Rest & Relaxation ?????

Hi again,

Most of the Habitat for Humanity Global Village trips finish with a day or two of Rest & Relaxation. We had our 2 days in the Mountains north of Chiang Mai, where we rode Elephants, stayed overnight with a tribe in their tribal village and floated for many miles on rafts down the Mi Tang river. We had a fantastic 2 days of insight into what seemed like a forgotten world of natural resources and elbow grease ! However, I'd have to say that any reference to either Rest or Relaxation is purely incidental .. it was tougher than the build !!

Here we are on Saturday morning, starting out for our 2 day adventure in our yellow taxi.. and that's Carolann, Michael and me looking very happy on the journey (before we knew any better !).
We stopped for breakfast at the centre used for trekking and touring in the area. It's a magnificent haven in the mountains .. wonderful little mountain lodges and a fantastic restaurant. Check out the table and chairs .. hewn from a tree. It's like the Teddy Bears' picnic in the woods ! We had a wonderful breakfast of scrambled eggs and hot rolls. We left our main luggage to be delivered to the meeting point next day and set off on our adventure with just our overnight bags for our night at the tribal village. First stop was a village close to the top where there is a fantastic view across the mountians. We just stopped for a quick photo and headed on to the first leg of the trek .. rafting on the river Mi Tang. The rafts were a lot smaller than I'd envisaged, the width about the size of a 7 iron (definitely not as big as a driver ..). The main picture above shows the intrepid trio .. Carolann, Vender and Eileen on their raft. We floated, driven by our local 'Captains' on the rafts for about 2 hours. The river was calm and it was sunny and peaceful. We then stopped for lunch (lovely picnic which the guides had brought with us). After lunch we resumed on the rafts. The weather closed in a bit and the river was quite a bit less calm than it had been ! The peaceful scenario of the morning was long gone and for the afternoon we battled with rapids and rocks .. but did eventually arrive, tired and very wet ! at the tribal village where we stayed overnight.

The village is amazing - it is genuinely like going back in time. No electricity or power of any kind. The guides had brought candles - so we had some light. I don't know how the locals managed, but they didn't have candles. The bedroom was seriously basic, no beds - just bedding on the floor (with mosquito nets) and the bathroom was non-existant, so rather than shower in the river, we all decided to wait till tomorrow night to wash ! We did have a great dinner though. Our Captains (who drove the rafts) cooked dinner. It was all local produce. We had a chicken and vegetable dish with rice. All of the rice, vegetables and herbs and spices etc., were grown in the village and we thoroughly enjoyed our meal. After a while around the camp fire, we retired to 'bed'. The lady at the centre at breakfast, had guaranteed us the worst night's sleep we'd ever had. She wasn't wrong !

We awoke at cock crow (that should be rooster crow - they never stopped from about 3am). I really thought my back was broken next morning and it took quite a bit of stretching before I could begin to function. After another great meal for breakfast, we set off for Day 2 of our trek.