of the hill paths, however, we had some elephant riding to get out of the way. Up until about five years ago, the elephants actually carried trekkers for a part of the journey. Then the owners must have realized that if they relocated the elephant camp to the side of the 'super highway' that they would probably make a little more profit. So 'Boombee,' our twenty-nine year old female elephant, only had to carry us in an hour long circuit around the designated forest trail and through a river. Don't feel too bad for her. There were three conveniently located stands along the journey where we could stop and buy her a bag of bananas and sugar cane to feed her. Not surprisingly, food is highly motivating. Unfortunately for her, her two year old baby elephant was trucking along oh-so-adorably beside us, sneaking her trunk up our legs and begging for Boombee's treats. Who can say no to a baby elephant? Who I ask! Our teenage 'Mahout' (Elephant trainer and driver) spent the first half of the trek texting on his cell from his perch on the elephant's head and wasn't much of a tour guide. Everyone else's guide was jumping down from the elephant to take photos of them and pointing out interesting sights. Not ours. He was tip tapping away like teenagers world wide. 'Dude, waz up.' 'Nothin' dude, u?' 'Nothin', Just ridin' en'elephant, yo.' 'Sucks, man. Come over when all those dumb tourists are gone and we can spend the whole night having a lobotomy in front of the TV.' 'Sick. See u then.' Well, I can't say for sure that that was an exact replica of the conversation, since it was in Thai, but based on the intensity of his texting, I'm sure it wasn't far off. Boombee, being a smart little cookie, was taking full advantage of the distracted Mahout. So while everyone else was forging life long bonds with their charges, we were being led into the depths of thorny bushes by Boombee snuffing out food, ducking under short tree branches and trying to protect our clothes from the elephant goober of the two baby elephant trunks that were snaking up our legs on each side: just long, slobbery and muddy enough to leave lasting souvenirs all over my only shirt. Has an elephant ever sneezed on you? At one point, while trying to fight off three elephant trunks at once (a baby elephant from each side and Boombee's massive trunk from the top, I decided to just give up and deal with muddy elephant slober. It was really mostly mud anyhow, right. And then. Because I had obviously jinxed myself. AH.... AH.....ACHOOOOO!! The sneeze bellowed like a plane engine. And, no it wasn't Jonathan. Elephant goober shot out of the baby's trunk and zoomed towards me like a lightening bolt. It all just happened too fast. There was no avoiding it. The massive glob of elephant snot, that is. And so, there it landed. On me. Where else? We hadn't even started trekking and I already was one (of one) shirt down. I can't lie and say I didn't love every second of it though. (Although I could have lived without the elephant snot) 'Can you take a photo of us?' I asked the Mahout. 'Moment,' he responded, not taking his eyes from the phone. Many 'moments' later, our Mahout succumbed to my pressures and instructed Jonathan to sit on the elephant's neck while he jumped down to document these kodak moments. Jonathan 'drove' Boombee very well, and it seemed that we were moving at his ideal speed for once! haha.

We bid farewell to Boombee and the babies and drove a few more hours to the start of our trek. We trekked up, down and around the hills to the Karen village that we were to spend our first night in. 'There's your Hilton,' our guide Dat said to us, pointing to an open air bamboo hut whose floor was covered in woven mats and piles of blankets. Mosquito nets hung from the ceiling. It gets downright cold in the Hills at night. We were at about nine-hundred metres. The days were warm, sunny and about twenty-five degrees. At night the temperature routinely fell to freezing.

We went out to visit some of the tribes-people. The first house we stopped at was hoisted up on stilts, which is probably very helpful in the monsoon season. The house is one room with a large fire pit in the middle (and no chimney). There were huge black charred kettles sitting at the edge of the fire which keep the tea warm all day. The fire is used for all the cooking and at night, the family lays their mats down around it for warmth. This particular house is home to seven people, one of whom claims to be one-hundred-twenty years old! The elder sat with a cat curled up beside him, his toes over the fire. 'He is very old and can't walk,' Dat, our guide told us. 'But he sits here by the fire all day and people bring him gifts.' Dat pointed to the package of soy milk juice boxes at the elder's side. The other old man poured us tea into mugs that were sections of bamboo, cut just under the natural partition. Bamboo is used for absolutely everything here: Walls, floors, roofs, mats, dishes, boats, tools, fences. Everything. Dat told us about his tribe, the Karen people, while we drank our tea. Many of the hill tribes in Northern Thailand have migrated over the years from Myanmar (Burma), where they are treated poorly. The Karen are one of the largest hill tribes in Thailand and are thought to have originated in Tibet. In the particular village of three-hundred people that we were in, every family owns a piece of land, on the side of one of the surrounding steep hills, that they grow their rice on. They can only grow rice once a year, in the rainy season, so they need to produce enough for the entire year. As rice is the main staple in breakfast, lunch and dinner, one family consumes a whole lot of rice. Especially because most couples have many children so that they can have help in the fields. Dat told us that the kids go to school in the nearest town about one-hundred kilometers away. They board there for the week and then take the bus home on weekends. When they are done school, most get married. When a boy is ready to get married he has to go around and visit the surrounding villages and meet girls. When he finds one he likes, he visits the family house often, in the evenings for tea, and helps out the girl's father with chores. Its important for the man to get along with his wife's family, because after they get married, the husband moves to her village and in with her family. 'When you want to get married, no need for a ring,' Dat told us. 'You just kill a pig and invite everyone over!'

