If you like elephants, fruit and supporting human rights (and to be honest, who doesn’t?) then there’s no better way to spend a couple of days than Chai Lai Orchid Resort.

Nestled in the Mae Wang mountains, an hour outside the Thai northern city of Chiang Mai, the Chai Lai Orchid lodge is within an elephant park that offers amazing scenery and activities while you’re there.

The prices are high for a backpacker and the place is certainly aimed at tourists, but as you delve into the history of Chai Lai and the work that is being carried out you will honestly forget about the high prices and just relax and enjoy yourself.

History of Chai Lai Orchid Resort

Created by Alexa, one of the founders of the excellent Daughters Rising charity, who visited Chiang Mai in Thailand and discovered the appalling trade in women and young girls around the area.  These unlucky souls are sold into sex slavery, sometimes by their own parents.

In order to provide a source of income and a future for these women, Alexa founded The Chai Lai Orchid.  Many of the girls working there are from the Daughters Rising charity, given an opportunity for training and a real fulfilled life working in the successful Thai tourism industry.

It’s these noble actions and goals that allow you the justify the high price you pay for visiting this incredible jewel in the mountain.

Accommodation

We stayed in the least expensive option at The Chai Lai Orchid, an Eco-Hut.  A simple wood shack without air-conditioning but, thankfully, a fan and mosquito net.

The king size bed was very comfy and there was a small balcony overlooking the river.  We spent very little time in the room but it was comfy enough that, even though it was small, it never felt crowded.

We payed 1200 THB per night (about £23/$40), although there are other options with more beds and with air-conditioning.

Each room includes a complimentary breakfast, which has good food and plenty of coffee and tea.

Most rooms overlook the path which the elephants are moved along so you can quite often see them just walking in front of your hut, trust me this never gets old no matter how long you stay at Chai Lai.

There’s also a cafe in which you can sit and watch the river below.  The mahouts are always bringing the elephants down to the river to wash them and play with them. We were jut happy to sit here all day looking at the elephants getting bathed or fed.  It’s a magical sight as these elephants are not the ones you see chained up in other parts of Thailand – they are respected and looked fed which every elephant deserves but the reality is so far from this.

The Amazing Mountain Adventure

We took the full day tour, the “Amazing Mountain Adventure.”  It is a very full day, it started at 06:30, finished at 17:30 and in the end we were totally exhausted.

Our day started by trekking in the jungle to find the elephants where they had been left to eat and sleep during the night.  We had two older female elephants and a young baby elephant.

Once the mahout had woken the elephants up they walked over to us and laid down in front of us, at which point we climbed onto their necks, bareback, and they stood up…

I thought the site of an elephant walking straight towards me was scary, but being on their necks without any sort of harness, legs dangling behind their ears was a different level of scary… especially when they move their heads from side to side to rip bamboo from the floor for their breakfast.

Don’t get me wrong, it was absolutely amazing experience in retrospect but it was intense, Serena’s and my hands were shaking after we got off the elephants.

We rode the elephants through the forest and to the river, on the way we met an American couple and their son who would stay with us for the rest of the day.  My favourite part was the little baby elephant who ran around making mischief and having fun.

At the river the elephants get washed and cooled down before you dismount.  Yes, you’re in the river getting squirted by an elephant and their handlers, but at least all your fear sweat gets washed away.

Then it’s time to recover.  We went back to our room, shower, get changed and enjoy the breakfast at the riverside cafe.  Eat well because you’ll need the energy for the next part of the day, the mountain hike.

In total the hike took us about 6 hours, but we had three rest points throughout.

We walked through a local hill tribe, learning about the history of how they were expelled from Burma (Mynamar) and found a home in Thailand, how they made their living by making cloth, and how they grow most of their own food locally.

This food is currently a concern as there has been an unseasonable dry spell in Thailand right now.  We are visiting Thailand during their wet season but it hasn’t rained once.  Our guide said that it hasn’t rained in over two months, not a drop.

