Overeating in Pai, Part 2: Savory Eats

This is my third post about our recent 3-night trip up to Pai, a slow little mountain town that’s popular with the backpacker crowd and tourists seeking relaxation.  Like I said in my previous post about cakes, pies and coffees in Pai, about the only thing to do in Pai is eat!  I don’t want you to think we only ate sweets and drank coffee while we were in Pai – we had some savory Thai food too!

Our favorite spot in Pai was Charlie and Lek’s, a great little restaurant that also has cooking classes.  We found a dish there that we haven’t seen anywhere else in Thailand – Pad Thai made with shaved green papaya instead of noodles!  If pad thai and som tam got together and had a love child, it would be Green Papaya Pad Thai.  IT WAS SO GOOD, as shown by Kevin’s face in the photo below.

Green Papaya Pad Thai at Charlie & Lek's

Green Papaya Pad Thai at Charlie & Lek’s.  Kevin is bursting with excitement for this food.  Naturally, we returned three days in a row to get this dish.

Red Dragon Fruit Shake and Watermelon + Lime Shake at Charlie & Lek's

A Red Dragonfruit Shake and a Watermelon + Lime Shake at Charlie & Lek’s

Green Papaya Salad at Charlie & Lek's - so so so good.

Close up of the Green Papaya Salad at Charlie & Lek’s – so so so good.

We also enjoyed some delicious Thai food from Na’s Kitchen.  The pad see iew may have been the best we’ve had so far in Thailand.  We also continued our love affair with Som Tam at Na’s – it did not disappoint.

Mango Shake at Na's Kitchen

Mango Shake at Na’s Kitchen

Great Pad See Iew at Na's Kitchen

Great Pad See Iew at Na’s Kitchen

Som Tam on the left, Sticky Rice in the basket on the right, and Pad See Iew in the back.  All for $4.

Som Tam on the left, Sticky Rice in the basket on the right, and Pad See Iew in the back. All for $4.

We splurged and decided to get burgers one night after realizing we hadn’t had any beef for almost 2 months!  We visited Maya’s Burger Queen to satisfy our beef craving.

Maya's

Maya’s Burger Queen

Hawaiian Burger? Yes please.

Hawaiian Burger? Yes please.

The Hawaiian Burger, check out how big that pineapple slice is.

The Hawaiian Burger, check out how big that pineapple slice is.  Wish the beef patty had been bigger, but it was still super tasty!  And just $3.

Fried Chicken Burger - delicious.

Maya’s Fried Chicken Burger – delicious.

Homemade French Fries

And of course, we got Homemade French Fries

The cheapest meal we had in Pai was at Chew Xin Jai, a Chinese and Thai eatery with vegan and vegetarian food.  You get a plate full of rice with 1 scoop of food for 30 baht, 2 for 35 baht, 3 for 40 baht, or 4 for just 45 baht.  Cheap, filling, and pretty tasty.

Vegetarian food at Chew Xin Jai

Vegetarian food at Chew Xin Jai

No vacation in Thailand would be complete without some street food.  We started at the end of the main road in Pai and ate our way down the street back to our hotel on the last night.  It was fabulous.  Not pictured: an ear of corn on the cob that I scarfed down before we had time to take a photo…

Curry Puffs, 3 for 20 Baht

Curry Puffs, 3 for 20 Baht

We had a chicken BBQ skewer for 20 Baht

We had a chicken BBQ skewer for 20 Baht

We stopped for some Beef Curry and Rice from the Indian Food street vendor for 60 Baht

We stopped for some Beef Curry and Rice from the Indian Food street vendor for 60 Baht

She also had delicious Samosas for just 5 Baht apiece!

She also had delicious Samosas for just 5 Baht apiece!

We capped our street food dinner extravaganza off with a Chang beer at our hotel bar, where we sat and enjoyed some live music.

Chang Beer, what some locals lovingly call "elephant pee"

Chang Beer, what some locals lovingly call “elephant pee”.  WE MISS PACIFIC NORTHWEST MICROBREWS.

