No Hinting. Stay on Trial.

At Mae Mut Garden, we typically work six days per week and take Sunday off. (Partly this is because the Karen staff, being Christian, take Sunday off anyway.) On our Sundays, we go out and see the surrounding area. The first two times, Step and I went out on a motor-scooter by ourselves, to chase those infamous waterfalls. Since then, we have been fortunate enough to go out with the whole family, including Pii Hom and her 14-year-old daughter, Nong Nam.

No hinting.
Stay on trial.
Don't write.

One of our recent such outings was to Mae Wang National Park—home of strange, amazing sandstone-like formations as well as many ambitious pebbles. Originally, weeks ago, we had been discussing the aforementioned Sundays-out-in-the-world plan after lunch. Marco disappeared into the house and brought out a glossy tri-fold brochure with beautiful photos of this place and much writing in Thai. “Where is this?” he asked one of the staff in Thai, pointing at the photo, and thus our adventure was born.

Fast forward. After breakfast and watering, we pile in the pickup truck. In the cab, we have Marco, Nok, Her Highness Serena, Pii Hom, and Bruno. In the bed, facing backwards and waving at two intrepid Thai children doing the same thing but standing up, we have Step, Molly (our super-co-volunteer—American, my age, superb company, former New Orleans mule driver and tour guide), and Pil. We just go where they take us, you know? As we rumble down the road, all four dogs sprint after us. We discuss the logistics of stealing one and bringing it to Burma. We do not. (Editor’s Note: We haven’t gone to Burma yet, so the possibility has not been ruled out, and also, it’s not stealing if every other day your host tells you to take every single dog except for Spaghetti.)

The first order of business is to go to a friend of Marco and Nok’s, Pii Paeo (Peh-yo) who lives on her own farm nearby. Pii Paeo will guide us to our destination, because there is no such thing as Google Maps in Thailand. She and her husband retired early, bought some land, and then built their whole house and basically everything else on the property themselves. It is impressive, and a dozen fresh-picked lemons (not lime!) are foisted upon us. We accept the various small fruits which Pii Hom picks and proffers. Every time, Pii Hom says, “Aloy! Aloy!” (“Delicious, delicious!) while wickedly waving the tempting fruit. Secret: it’s not always delicious, and Pii Hom knows it, but it’s a sign that she loves us. After this short tour, Pii Paeo joins the cab-of-the-truck crew and Bruno comes back to the pickup bed with the rest of us clueless farang. Bruno points out to us a field full of tobacco plants on the way, thereby educating the youth.

After much driving and interrogative repeating of words in Italian and English (“Quick, Bruno, cippolline, in English!”) we arrive at Mae Wang National Park. We park, nationally, near the top of a hill, and after taking in a beautiful panorama we descend a long staircase. The path at the bottom is dusty, tan, full of pebbles. As Phil remarks with unbelievable nerdiness to Molly, it looks a lot like the canyon on Tattooine that the Jawas’ big trapezoidal vehicle drives through in Star Wars. Along the way, to Molly’s amusement, are not just a few trail markers, in the form of pyramidal piles of pebbles, but many, many trail markers. We wind through these canyons, sometimes single-file, sometimes fairly squeezing through, until we arrive at a short, kindly placed bamboo ladder with complimentary bamboo handle sticking out of the rock. We go up. And bang, we behold that which must have been described on those Thai signs: the tall, eroded, reddish pillars of Nature herself. Initially, we think that they are sandstone, but closer inspection (and some poking) reveals that it is just compressed dirt.


After a few photos, including a superbly executed debut selfie by Marco, we climb a steep set of “stairs” with the ample aid of a thick rope railing. Mostly we haul ourselves up. From this level, we can see much farther. Forested hills on all sides, disappearing into the distance. This level is only perhaps half the full height of the sandstone pillars. After group photos, Marco, Pii Hom, and Molly go back down. Step, Phil, and Bruno take it even higher, scrambling up a rutted “path” to a ridge closer to the top. Up here, pebbles shift under our feet, it is deathly apparent that this is not rock at all but pure dirt, and we are very careful in every way our mothers would like us to be. Bruno Goes Farther than Steppil, foraying out onto the peninsula in order to take slightly nearer photos of the distant scenery.

After the National Park, it’s decidedly time for lunch. We drive back to a small village not far from home, where we eat tasty, spicy lunch at a simple roadside vendor’s table. The highlight? At this place, you can buy harvested ant eggs in small plastic bags, which we do. Step and Pil each eat a spoonful of ant eggs, minding that they don't scoop one of the several live ants in the bag onto their spoons. It tastes like dust and protein.

Our goal for this outing is to visit every picture in the glossy tri-fold brochure. Pointing to the picture of a compelling cave, we ask the lunch ladies where we can find this cave, and are directed to what turns out to be a wat, emerging on the wooded mountainside after some twisting turns amidst tangerine trees. Like many wats, but perhaps more than your average, this is really a quiet, peaceful, lush place. We climb to the entrance to the cave, which involves passing through a beautiful shrine set into a large alcove in the rock, with various cups and books and bottles arranged as offerings on either side of the path. Lighting our phones (or, in Molly’s resourceful case, headlamp), we descend into the cave. It is cool There is a light fixture, which does not respond to our inquiries. Around a bend, at the far back of this cave, underground, out of sight of the opening, is a beautiful, serene Buddha. We pause to watch him a minute, to see what we can learn, and then we turn back.

The wat emerges from the longan grove.

Ganesh holds up the electricity cables.

On the reservoir.

The day’s gastrointestinal adventures are not over yet, for it’s getting to be time for dinner. We agree that we can spring for a restaurant. Correct choice! Marco and Nok take us to a lakeside restaurant offering many small bamboo shelters—sort of like detached porches—where you can sit cross-legged around a table near the water. (We avoid the ones on the water to forestall the possibility of Serena falling through the slats into the sea).

Apparently this is “the thing” for Thais to do on the weekend, or so Marco says: hit up the local reservoir, eat out on a floating raft-house, and sing karaoke. This might be our most authentic Thai experience yet! Nok, knowing Step’s adventurous eating habits, mentions that there are fresh prawns that you can eat, so we order these fresh prawns. So fresh, in fact, that when Pii Hom lifts the lid off the bowl, they start leaping out of the boal. They are silver, long-whiskered, and definitely not dead. Step eats them fearlessly, and Pil is persuaded to follow suit. Turns out these live prawns are really delicious, and mostly they don’t move while they’re in your mouth, and they’re not too filling. You can’t eat just one. All the rest of the food is delicious, too. The Chang is classic.

And when we get home, the dogs jump all over us with glee.