We have just arrived back in Chiang Rai after a 3 day Hill tribe trek to the Lizu and Akha hilltribe villages. Oh my god! What were we thinking!!! We had Pui our guide and 2 other guides come with us. Their names were Gin (introduced as Like gin and tonic) and Oldo our scout to find the way. Now that I have finished I can say it was wonderful and I feel really good for doing it but when we hit our first day and did 5 hours of crawling up a hill face for about 1500ft I can honestly say we weren't laughing. When the trek notes said you had to be a level 3 fitness out of 5 levels they forgot to mention that a level 3 was Olympic athlete equivalent. But we just kept to our moto: KEEP SMILING and we got through it and were greatfully rewarded with a Thai massage for 150Baht (about $3). The first night we stayed at the Lizu tribe. However we all definitely got the feeling that the tourist trade was welcome to spend their money in the village but were not wanted in the village. We were very nicely shuffled to a tourist market to buy their goods and then shown around the village but not introduced to any locals and those who acknowledged us just stayed and very rarely said hello.
The next village on night 3, Akha village was much more friendly. Our accomodation was part of the village and the kids loved interacting with us. We visitied the preschool (although it was weekend the kids still hung out there) and picked up some followers who then came with us to the school where there were permanet kids living because they came from others villages. We played soccer with the kids and they loved having their photos taken. This was definitly a great experience.
We arrived back in Chiang rai today and are very happy to be finished our trek. We all have sore knees, ankles, backs, shoulders and bums muscles from the very steep climb back down the hill today. So Lara and I am going for a Thai massage. Why not when they are soooo good and sooo cheap!
