Saying Good-Bye to Paradise

Leaving is always hard.  Even excitement for new places and new adventures can't completely temper the sadness of leaving friends, favorite restaurants, familiar routines.  Even with promises of keeping in touch and visiting, the truth is, we know we may never be back.

To help take away the sting, as our departure from Chiang Mai approached we planned lots of good-byes--the fun kind!

First, we invited all our friends to one of the coolest places on Earth:  Chiang Mai Grand Canyon Water Park.

We got there soon after it opened and left when they kicked us out at closing.

We had a blast, slipping and sliding on obstacles, jumping from the tall inflatables, swimming, and laughing.

Darling Daughter with her friends

It seemed like half of CMIS 9th grade showed up to say good-bye to Young Man!

Funny Guy and friends

I can't think of a better way to say good-bye than by making memories like these together.

We also filled our last weeks with lunches, dinners, camping (will get its own post), and parties--as much fun as we could cram into a month and still pack out on time.  It almost made moving worth it.  We are going to miss this place and these people!  Here are a few highlights from our last month in Chiang Mai:

The locally employed staff at the Consulate General Chiang Mai took me out to eat for lunch at a Mexican restaurant.  These are the people who made working in Chiang Mai so wonderful.  I will miss them!

Dinner and dessert with great friends!

A good-bye lunch at Dash with some of the fantastic Consulate ladies I had the privilege of getting to know.

Christmas party with the missionary community we had the pleasure of mingling with.

Last dinner at one of our favorite Chiang Mai restaurants: Salsa Kitchen!

Young Man got his braces off (after more than five years!!!).

Caught Moana with friends--great movie!

Last trip to the Chiang Mai night market.  The kids and I had fun browsing the wares; My Man enjoyed a long foot massage.

Darling Daughter talked us into numerous good-byes with friends.  We're going to miss these awesome girls!

Funny Guy has been begging to go to the Chiang Mai Night Safari practically since we moved here.  We finally squeezed it in our last week with one of his besties.

Darling Daughter had a great dance performance; Funny Guy also had a Christmas concert.

The Consulate threw a great Christmas party/Farewell, showing a slideshow for My Man and showering us with gifts.  Santa even made an appearance, riding in on a tuk-tuk.

Camping in Paradise: Last Trip To Doi Pui

"Do you really think that's a good idea?" I asked, eyebrow raised as My Man announced a plan to go camping just days before our final pack-out.  I made a mental checklist of things we still needed to do before our move.  Adding in the prep and then cleanup of a campout seemed crazy.  But then again . . . I really love camping up at Doi Pui.  I grinned, "OK, let's do it!"

We invited friends, prepped food, gathered the last of our s'mores ingredients and hit the road.  One of the best parts about Doi Pui is that it is less than mile an hour from our house.  The road is steep and windy but boasts sweeping vistas and Buddhist temples and (in December) bright red poinsettias in bloom.  The last mile or so is a twisting one-lane road that requires some creative driving, but the end result is worth it:  a beautiful terraced campsite with stunning views of Chiang Mai.

Just five minutes in camp was enough to assure me that we'd made the right choice choosing camping over packout prep this weekend.

We set up tents (Young Man preferring to set up his camping hammock), built a fire, then got busy relaxing while we waited for the rest of our friends to show up.  I spent more than an hour in a hammock reading, uninterrupted!  Young Man searched for (and found) several scorpions.  Darling Daughter and Funny Guy kept the fire well-stocked, and My Man seronaded us all on his guitar.

And then friends began to arrive and the fun really began.  We enjoyed a potluck dinner, music, a puppy, games, and s'mores.  We laughed, we talked, I may have gotten a little nostalgic thinking of leaving and shed a few discreet tears.  Mostly I just tried to soak it all in, loving every moment.

The next morning, we watched a beautiful sunrise, enjoyed a fantastic breakfast, then soaked in the soul-freeing beauty of the mountain until it was finally time to pack up and head back to a few more days of real life before packing up to leave all of this behind.

Camping is great.  Camping with friends is unbeatable.  In fact, we had so much fun that we seriously contemplated coming back the next weekend (our last weekend in Thailand!) but at last decided that there was no way to improve upon this trip and to try would risk disappointment.  Besides, at some point we really would need to pack. . . just not today.