At the next house we visited an older woman sat by the firelight smoking a huge pipe. The glow of the fire and the flickering red of her pipe in the dark room was very atmospheric. She had a million questions for us that she asked through Dat. Where did we come from? Where were we going next? Why didn't we have kids? What time did we usually go to bed at? Did we like Thai food? Did we think it was cold in the hills?

When we had climbed back up the bamboo ladder that brought us back to the house complex we were staying at, Dat suggested we sit by the campfire that separated our 'Hilton' and the family house, and enjoy the view over the hills while he made dinner. Village people came to visit and the house filled with chatter and laughter. It sounded like we were missing a good time. There were no closing doors or windows on the house, so we could see in from the campfire. At one point there was a particularly loud 'swoosh' of a huge flame and I looked over just in time to see the fire that Dat was cooking on explode up into the roof. The mother rushed out carrying the small child and all of the sudden the house was a flutter with action. 'Ummm, I think the roof just caught on fire,' I told the rest of the group. 'What!?' They rushed over to see the bamboo ceiling lit up like a clear night's sky with burning flecks. The pieces of red hot bamboo then started to shower down from the ceiling all over Dat. 'Happens all the time!' shouted Dat, stirring our curry frantically.

There is no electricity in the village, but the government had bought every house a solar panel. 'Sometimes the family will save up all their power and then they can watch the TV,' Dat told us. 'But the power only lasts for a maximum of two hours, so they have to choose carefully.' Apparently when this happens, the whole village turns up at your house to crowd around your TV and oogle at the latest episode of Thai Big Brother, or something.

That night we crawled into our sleeping bags on our bamboo mat, under our mosquito net and about ten blankets. It was cold, quiet and very dark. All things we hadn't experienced in quite some time. The next day Dat handed out our lunch bags that we had to carry with us on the hike. We each got a triangular package-rice and veggies double wrapped in banana leaves and then secured by twisting palm string into swirls on the top. Completely void of technology, and yet completely secure AND bio-degradable! (Who says that isn't technology?!)

We hiked for six hours that day, up the hills, down the hills, up the hills, down the hills. We stopped to watch fishermen, waist deep in the water, throwing their nets out, to watch women weave intensely pink sarongs, a pregnant woman flip the rice in wide plates, separating the kernels from the husk and couples working together to distill rice whiskey. When we got to the bottom of one particularily steep hill we came upon a completely isolated hut. We had been hiking for hours, and would hike a few more before coming upon any other hut. A skinny old man sat out on his front porch in the blazing heat wearing a bright red toque. When he saw us coming he jumped up, ran over to Dat and started talking quickly. 'Do you want some Coke,' Dat asked turning to us. We looked at each other. We assumed he meant the drink, of course, but were confused as to how this man would have come across a bunch of extra Coke he urgently wanted to get rid of, and if he had, where the heck was this stash? Plus, the idea of this completely isolated valley and the commercialism of Coke just didn't make sense together. 'Like as in opium?' Someone asked skeptically. We had made our mandatory stop at the 'tourist police' before leaving the city and the officer specifically came out to lecture on not doing drugs. 'You're in Thailand, people,' he had said. 'You get caught doing drugs- you the death penalty.' So, like, almost as serious as insulting the King. Which you really really don't want to do. Dat laughed at the question. 'Nooooo! Like Coca-Cola!' We were all still confused. We looked around the trees, rice field, vegetable garden.. nope, no vending machine. We were in the epitome of the 'middle of no where.' Dat led us over to the small stream that ran down through the man's property. There, was a huge rice sack, stock full of Coca-Cola cans, being kept cold in the stream! ohhhhh. None of us wanted any pop, but we felt so guilty that obviously this man had been sitting there awaiting the arrival of the westerners, apparently hoping there were fifty of us, and had gone to all the trouble of cooling it for us, that one of the girls in our group bought a can. For fifty cents. You can't even get a can of Coke out of your fridge for fifty cents, let alone in the middle of nowhere, kilometers from anything, with the novelty that it has been cooled by nature itself! Oh, Thailand.

