From Nan it was about a five hour drive north way way up into the hills of Phu Chi Fa National Park. It’s time to take a break from all the temples and focus on some hiking. I quickly found my accommodation for the next few nights perched on this very steep slope, Chill Chill Camp.

This place is awesome! It’s one of many similar camps along the single lane mountain road up here. I’m not even sure what village this technically is as everything is just dotted along the road, but whatever. Look at that view!

I have my own tent and my own deck with that amazing view west into Thailand. I’m the only guest here and I haven’t seen any other guests or cars or anything at any of the other camps either. The whole district seems abandoned and I’m pretty sure I’m the only tourist east of Chiang Mai. Ha! It’s still the off season and it shows because every restaurant and store is closed up here. I was anticipating that, though. Good thing I stopped at that grocery store in Nan before heading out.

I often get asked about my backpack, well there it is in a very rare photo appearance above. I’ve been using that same backpack for ten years now. It’s been really good to me. Anyway, the best part about coming to a place like this in the off season aside from not having to deal with a lot of people and a lot of traffic, is that I get to stay at amazing places like this at a 75% discount.

The one and only thing to do up here is hike, and that’s exactly why I came. The really big draw is the uber famous mountain, Phu Chi Fa, which I tackled first. There’s a good road that goes up to a parking lot before taking the relatively short walk up to the summit. For some reason though, I decided just to walk from my hotel.

After walking along the road for about a mile, then up the forty five degree access road to the parking lot, then up the steep trail, I finally made it to the distinct summit. I was a bit tired… and very sweaty.

This mountain range forms the border with Laos. The summit marker clearly shows Thailand on one side and Laos on the other. Although, according to the map this point is over the border by a few hundred feet.

I took a nice long break and gazed out over the Lao countryside. In the pic below, that village is Ban Kim Siang, Laos. You can also see a sliver of the Mekong River, which flows from Yunnan, China all the way to the southern tip of Vietnam, just below the clouds on the left.

If you’re having trouble making out the river, here’s a close up. We’ll get closer to that amazing river in just a bit.

I walked down Phu Chi Fa and all the way back to my hotel and had some lunch, thinking I would just relax the rest of the day. But there are other peaks I came here to see and my restlessness got the better of me, so I hopped in the car and drove about eight miles up the road to Phu Chi Dao. The access “road” up to Phu Chi Dao is beyond steep and I quickly realized my little rental car wasn’t going to make it. So I parked down on the main road and started trudging. The road didn’t last very long anyway before it turned into a normal trail.

The hike up was pretty much straight up for a couple of miles and after climbing Phu Chi Fa earlier, I was wondering if I would make it. I did finally reach the summit exhausted. This summit is also at the border with Laos.

I was questioning my sanity and my decision to do both of these peaks in one day all the way up, but that view was totally worth the pain. From the top I could see Phu Chi Fa from this morning and a little bit closer view of the Mekong (on the left again).

It was a very long slog back down that steep slippery mountain. I’m definitely gonna feel this tomorrow.

Well, I was right, I did feel it the next day. My legs are little wobbly. No time to stop, though, I have another peak to get to. Luckily for my knees, the road up to the parking lot at Doi Pha Tang was good and it was just a short hike up from there. I get the impression that this is a really popular place during the regular season, but today it’s all mine. That’s my lonely rental car at the far end.

Doi Pha Tang is also a border peak and the closest to the Mekong River. Further north the river is the border, but down here the mountain range takes over and Laos gets to enjoy the muddy water exclusively.

They didn’t have the usual summit marker up here, but they did have a couple of bells. And I rung the hell out of both of them. There’s no one here to hear them anyway.

There was also a lot of butterflies up here. This was the only one that would let me take a picture though.

I’ll finish out this post with an awesome panorama from the summit of Doi Pha Tang. The Mekong River runs through the whole length of the pic! Beautiful! This was probably the best view yet. I spent a long time up here taking it all in before heading back.

This place may not be in any danger of flooding, but there are a lot of remnants of mudslides in various stages of clean up. I feel like I’m lucky to have come here without incident. Now it’s time to prepare for the next leg of this journey. They say the flood danger has subsided, let’s hope so. Later…