Non Khai

I stayed in the 400Baht Ruan Thai guesthouse, rented a bicycle for 30B and took off around the relaxed town. The first place I came across was the Mutmee guesthouse which seems to steal the show in the guidebooks and became a base for me for the next day. Their food was simple, tasty and cheap, although the ordering process was unusual until I got used to it – it’s a bit DIY. I cycled the 5 kilometres to the Sala Keaw Ku sculpture park which houses many huge fantasy statues of deities from Buddhist writings. Then I went on a 100 Baht river cruise (owned incidentally by Mutmee), having made a quick pit-stop at the Tesco Lotus Supermarket outside town. This cruise was a great sunset photo opportunity and then I sat at a very relaxed little bar on the pier, run by a lovely young Essex girl called Caroline (on behalf of Mutmee), and spoke about all sorts of world politics with some other people who were travelling on their own. This was in part facilitated by my ordering 2 Beer Chang instead of the much more safe Singa Beer. When I got back to the guesthouse, I realised the air-con wasn’t working in my ‘posh’ room and there wasn’t a fan so I decided to move on this morning and set off to make my second boarder crossing to Laos.