Much later that day we made our final descent to the rafting camp where we would be spending our second night. The bridge that spanned the river consisted of a couple of thin logs haphazardly nailed together and a bamboo railing tied with palm string and nailed to seemingly random pieces of wood. It was about fifteen feet high, over the shallow river and about fifty feet long. If we survived the bridge, we would be home free. Either way, after that long hot day, I was getting into that stream. Whether it be because I fell through the bridge (more likely) or managed to don a bathing suit before taking the leap (preferred, but less likely).

The water was cold. Like cans in a rice bag full of ice. But, I was hot and sweaty. Plus, everyone else (other than Jonathan, of course) was already floating around, so I joined in. It was refreshing, to say the least. Its like we were in the wilderness-pop cooled by a stream, bathing in the river. Man, we were roughing it. Speaking of, our chef cooked us up another delicious dinner, minus the whole roof-catching-on-fire thing. We even had some rice left to feed to the adorable, tail wagging stray dog that was encircling our feet. She scarfed our leftovers like she hadn't been fed in a week. 'That stray dog is really cute,' we said to Dat later. 'Yes, she always comes around because the tourists always feed her! Which is not good,' he said, giving us a stern look. Jeez. He knew. How did he know. I guess that last time our cute little puppy ate was probably the night before, when the last group of trekkers took pity on her. What can I say? Would A. Marlene or A. Maryann let this poor puppy suffer? Of course not. She would have been adopted eons ago and would now be living in the lap of luxury on someone's couch by now. The least I could do was share some rice....

We noticed that our guide's friend who had been with us for the day had been carrying around three long bamboo stalks since lunch time. Every time we asked Dat what they were for, he would just say 'for later!' Finally later arrived. Dat filled the bamboo stalks with sticky rice and then poured thick, creamy coconut milk to the very brim. The stalks were then placed in the fire for a good long while, where something magical certainly happened.
For dessert, Dat brought around the bamboo, peeled off the outer layer and we ate chunks of delicious sticky rice in the thin bamboo husk. Maybe they don't have it so bad out here after all.

The villagers seemed to agree. It seemed like all night flashlights came and went from the village behind the rafting camp. Then again, before the sun could even make it through the trees, the hut was filled with happy villagers again. There was constant laughter in Dat's hut. He invited us in later that night to see what the locals were eating. 'Wow, its a boys club in here!' We noticed. 'Where are all the women?' 'Ohhh, They're at home!' laughed Dat. Men.

The next morning we walked down to the river to board our bamboo rafts for a trip down the river and through the rapids. First things first. Our raft already needed repairs. It hadn't even left the beach yet. Dat and the gaggle of men and children from the village who had come to the riverbank to bid us farewell set about tightening the palm string that held our bamboo stalks together. Dat was ordering everyone about, the kids were jumping around waving at us and shouting 'bye! bye!' and the men were sliding along the rafts using bamboo gadgets to do things to the bamboo raft. It was all very entertaining to watch from the riverbank. We used two rafts in total between the seven trekkers and two guides. Each raft was made soley of bamboo stalks and palm string. They were about a metre wide (enough to spread out legs out for balance) and very long, maybe about ten meters in length. We were meant to stand on them, which was good, because even though we were all spread out in our very own raft section, our feet were still fully submerged in the water. Dat told us to get on the raft. Then to get off. Then we changed rafts. Then we got on. Then we were ordered off again. And then we moved forward. Then closer together. Then back a bit. Then we did the hokey pokey and turned ourselves around. And that's what its all about! Right. Then Dat took a machete and started chopping off various chunks of our raft. There must have been method to the madness, but at the time, it wasn't all that apparent. Then three more bamboo shoots were cut, and tied together at the top. The bottom of each shoot was then jammed into a newly knifed hole in the raft and all our shoes were hung by their laces from the impromptu stand and our cameras were wrapped in 7-11 bags and stuffed into Dat's army-print sack, which was also draped from the stand. All the cameras, except mine, of course, because I was going to document this crazy adventure. It was a bad idea. I know. You can say 'I told you so' now and get it over with.

Once we were all in acceptable positions, Dat, in the front of the raft, armed with, surprise, a long, long bamboo stalk, myself, behind him where the 'princess' stand, Holger, our German friend behind me, and Jonathan, in the rear, and also armed with a bamboo stalk. Yup. Jonathan was going to steer us down the rapids apparently. 'Have you ever done this before?' I asked him. 'Yup!' he responded proudly. 'In Jamaica! Only I wasn't driving.. and I was 13.' Well, good thing I was looking for adventure. And off we went.

The river pulled us along at a decent speed. Being the dry season, the water was quite low at times, which worked out for us, since we had to hop off a few times to push our raft out from the rocks it had become jammed in between, or pull it over a shoal. Sometimes we tried jumping up and down on the slimy raft, to bounce it over the shallow points. Safety First! The bamboo was slippery to stand on. We would shoot through a rapid Dat yelling 'LEFT! LEFT!' 'RIGHT!" and Jonathan swinging the bamboo pole side to side, pushing off rocks and tree trunks and the river bank, ducking under low branches, then the river would calm momentarily and we would float along merrily for a bit until we came upon the next bit of fast water.

