2002-02-02

Watching the stars

I took a short motorcycle excursion to Phrao and Chiang Dao. It's about 150 kilometers around the edges of a box where the corners are, in order of travel: Long Kord, Phrao, Ping Khong and Mae Taeng. This was a warmup for longer trips and it went without any trouble. Everyone is telling me to make an overnight visit to Pai so I think I'll do that tomorrow.

"Come out, you'll miss it!", Botter was outside banging on the window to get my attention. I put my shoes on and went out. It was dark and it took a few moments for my eyes to adjust. There isn't much light pollution here in the country and the stars are brighter than I remember them being at home. A few stars lined up on the horizon looked peculiar and I wondered why they were such a bright red. Before I could ask Botter explained, "Those are hot-air balloons. They make them from paper with a bamboo frame about two and a half feet wide and five feet tall. Fuel-soaked rags supply the heat. They launch them for celebrations."

We watched for several minutes as the balloons rose and drifted slowly across the horizon. Beautiful.