The ride back

Beloved --
A nice ride through villages and rice paddies back to the resort and the chilly pool after our visit to the coffin maker. We enjoyed yet another spectacular Thai dinner with our head guide, Mr. Pan, joining us this time.
It was not always Mr. Pan's habit to eat with us. In the hill-tribe villages he ate with the host families and assistant guides. I can quite understand his eating separately from us--it's hard work to enjoy yourself in table conversation in something other than your native language. Pan is a great guy and does his best--and the conversation becomes more animated after a couple of Singha beers.
I should mention that REI Adventure tours does its best not to exploit the usual tourist attractions and environmentally damaging trekking practices. We did not go to Karen villages where the women's necks were stretched over their lifetimes. That is a much touted "cultural/eco-tour" in the store fronts in Chiang Mai. The elephant sancturary we visited--despite a pretty kitchy show--works to rehabilitate/care for elephants that have been used to clear land mines in Laos. Our hiking was all in national parks and forest preserves. The money for the homestays in the hill-tribe villages goes to the villagers and are intentionally not tourist traps. (After a few days now in Chiang Mia seeing what is being flogged to the tourists as trekking adventures, I'm very happy with the REI Thailand Multisport trip. By way of full disclosure, I do not work for REI or any of its affiliates. I do have a very low--read 5 digit--membership number, which used to get me a free beer amongst the Northwest expat community in Greece whenever we would play "low coop number poker." Wonder if that still works?)
I love you and miss you all,
Jim