Day 8 - Trekking Day 1

Banana pancakes are meant to be the backpacker staple so I decided that'd be an appropriate breakfast to begin my day with before heading off on my three day trek. They were slightly disappointing though I must say.

In our truck there was one other kiwi girl - Lisa, her English partner - Trevor, a Brazilian guy - Kamel, two german girls, Maree and Katherine and an American guy Jay.

The drive to the trek was an interest one with Kamel still being drunk from the night before and telling us tales of his night spent boozing with the other half of our group in the other truck. The others were two German guys, Hanass and Joerg, two Northern Ireland guys, Colom and Niel and a dutch couple - Richard and Noemi. Quite a mix.

The first day of trekking we spent about five hours of walking including lengthy breaks. It was pretty slow going as most of the guys were still drunk or hungover from the night before, some of them still continuing with the booze in the morning. There was some great scenery though and the guides did a good job of keeping us entertained with their quirky remarks along the way.

Our first night we were to stay at guide Robert's village which had about 30 people living there which consisted of about four families. The toilets were as they had been throughout the day, squat ones with no loo paper, just a bucket of water next to it to wash things down. I knew immediately that I wasn't going to be spending any time loitering in the toilets throughout the three days. Peeing was plenty enough time in there. The only running water was a pipe that sprayed water out of the ground that constituted as their shower so most of us gave a shower a miss despite our sweaty bodies.

Upon arriving we looked around the village and some of the group purchased some hand made souvenirs from various women in the village. One of the Irish guys Roger was a complete sucker and got a bag, bracelet and two scarves. I on the other hand managed to avoid buying a single thing. I'm sticking to this minimum baggage regime quite nicely so far!

After our beautiful traditional thai meal that had been prepared by our guides, it was time for singing to Roger and Kamel taking turns playing the guitar around the campfire. It reminded me of being on the Whanganui River Trip all over again. We managed to get the guides to play us some Thai songs too which were very soft and poppy sounding compared to the classic campfire songs the boys had been belting out.

When it came bed time it was a bit of a shock to find that not only was the mattress less than an inch thick, but that it was bloody freezing and the blankets were not warm enough to keep the cold at bay. This meant a long cold night spent lying awake listening to others snore and toss and turn as they tried in vain to get comfortable too.