 

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What’s the best thing you’ve eaten on your international travels?  My favorite meal is still a cook-your-own-hot-plate meal we ate in a dark alleyway in Hanoi, Vietnam last year. We were sitting on tiny plastic stools at a tiny plastic table in a tiny little alley with motorbikes racing by.  Sometimes it’s more about the surroundings than the food!

 

Overeating in Pai, Part 1: Cakes, Pies and Coffees

We recently took a little 3-night trip up to Pai, Thailand to get away from the hustle and bustle of Chiang Mai.  Pai is a slow little mountain town that’s super popular with the backpacker crowd and tourists seeking relaxation.  There’s not a whole lot to do in Pai other than eat and relax, so we did as much eating as possible.  What could be more appropriate than overeating in a town whose name is pronounced “Pie”, anyway?  Also, writing about your overeating burns off some of those excess calories.  Ok, I may have just made that up, but I’m hoping it’s true.  Here are some snapshots of the tasty cakes, pies and coffees we sampled in Pai.  Stay tuned for a second blog post of all the non-sweets we had in Pai.

Cakes and Pies in Pai

First stop for some sweets was All About Coffee, a fun spot we found through some fellow traveler’s blogs online.

All About Coffee

All About Coffee

Kevin had the Binoffi Pai on the left, which was sort of like a banana cream pie with chocolate drizzle.  I had the Mango Cheese Pie on the right, which was pretty much a cheesecake with mangos on top.  Super delicious, but a bit expensive.

Binoffi Pai and Mango Cheese Pie

Binoffi Pai and Mango Cheese Pie

Next, we learned that Thai folks interpret “Ice Cream Sandwich” concept very literally.  We picked up this concoction below for just 10 Baht. It’s literally an ice cream sandwich – a piece of sandwich bread filled with scoops of coconut ice cream, a scoop of sweet sticky rice, sweet coconut drizzle, and peanuts.

The Infamous Thai-Style Ice Cream Sandwich

The Infamous Thai-Style Ice Cream Sandwich

We also made a visit to the Witching Well restaurant, which we’ve read has delicious cakes and desserts.  Their decor is also fun and unique.

Fun Decor at Witching Well

Fun Decor at Witching Well

Menu and Decor at Witching Well

Menu and Decor at Witching Well

Decor at Witching Well

Decor at Witching Well

Kevin ordered the Apple Crisp, and I got the carrot cake.  Both tasty, both cost 70 Baht.

Apple Crisp at Witching Well

Apple Crisp at Witching Well

Carrot Cake at Witching Well

Carrot Cake at Witching Well

We also stumbled onto this street vendor, serving up delicious coconut pancakes.  We got two with coconut + corn, and two with coconut + banana.  SO GOOD.  Don’t miss these if you’re in Pai – it was the best dessert we had there!

Coconut Pancakes

Coconut Pancakes – don’t miss these!

 

Coffees in Pai

All the cakes and pies made us lethargic.  Naturally, we sought out some high-caffeine high-sugar beverages as a pick me up.  During our visit to All About Coffee, we also snagged some tasty drinks.  Kevin got a Siphon Coffee, black, and I had an Upside Down Coffee, which is a shot of espresso on top of sweetened condensed milk.

Kevin's Siphon Coffee

Kevin’s Siphon Coffee

My Upside Down Coffee

My Upside Down Coffee

 

News Flash: Melanie is now addicted to coffee

News Flash: Melanie is now addicted to coffee

Kevin kicked back and relaxed at All About Coffee

This is as relaxed as Kevin gets, enjoying some reading at All About Coffee.

We discovered a little cafe called Cafein in the center of Pai with two rocking chairs right by the street.  This cafe is situated right across from a motorbike rental place, so we killed several hours watching brand new motorbike riders come up and shakily ride off on their newly rented motorbikes.  We saw some of them again later with knees and elbows wrapped in gauze!

Our favorite spot in Pai

Our favorite spot in Pai

Green Tea Latte at Cafein

Green Tea Latte at Cafein.  Spoiler alert – all that green coloring is not natural.  My tongue matched the drink after I finished it!

