I had booked 2 nights at place called 'Eco Resort' when I bought my flights. Nothing wrong with the place but it was over priced. Usual case of when you buy something Thai in England it costs you twice what it would if you just showed up.
First day I wondered the streets and bought some clean shorts, a T-shirt and some underwear. Managed to find a Thai boxing gym and joined in for the evening session. They were nice enough to lend me shorts and hand wraps so I didn't need to buy them before mine arrived. Session was good, only new experience was the one on one rounds with the main teacher. You do three rounds of pad work. This was extremely exhausting, all my prep has been endurance running. So all of sudden doing high intensity bursts was very taxing. Seemingly a different energy system. I would recover quickly but my power would fade so fast through the round.
Best part of the experience is when the teacher shouts when you hit the pads, its this shout of "Whey!" followed by a smile and a chuckle. At the beginning of the round he would shout this when I threw my right high kick. It's so encouraging. Crosses the language barrier perfectly.
Training session over I went back to the room got showered and changed and headed out to Thaepei Stadium to watch some Muay Thai fights. This stadium is so different to what I have experienced in the past in Bangkok (Lumpinee). This is basically a ring surrounded by bars and totally aimed at drinking tourists. The calibre of fighter very much reflected this. No one really seemed bothered about winning or losing their fight and they had a 'half-time show' where 5 blind folded 'fighters' got in the ring and had a round of blind folded boxing. They were like clowns. But people seemed to enjoy it.
The fights that stood out as exceptions were the lady fight, 2 young boys (12), international fight (Poland vs Thailand) and the main event. The polish guy was much bigger than the thai... But notably older. If I had to guess I'd say 40. So fair play to him. But for all his efforts the thai guy was just playing with him, laughing and takin his time. But when the Polish guy got aggressive the Thai ramped it up, knocked him down with punches then ended it moments later with body kicks. Liver KO. Brutal.
The main event featured a fighter from the gym I had trained at during the day. I was sat nearby and they recognised me as they approached the ring. A few bows and hand shakes later I was sat with them in his corner. I don't speak any thai so i wasn't helping. But it did allow me to get some good photos... and soaked during round breaks when they covered their fighter in ice cold water.
He won his fight with knees to the body. It was a good fight, good way to end the evening.
The next day my bag arrived from the airport so I checked out and jumped on a mini bus to Pai. 3 and half hours north into the mountains we went. The surroundings changed dramatically. Especially after the first hour. We started to climb and it was clear there was a hell of a lot more moisture in the air. As we climbed the plant life flourished and we went from arid city limits to full on jungle. If you have seen a vietnam war movie then you can picture what it's like. Muddy, slippy, dense with fog rolling in from the mountains and rain showers once or twice a day where the sky just falls. Sounds way worse than it is. It's not the Thailand of post card fame. But the temperature remains so much more bearable.
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