Photobombed by a rooster

This certainly wasn't your average Boxing Day excursion in order gently to work off some Christmas Day excesses. Oh no. An 8am start for a guided tour of the area north west of Chiang Mai where there are many hill tribes still living in relative isolation from the rest of Thailand (i.e. a 4x4 or even in some cases a motorbike or feet are needed to reach their villages). We had hoped to do a longer tour, but Mr A's heart attack put paid to that. Anyway the day tour, much of which was in the Doi Inthanon national park, which was absolutely stunning, gave us a taster for more and a good flavour of what we were missing.

The day started at the Baan Tong Luang village (dubbed an "eco agricultural" village). While it was interesting to see members of so many tribes all at once, I found it disturbing to visit what was in essence a human zoo. In particular, I have a lot of questions about the practice of the long neck women Karen tribe. I didn't take any photographs and I have many unanswered questions about this cultural practice.

We went on to a Hmong village situated at the top of a hill (1200m), then stopped for coffee at the Samoeng Centre. The final substantive part of the tour was a trip up a long and very rough road to visit some Karen villages, the last of which is largely cut off from world although it does have mains electricity (since last year). Apparently two families now have satellite dishes. There was one further village, but only accessible on a motor bike or by walking. L would have been keen to visit, but we didn't have time. We were hosted in one family's house for a snack of passion fruit and honey, and saw a variety of village activities including the craft of making roofs from rattan leaves (now largely superceded by the arrival of corrugated iron roofs). Dogs, wild boars and chickens were everywhere, but I didn't realise my photograph (taken with a fairly long lens) had been bombed by a rooster until I loaded it on to the computer. I've popped the location onto a spot somewhere out in the countryside near Samoeng, which is the nearest approximation I can manage.

After the lengthy and bumpy ride back to Samoeng we visited a banana chip making facility where we tasted (and purchased) the wares, before lunch at a local restaurant. A couple of things struck me. The first was the prevalence of cyclists on the road. It isn't that hot here, but even so... A tough day out! And the other was the variety of crops being grown in small clearings in the forest. In addition to rice (not under cultivation during the dry season), we saw banana plantations and rose plantations, tangerine farms, and strawberry farms, and then all manner of fruit and vegetables including avocado, lychee, garlic, cucumber, kale, chillies, peppers, and the rest (eg coffee and tea). It seems that whatever you put in the ground here grows well, so doubtless one of the main obstacles to successful farming would be dealing with the challenging weather and preserving the rain that comes down in the wet season for the dry season. And stopping erosion from excessive deforestation.

There was energy in the evening for little more than taking a taxi to a recommended restaurant on the Ping river for dinner, and back again. We did have to walk a short distance along the night time roads from the hotel to a local 7-11 for L to pay for his bus ticket to Chiang Rai tomorrow, and that was more than enough for us.