Iced Lattes at Cafein

Iced Lattes at Cafein

Wonderful Cafein

Wonderful Cafein

Another favorite spot was Cafe d’tist, just down the street from our hotel.  They had tasty iced drinks for just 50 baht, and we really liked their Iced Lattes and their fun decor.

Iced Latte at Cafe d'tist

Iced Latte at Cafe d’tist

Cafe d'tist

Cafe d’tist

Cute little rocking swan at Cafe d'tist

Cute little rocking swan at Cafe d’tist

Enjoying some Iced Lattes at Cafe d'tist

Enjoying another round of Iced Lattes at Cafe d’tist

A stray dog hanging out at Cafe d'tist

A stray dog hanging out at Cafe d’tist

Not all our caffeine came from coffee in Pai.  We also stopped by Art in Chai, a little coffee house that’s super popular with backpackers.  Art in Chai is known for their Masala Chai.  For each glass, the barista uses a mortar and pestle to freshly pound up all the spices that go into that cup.  We met a few people at Art in Chai who came to Pai on week-long vacation and are still here two years later.  A lot of people seem to come to Pai and just never leave!

Art in Chai, backpacker's paradise

Art in Chai, backpacker’s paradise

Masala Chais at Art in Chai

Masala Chai Teas at Art in Chai

 

I’m almost embarrassed to post all of this.  Yes, we were only in Pai for 3 nights, and yes, we really did eat all of these sweets.  If you could win a vacation award for eating cakes, pies and coffees, we definitely won on this trip!  YOLO, right?

We want to hear from you!

Where in the world have you had your best coffee?  There will always be a special place in my heart for Vietnamese coffee, which tastes almost like chocolate.

 

Getting to Pai from Chiang Mai

Off we go, to Pai!

Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, it’s off to Pai we go!

The Road to Pai

The road to Pai from Chiang Mai is a stomach-churning nausea-inducing blood-pressure-increasing 80-mile-long nightmare.  According to legend, the road has 762 hairpin turns and is one of the most dangerous stretches in all of Thailand.  Zoom in on the map below to see all the twists and turns as the road nears Pai – it’s quite the ride!  In spite of it being just 80 miles, the drive usually takes 3-4 hours unless you’re a crazy daredevil.  Being the idiots that we are, we still wanted to make a trip to the cute little mountain town of Pai, Thailand, but it was harder than we thought it’d be to decide how to get there!  We visited no less than 8 travel agencies here in Chiang Mai to assess all of our options.

Option #1: Fly

The quickest way to get there is to take a half-hour flight with Kan Air, a tiny airline that only serves a handful of towns in North Thailand.  But they only make the trip Fridays, Saturdays and Sunday, and only once per day!  Their flights are close to $60 one way, and were mostly sold out for the next few weeks.  Also, as a former Boeing employee, I tend treat small domestic airlines in foreign countries with a healthy dose of skepticism.

Option #2: Public Bus

The word on the interwebs is that a bus fare to Pai costs 150 Baht, or about $4.60. I’ve read that the “air conditioned” busses don’t have very good air conditioning, so what ends up happening is that you’re just stuck in a hot bus with windows that won’t open!  Non-air-conditioned busses also make the trip to Pai, but  stories of fruit rolling around on the floor and random loose chickens deterred us from bussing it.  We’ve only been in Thailand a month, after all, so we aren’t sure we’re ready yet for that experience.

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Option #3: Motorbike

We were encouraged by several strangers to attempt to motorbike up to Pai.  Now that we’ve seen the road, we are about 95% sure that motorbiking to Pai would’ve killed us.  Neither of us has driven a motorbike before, so a 3-hour trip through the mountains in the rainy season with tons of hairpin turns would have been an absolute disaster.  I’m pretty confident I wouldn’t be writing this blog post right now if we had attempted to motorbike to Pai.  This road is definitely for advanced motor bikers only!