The scenery was magnificent. Massive bamboo bushes lined the river and formed a canopy of leaves above us. Other trees boasted leaves that were yellow and orange, which contrasted the otherwise lush green foliage. The sky was bright blue and the birds were singing. It took about an hour and a half. In the rainy season the whole river only takes a half hour to raft. 'Its very dangerous then,' Dat told us. It was only vaguely comforting to know that this was the 'safe' experience. Our hefty bamboos took quite a beating over that hour and a half. The bottom scraped along the rocks so loudly that I was surprised they weren't ripped off entirely, leaving us to stand on the string alone. The back of the boat, where first Mate Jonathan was, took the brunt of the beating. By the time we were half way up the river, I think the stern was left with about half the original bamboo. Chunk after chunk was sacrificed to the river rocks. When we found ourselves caught in between one particularly nasty rock and hard space, Dat eventually had to go to the back of the boat and use his machete to chop off even more of the boat just so we could un-jam ourselves! Then we got to a point where Dat told myself and Holger to jump off and walk so he and Jonathan (the experts) could navigate their way through a shallow, rapid corner without our extra weight. It was fantastic! Perhaps lacking in safety standards (completely) but still, fantastic.

'Get low!' Jonathan kept yelling at me from behind when we came upon a new set of rapids to shoot. He wanted me to squat down (and drag my butt through the water, because that's how under water the raft was) when we went through the rapids, because he was certain that I was going to tumble off like a clumsy child, completely void of balance. But, being stubborn, I mostly pretended I couldn't hear him. Although, considering the only sounds around us on this peaceful, pristine river, other than the swiftly moving water were bird songs and his bamboo stalk pushing off the rocks, I think he might have figured out that I was ignoring him. I was just thinking how bossy he was and how annoying it is that he's always telling me what to do, when we slammed head on into a rock hiding just under the surface that no one had seen. All four of us jolted forwards on the impact. I, however, was the only one who tripped over the stupid rope that was tied around the bamboo and fell face first into the half foot of water that our raft was under. Me and, of course, my trusty camera. I jumped up so fast that I almost slipped on the bamboo and fell the other way. But I didn't. Must have been my supreme balance that kept me upright... on my knees.

Our ride came to an end at the top of a waterfall. I'll say 'top' again, so you can be suitably impressed. We left our battered rafts lengthways across the narrow mouth of the falls. 'How are you going to drag our rafts all the way back up the river for tomorrow's group?' we asked. 'We won't,' replied Dat. Apparently the rafts were left every day at the top of the falls and people could come take them and use the bamboo for their roofs. I guess its like the equivalent of leaving your old couch out on the side of the road. You know, the one that's gone before you've even walked away from hoofing it down to the curb? They would just whip some more rafts up for tomorrow back at the camp. Like I said. They use bamboo for everything.

The last few hours of our three day trek were spent swimming in Chiang Mai's highest waterfall. The water plummeted over one hundred metres down to a small, incredibly deep pool before cascading down into another pool. Our fellow trekkers were very excited about swimming in the icy waters. That made me excited, because usually I am forced to swim solo. For someone who has a whole lot of hair (more and more everyday it seems) Jonathan is quite whimpy when it comes to cold water. (J: I'd like to know what's so great about swimming, anyway...) In his defense, I suppose, this water was absolutely freezing. As in any colder and it would have actually been frozen. As in Dat probably ran ahead of us to scoop the chunks of ice out of the pool before we saw them. 'Awwww, it's not so bad once you're in!' Our Irish friends called encouragingly from the water. 'We've been in colder!' I didn't see how that was possible. 'Where was that?' I asked. 'In Ireland! We were up in the mountains and it was a really hot day, so we jumped into a stream to cool off.' Crazy Irish. Must have had a Guinness or two under their belts at that stage. 'We had to get out, because our skin was turning blue!' They admitted. So far my skin was still white... ok ok, more of a sunburnt pink. I have never been in water so cold in my life. It was so cold that you almost couldn't breathe-when your head was above water! 'How is it?' asked my whimpy husband, sitting fully clothed on the rocks watching us. 'Refreshing!' I answered. We were the only ones there. Just the seven of us, and Dat. Our fellow trekkers included Jenny and Neil from Dublin, Nadia and Mai from Singapore and Holger, from Berlin. They were a fantastic crew. When another group of trekkers showed up at the waterfalls we took it as our cue to move on. We hopped onto the 'Super Highway' for the drive back to Chiang Mai. I had never been so happy to see pavement in my life.

p.s. Happy Birthday, Will!