My last full day in Pai I spent hiking through the jungle to the Mae Yen waterfall. I had visited two other waterfalls in the area a few days earlier and I was thinking that I didn't need to see another. But I wasn't going to pass it up without getting a first hand account. I asked the advice of a blond, long-haired Californian with black rimmed glasses named Bob. Bob looked a like a surfer version of Waldo (yes, this is the company I keep). He said it was beautiful and I had to do it.
Reportedly, it is a 7 kilometer hike. Perhaps that is the distance as the crow flies and doesn't account for the twists and bends? Perhaps it felt longer because about 5 minutes into the hike I passed a French couple that pointed out something disturbing, which I'll call a nest of spiders (see picture below). The spiders seemed of the daddy-long leg variety, but it was enough to remind me that I don't especially like spiders, and oh yeah, the jungle is full of them. At one point, I walked through a web on the path and a little itty-bitty spider collided with my sunglasses I was wearing. I freaked out. I threw my glasses down and danced around like a crazy maniac. A display of raw masculinity, it was not.
If that wasn't enough, there's more. The trail at the beginning was well defined and the jungle cover was quite thin. About an hour in, the jungle had became much more lush and encroaching (junglely?) and the path in places became non-existent. I was hopping from rock to rock in the middle of the stream for an absence of a path, and I had not seen anyone for a few hours. The spiders had put me in the wrong mindset. I started thinking maybe I had gone too far. What if I slipped on of the rocks and knocked myself out, or twisted my ankle? What if there are poisonous water spiders? Or snakes? Or jaguars? What if I get shot by machine gun carrying drug smugglers?
That last one isn't a joke. Bob's story of this hike goes like this: He walked to the waterfall the same way everyone does, but he wanted to walk a different way back. He got lost in the jungle and was trying to find the stream again when he came across some presumably upstanding gentlemen in camouflage and machine guns. They were carrying a large bushel of a cash crop on their backs. Fortunately, their goods didn't make them very prone to belligerence. They all partook in lightening the load a little too. Afterward, the gentlemen pointed him in the direction of the stream. Eventually, I passed four other hikers so I knew I hadn't gone off trail. I was perfectly content without meeting the people in Bob's story. It was a sunny day, the sound of the stream was very peaceful, and lots of butterflies were flitting about. My spirits improved.
The waterfall wasn't that impressive if you've seen other waterfalls before. But like most things in life, the journey is better than the destination. I made quick work of walking back while I practiced reciting part of a poem from memory. The poem is by Oscar Wilde called the Ballad of Reading Gaol. (Why the Brits spell the word "jail" as "gaol", I have no idea. I'm not kidding, both those words are said exactly the same way). I have about half of it memorized now, and I hope that I have it finished by the time this trip comes to an end, wherever and whenever that maybe.
Reportedly, it is a 7 kilometer hike. Perhaps that is the distance as the crow flies and doesn't account for the twists and bends? Perhaps it felt longer because about 5 minutes into the hike I passed a French couple that pointed out something disturbing, which I'll call a nest of spiders (see picture below). The spiders seemed of the daddy-long leg variety, but it was enough to remind me that I don't especially like spiders, and oh yeah, the jungle is full of them. At one point, I walked through a web on the path and a little itty-bitty spider collided with my sunglasses I was wearing. I freaked out. I threw my glasses down and danced around like a crazy maniac. A display of raw masculinity, it was not.
If that wasn't enough, there's more. The trail at the beginning was well defined and the jungle cover was quite thin. About an hour in, the jungle had became much more lush and encroaching (junglely?) and the path in places became non-existent. I was hopping from rock to rock in the middle of the stream for an absence of a path, and I had not seen anyone for a few hours. The spiders had put me in the wrong mindset. I started thinking maybe I had gone too far. What if I slipped on of the rocks and knocked myself out, or twisted my ankle? What if there are poisonous water spiders? Or snakes? Or jaguars? What if I get shot by machine gun carrying drug smugglers?
That last one isn't a joke. Bob's story of this hike goes like this: He walked to the waterfall the same way everyone does, but he wanted to walk a different way back. He got lost in the jungle and was trying to find the stream again when he came across some presumably upstanding gentlemen in camouflage and machine guns. They were carrying a large bushel of a cash crop on their backs. Fortunately, their goods didn't make them very prone to belligerence. They all partook in lightening the load a little too. Afterward, the gentlemen pointed him in the direction of the stream. Eventually, I passed four other hikers so I knew I hadn't gone off trail. I was perfectly content without meeting the people in Bob's story. It was a sunny day, the sound of the stream was very peaceful, and lots of butterflies were flitting about. My spirits improved.
The waterfall wasn't that impressive if you've seen other waterfalls before. But like most things in life, the journey is better than the destination. I made quick work of walking back while I practiced reciting part of a poem from memory. The poem is by Oscar Wilde called the Ballad of Reading Gaol. (Why the Brits spell the word "jail" as "gaol", I have no idea. I'm not kidding, both those words are said exactly the same way). I have about half of it memorized now, and I hope that I have it finished by the time this trip comes to an end, wherever and whenever that maybe.
Oscar wilde was Irish not British - e.g Kilmainham Gaol in Dublin
ReplyDeleteIndeed he was Irish. But Britain is an ambiguous term. I used "Brits" because all the online dictionaries said the word is a British English variant.
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