Option #4: Aya Minivans

When we started looking into the Minivan option, we found that the most popular van operator, Aya Service, has a plethora of terrifying reviews online.  Phrases like “don’t use this company if you value your life” and “someone threw up everywhere in the van” were commonplace. Some people’s reviews even said their drivers were acting erratic, like they had used some sort of drugs to stay awake.  More than a few people mentioned that the Aya drivers go way too fast, hustling up to Pai so they can load up a new vanful of passengers and race back down to Chiang Mai.  We even read a post online claiming that the passengers in one Aya van revolted, forced the driver to pull over, put him in the back seat, and a passenger finished out the drive up to Pai!

Before I snapped this photo, I asked Kevin how he felt about our upcoming journey...

Before I snapped this photo, I asked Kevin how he felt about our upcoming journey…

Reading these reviews had us rethinking our trip to Pai altogether.  It made us nervous for the trip no matter how we got there, as shown by Kevin’s face in the photo above.

Option #5: The winner, a Minivan with Terminal Green

Luckily, we found Terminal Green!  This company operates the same style of 16-passenger minivans as Aya Service, and their tickets are the same price.  The fare for a ride up to Pai is 180 Baht (about $5.50) and includes pickup at your hotel/apartment.  The ride back down costs just 150 Baht (about $4.60), and ends in Chiang Mai’s Old City, close enough to our condo that we could just walk home afterwards.  We could hardly find any reviews online for Terminal Green, but we felt “less unconfident” about them just because of the lack of bad reviews online.  It seemed like the least evil of all options.  To book the Chiang Mai to Pai portion, call Terminal Green at 081-960-9283 (and be sure to request seats in the front of van!)  The return journey can be booked at the Terminal Green storefront in Pai.  Seats on the return journey are first come first served for the trip back to Chiang Mai, so you have to arrive early and throw some elbows to sit in the front.

The Journey

We each took some Bonine for motion sickness before leaving the house to head to Pai.  This turned out to be a great idea – highly recommend a Bonine pill or two.  A Terminal Green van picked us up near our condo at 9:45am and drove us over to the Chiang Mai Arcade Bus Station to load up into another Terminal Green minivan.  Try to show up with an empty bladder – it costs 3 Baht to use the filthy bathrooms at the bus station.  Do you at least get toilet paper or soap since you paid 3 Baht?  No way, man!

This is the ticket counter at the Arcade Bus Terminal where you can buy tickets to Pai

The Arcade Bus Terminal Ticket Counter

We loaded up into the van, packed like sardines.  One seat even had two passengers – a mom with her 5 year old daughter on her lap!

One last selfie before the drive - hopefully not the last selfie ever...

One last selfie before the drive – hopefully not the last selfie ever…

By 10:30am, we were en route to Pai.  We were probably the only passengers who wore seat belts.  Even the driver didn’t buckle up.  Luckily, the air conditioner worked well and it wasn’t too warm!

Please Expect Seat Belt

We chuckled at this sign in the van: “Please Expect Seat Belt”

We stopped at a rest stop halfway up to Pai. Using the bathrooms at this stop cost 3 Baht, toilets were of the squatting variety, and it did not include toilet paper or soap.  Sigh.

We were glad we brought snacks along – it was a long drive and the food at the rest stop was expensive (and by expensive I mean $3/meal) and it looked like it had been there for more than a few days.  After eating our makeshift egg sandwiches (not egg salad… just a boiled egg wrapped in a piece of bread… we are simple folk), we piled back into the van.

Our trusty van which got us safely up to Pai

The trusty steed which got us safely up to Pai

En route to Pai, we drove through a herd of cows on the road and passed several big semi trucks on the windy road.  We arrived safely at the bus station in Pai at about 2pm, hungry, tired, and with a Bonine hangover.  Luckily, no one threw up in our van.  Success!

If we had to make the trip up to Pai again, we would definitely use Terminal Green.  They were one of the cheapest options for getting to and from Pai, and we never felt unsafe.  We liked both of our drivers – they took their time getting us safely through the mountains and always passed slower cars/motorbikes carefully.  We did spot a few Aya vans that seemed like they were really zooming around other cars on the road – several zoomed passed us on our journey – so we were happy with our choice to use Terminal Green.

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Have you ever had a terrifying journey on your travels?  We want to hear all about it!  Please leave us a comment with your story.