A Day in Pai: Exploring the Bamboo Bridge and More

A tour of Pai

A day staying in Pai with no travelling meant a day by the pool for Karen.

I was keen to see the Bamboo Bridge but couldn't see an easy way to get there as I didn't fancy hiring a moped. Luckily a few of the Australian ladies were keen to look around and I convinced them to include the bridge on the half day tour they arranged.

We started with the White Buddha, this was up 353 steps and it was only after about 330 we saw the statue and could see it was being renovated and covered with bamboo scaffolding. The next call was a viewpoint and the Chinese Village. The gardens at the village were really impressive and some great views. The Chinese Village was the original settlement for Chinese immigrants after WW2 but now is a tourist attraction and didn't look like many people still lived there..

After this it was the Bamboo Bridge. The bridge/walkway was built during covid. Iit's 800 metres long and goes over the rice fields leading to a temple. It was initially built for the monks to give them a better route rather than across rice fields. Surprising how strong it seems.

From the road it looked a bit ropey and I don't think anyone was impressed but once we started walking it was very peaceful and scenic. Luckily, afterwards everyone was impressed by my suggestion!

We finished at a canyon with impressive views and very narrow paths as the wind and rain were starting we had a quick walk round then headed back.

We went into Pai both nights, at this time of year not too crowded and lots of restaurants and bars to choose from again.

Back to the Old Hotel

The next day was the journey back to the starting hotel. The roads were the craziest yet the usual bends and ups and downs but also giant potholes. One tuk tuk hit one of these caverns and burst a tyre. They didn't have any spares so a bit of a delay so we went 3 in some and left one tuk tuk behind. It summed up our Tuk Tuk that they swapped wheels and left ours behind, rather than the one with the puncture!

Earlier in the journey we revisited some hot springs and used these to boil some eggs which we ate later in the morning a bit of fun. No road trip for us could be complete without animals in the road and today, as well as avoiding stray dogs, the driver had to stop whilst some cows slowly crossed the road.

As we were running late we missed a few stops on the way which was a shame but I imagine they were keen to get us to the hotel without further drama, as the Aussies might say.

It's the end of the tour..

We had a final meal as a group which was nice, unfortunately the group we are with seem to have no issues expressing their contempt for the indigenous people in Australia which we both find a bit depressing. The South Africa couple had left before our meal so there wasn't much light relief!

We set off towards Laos tomorrow, we've enjoyed Thailand and the Tuk Tuks. We would recommend this trip and the people were nice with the above caveat also that the average age in the group is usually around 70, this trip other than us I think it was closer to 80! At times felt certain activities were toned down due to the older people, such as some treks on the itinerary weren't offered and in the caves we only did one rather than all 3 but still we enjoyed the 11 days.

We had some laughs and felt we saw some of the lesser visited parts of Thailand if not quite off the beaten track.