Pai, Thailand Travel Guide and Things to Do (ปาย)

As a vacation from our residence in Chiang Mai we decided to take a serpentine road trip to the hillside country town of Pai (ปาย) where relaxed, wandered around, enjoyed stunning scenery and visited a Hot Spring.

As we crammed into a over-capacity white minivan we began our journey to Pai which included a staggering 746 turns / curves in the road. I'm not normally the type to get sick on the road; however, I started to feel nauseous from the trip, so I ended up popping a couple of gravol pills to settle my stomach down.

For every twist and turn we encountered along the way we were rewarded as soon as we arrived in Pai where we instantly noticed the pace of life slowing down.

Our guest house was located in an idyllic setting which included hillside views, rice fields in our backyard and thatched bungalows. To keep us company three pet cats would often sleep beside us as we swung on a hammock and the adorable Pugsley, a cute pug (who is actually named Faye) would wander over to us looking up at us with his big eyes and wrinkly face.

The three days in Pai were spent mostly relaxing and chilling out. In fact, it's hard for me to fathom people coming to Pai and doing anything else but taking it easy.

The only thing I wish is that we had more time. If I ever base myself in Thailand again I think I'd prefer Pai over Chiang Mai to work on creative projects.

This is the hillside town of Pai. It is about 3.5 hours away from Chiang Mai and this is where we've been spending the weekend.

We are staying at the Pai Chan Cottages and this is our private little Bungalow, so let's go have a look inside.

Hey! Come on in! This is our humble little room here. You can see we've got a nice big size bed and mosquito net over here. Fortunately this time of the year we haven't had to be using it very often. It's freezing at night! It is freezing so likely the mosquitoes have all died. The best part about this place are the views. Check out this: rice fields!

Am I interrupting your nap? You're just too cute and wrinkly. Look at that little nose.

Meow meow!

We've only got a few days left here in Thailand and I've been hearing from friends raving about Pai for years and I've always put off coming here. This time I said 'There is no way we're going to leave Thailand without coming to Pai." Now I understand what all of the fuss is about. This place is wonderful. It is one of the most relaxing towns I've ever visited and we're going to show you around. You'll get to see first hand why we love it here.

What are you doing? I couldn't be anymore relaxed than in this hammock right now. At this rate, I don't even know if we're get into town.

One of the main reasons people come to Pai is to just relax and totally chill out. A lot of other destinations you go to visit temples, you go to do other types of things but here it is just enjoying the scenery, wandering around and swinging on a hammock. Those are the top things to do and I'm loving it so far.

We seem to have found hippy central just across the river. There is a cool little bar called sunset bar and it can be reached via a bamboo bridge. Shall we check it out?

That was awesome! We crossed that rickety old bridge and then we came to some really cool looking guesthouses and now we're here in the fields.

One of the draws to Pai is being able to explore the countryside. Yesterday, I rented my very first scouter. It only cost me three dollars a day and I got a helmet with that. It was a great way to explore. I thought it was going to be kind of tricky riding it for the first time but it was a lot of fun. You did well didn't you? It opened up a lot of the surrounding areas that would have been tough to reach by foot.

Aside from chilling out and relaxing in Pai one of the few things that we actually really want to do is to take a trip over and visit the hot springs.

We're here in Pai visiting the hot springs. This is the thirty five degree pool and I'm swinging like Tarzan. Well not exactly but I'd like to think that. Oooh Oooh Oooh!

That giant white Buddha over there is something I plan on visiting tomorrow morning when I wake up.

I can't swing. I need an assistant to swing me. Sam, come swing me! I'm just kidding. I'm kidding! No, Sam. Sam no! Oh, my gosh! What are you doing? Okay, I just want to get you on the hammock. I don't want to go flying! No. Okay, just go back on and say something.

Go fetch me a drink!



This is part of our Travel in Thailand series. We're making a series of videos showcasing Thai culture, Thai arts, Thai foods, Thai religion and Thai people.

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All photos and video taken by Samuel Jeffery (Nomadic Samuel) and Audrey Bergner (That Backpacker).