The Trek Part 2: The Morning Errands

Wake up for the trek was at 7 since Ar would be picking us up at 8. I was probably awake from 6 just laying in bed for Jennifer’s phone to start alarming. I suppose it was a good thing since her phones alarm was quite wimpy and did not wake her. The shower was bearly above room temperature, but that’s about as good as can be expected from dorm accommodations for 100B a bed. As we all got ready we dragged our bags out to pack what we were bringing on the trek. The rest we could leave in the guesthouse office. Ar arrived early at about 7:45, and by 8 we had all piled ourselves and our gear into the back of the songtau. The songtau was driven by our second guide and Ar’s friend, Song. Our first errand to run before heading on the trek was to stop by the Tourist Police offices. Volunteer officer Dan Kelly, from Northern Ireland talked to us and was given a copy of our itinerary and passports, and basically assured us that if anything bad happened he would come find us. He made some quip about our proximity to the Burmese boarder during the trek but said not to worry; he was from Northern Ireland and they are bomb making experts. (The closet we came to the boarder was 60km, but that is a measure by trail rather than as the bird flies)

We then drove off to our second destination of the morning, a local market. At this market Song and Ar went off to buy the food supplies that they would need to cook for us during the trek and we found water, bug spray, suntan lotion, flashlights (or torches as they call them here, british influence I suppose) and oranges.

Back into the Songtau we started our long drive into the mountains. Slowly but surely the landscape we were driving through changed from urban sprawl with majestic emerald mountains in the distance to forest surrounding us on all sides, stretching as far and as high as the eye could see. Ashton brought his iPod and a set of external speakers so we rocked out and sung along to the songs as we ascended the mountain through winding switch backs and epic views of towering forested monoliths. We made two stops before reaching our final destination. The first one seemed like a boarder checkpoint, although we hadn’t crossed any boarder that I knew off, and Ar handed our itineraries to a solider and after a short discussion he let us through. Our second stop was at the Chang Dao National Park Headquarters. This was the last western toilets available to us for the next few days. I didn’t take advantage of it, I just got out to stretch my legs, but both of the girls made sure to make a quick pit stop.

Then it was back into the vehicle for more driving. By the time we had reached the picturesque mountain village we had driven for 2 hours, although it was 2 hours of the most wonderful scenery.