Jungle Rafting

After an early breakfast we headed west out of sleepy Pai, our pick-up truck making the only sound as we followed the road into the hills at the top of the valley.

We were travelling towards the small town of Soppong, which is really just a trading centre for the surrounding hill tribe communities. Near here we would be launching our raft and spending the next two days paddling fifty kilometres down the Pai river to Mae Hong Son.

With me in the back of the pick-up were three Americans; Mike, Jack and Anna. In the cab was Alex; the trip organiser, and Lee, a tough looking Lisu who was to be our skipper, guide and general entertainer for the trip. Spread with equal discomfort for everyone in the back were our uninflated raft with it’s accompanying equipment, food and beer for the trip, and our daypacks containing little more than a change of clothing and a towel.

Once we climbed out of the Pai valley and up into the mountains the views were magnificent. Ridges running as far as I could see every few miles, separated by lush green valleys which were mainly secondary forest; all of the ancient timber forests have long since been cut down. These days you have to travel another fifty kilometres into Burma to get your illegal teak.

None of us had much rafting experience, so as soon as we unloaded the pick up at our launching place, Lee gave us some hands-on training in paddling and steering, and explained the safety rules which came down to ‘always wear your life vest and helmet because you’re all going to fall in’

For the first two hours we slowly floated downstream, through the steep jungle clad hillsides, totally absorbed in the scale of the forest; the sounds of the monkeys, the sight of electric blue kingfishers flying low and fast just above the water, the atmosphere defined by the tropical heat and the ambient soundtrack of the flowing river.

We continued after a lazy lunch on the riverbank, stopping at a small waterfall for a swim, and soon after reached our camp for the night. At a junction with a small tributary of the river were a collection of open sided bamboo shelters; between them these structures provided cooking, sitting and sleeping facilities.

The center of the campsite had an open fire at each end of a 4 metre thatched roof with a bamboo supporting wall on the side of the jungle, open to the river on the front. A long bamboo table with benches running along the sides filled most of the space. Around the fire at the top was a rudimentary kitchen area, above the other fire hung a large iron kettle.

Sleeping accommodation was in a bamboo longhouse. A metre above the ground, a platform the length of the building was walled in on the back and sides, again the front was open to the river. Mosquito nets draped over six sleeping mats on the platform; these were to be our beds for the night. Washing and toilet facilities were in the river; above the camp a small fall in the stream was walled off with rocks to create a natural spa, downstream a bamboo screen on the riverbank allowed a little privacy for taking care of natures call.

After a dip in the pool and a mug of hot tea we set off to explore a cave. Following the tributary upstream we walked for almost an hour into the jungle, gradually climbing up the steep hillside towards the cave entrance. When we finally arrived my heart sank. Far from being a cave as I had imagined it would be, in front of us a narrow crack in the rock at our feet led to an almost vertical ten metre chimney into the depths of the mountain. Once I found out that inside most of the traveling would be on hands and knees I decided that a combination of claustrophobia and snake phobia were too much and would stay outside whilst everyone else went pot holing.

After they had disappeared into the cave, I sat down and communed with nature. Sitting here in the jungle totally alone was fantastic, the trees provided enough cover to keep the temperature down, but allowed in enough sunlight to see.

Mike came back out after ten minutes; apparently he was too big to squeeze through the cracks so I had made the right decision by staying outside. We started to explore the immediate vicinity, but didn’t want to stray too far from the cave entrance, so spent the next forty minutes sitting and chatting, absorbing the jungle sights and sounds, waiting for the others to return. The walk back to the camp was physically easier as it was downhill all the way, but, as it was getting near to dusk the light was fading quickly, and we became aware of more and more wildlife activity as the inhabitants of the forest started to come out for their nocturnal hunting. It was almost totally dark for the last kilometer, luckily we had each brought a torch and were able to light our path, but, disconcertingly, when shone into the trees you could see occasional pairs of eyes reflecting in the beam.

Back at the camp, the evening entertainment consisted of a freezing bath in the river, followed by huge amounts of curry and rice cooked over a fire, lots of beer and home-made whiskey, a few spliffs, finally going to sleep at about nine pm. Surprisingly I slept solidly for eight hours or so, and didn’t get bitten by a cobra, dragged off by a tiger or dined on by marauding mosquitoes.

Day two was the white-water rafting day. After an early breakfast we loaded the raft and set off downstream, all of us excited but slightly apprehensive about the forthcoming rapids. We entered the first rapids after thirty minutes of gently floating along with the current. At this part of the river the first few sets of rapids were quite tame; grade two we were told, easy enough for novices to practice without too much force, so we should manage to stay in the raft. As we approached, the raft speeding up as the current flowed faster between the protruding rocks, Lee shouted out instructions. ” When you fall out relax and float with the river, don’t fight the current,” he told us. `And don’t let go of your paddles, they cost 20 dollars’, he added with typical Thai respect for materialism over human life.

We rode through the first few rapids, gaining confidence and keeping inside the raft. The fourth set was the first of the grade four rapids, with a drop of about a metre. As we neared the first rocks the river flow picked up noticeably, and we could hear the water crashing past the rocks ahead. Lee, steering at the rear with a paddle, lined up the raft to approach the gap between the rocks head on, and on his command we raised our paddles from the water, and carried along quickly by the fast flowing current, bumped through fifty metres of rocks before finally flying out over the drop, crashing back into the water with a bump. We looked at each other and grinned, smugly congratulating ourselves on a successful ride. Without warning the front of the raft hit a small rock, spun us sideways, and Anna fell out, quickly carried away from us by the river. We frantically paddled over to the slower flowing side of the river where she ended up, Jack leaned over to help her back into the raft, and promptly fell out himself.

The next set, four hundred metres downstream, was actually two sets together, with a metre drop at the start, followed by forty metres of rocks and another metre drop at the end. As we hit the water after the first drop, I slipped from my position seated on the side into the raft, Mike fell on top of me, his knee catching me in the chest, knocking the breath from my lungs. With only four people left to control the raft we hit the second drop sideways, but miraculously managed to keep the raft upright with everyone on board.

We stopped for lunch by a bend in the river where the erosion had created a small beach. On the opposite bank a waterfall tumbled down a cliff, and a troop of monkeys played in the trees. a short walk along the riverbank took us to a hot spring. The water was as hot as a bath, and the steam created a mist floating above the river for about twenty metres. There was a strong smell of sulphur in the air, the rocks surrounding the spring were stained yellow.

We continued our journey, passing through another six sets of rapids uneventfully, fully confident of our rafting ability. As we approached the last set, again with a drop at both the start and the finish, we were all distracted by a group of monkeys in the trees on the right, the raft spun to the right so that we hit the first drop sideways. Anna and I, seated on the left side, fell in. Luckily the rapids here were not too fast, and we managed to scramble back into the raft before we arrived at the next drop. This time as we approached the drop the raft spun to the left, and predictably Jack and Mike fell in.

The final few kilometers of the journey took us into the Mae Hong Son valley, where the river widened and slowed, and we were out of the jungle clad hills and into cultivated land. We passed a few small villages where children, after staring at us as if we were aliens, broke into huge grins and waved, shouting ‘farang‘, the Thai word for foreigner.