We saw the problems with this as we walked through the rice paddies.  Dried up and unused terraces down the hill-side surround this area.  Places where locals would normally grow the food they need to live are totally barren.  We asked our guide, Sing, what the people eat instead of rice… “They don’t.”

Our first rest point was after we had trekked up the side of the highest hill in the area. Amazing views over the surrounding countryside and a little shade.  If we had attempted this trek in England I don’t think it would have been that challenging, but under the full heat of the Thai sun at around 40˚ Celsius it was hard – we drank about a litre of water each before that first rest point.

The going was a little easier then, downhill and towards our lunch rest point.  Epic scenery all around and the occasional wildlife spot broke up the trek with lots of little moments of excitement.  Sing made us all hats from local leaves to take the heat off our heads, stylish!

Lunch was at a small water fall with a number of small pools you could move between in the water, defiantly refreshing.

Sing cooked us lunch, a quick noodle and vegetable dish that was delicious and well needed after a long walk.

There was also a local woman selling goods she and her family had made, Serena bought a blanket but there was lots of small items you could buy.

Another hike through the forest, thankfully all under cover this time, took us to a refreshing waterfall.  Again we took some time to relax and enjoy the water.  I think this is the most impressive waterfall I have swum near, the force of the water was so impressive that it’s hard to swim up to the waterfall itself.

Yet another hike after the waterfall, the theme of the day, and a short car ride and we found ourselves at the Wang river, the same river that crosses the front of The Chai Lai Orchid resort.  We hop on a bamboo raft with our driver (pilot? punt-er?) and head off down the river.

The low rain makes this an interesting trip, with the raft risking getting caught on rocks but our cheerful and playful expert driver avoids most of these… until he offers me the chance to control the raft.  Not being an expert I got the raft caught more than a handful of times on the 2 hour drift down the river.   It’s also more tiring than you would expect to constantly punt a raft trying to avoid rocks and direct the raft down the river, especially when your expert driver is behind you rocking the boat (literally) trying to make you fall off, all the time laughing as you stumble to regain your balance.

Once we had drifted down the river to the lodge I was totally exhausted while Serena had quite enjoyed her relaxing ride on the raft.

We finished off the day by washing baby elephant in the river and feeding it, it even gave us each a kiss on the cheek to say thank you!

We won’t easily forget our time at The Chai Lai Orchid, being introduced to these amazing creatures and learning more about the challenges that many people face to just survive in the world.

Where Next?

We are heading to Chiang Mai city itself to explore the temples and a local festival that’s happening there.  We’ve also heard about a waterfall that’s made from a mineral deposit that’s actually so sticky you can actually walk up it.

This page will be updated regularly when we have done new reviews.

Reviews of all our Hostels/Guesthouses/Hotels we have stayed at:

• Orchid Lodge, Cameron Highlands. Malaysia.
• Friendly Green House, Georgetown, Penang. Malaysia.
• Chai Lai Lodge, Chiang Mai. Thailand.
• Sakura Hostel Saigon, Ho Chi Minh. Vietnam.
• Le Village Guesthouse, Cebu city. Phillippines.
• Noordzee Hostel, Boljoon. Phillippines.

Reviews of all our Backpacking Gear:

• The North Face Women’s Trekker Convertible Pants
• Eagle Creek Pack-It Cubes
• Eagle Creek Pack-It Shoe Sac
• Eagle Creek Wallaby 2 Washbag
• Teva Zirra Lite Women’s Walking Sandals
• Aqua Quest ‘Sport 25’ 100% Waterproof Backpack
• Cocoon Grid-It Wrap for MacBook Air 13 Inch
• Go Travel Pegless Washing line
• Mountain Warehouse Microfibre Mummy Sleeping Bag Liner

Reviews of the Visa Process:

• Vietnam Visa Victory
• China Visa Rant
• How to Get a Cambodian Visa

‘Money, money, money!’

Let’s face it travelling is not cheap. At the time of writing this (2nd February 2015) I have spent £2027.80 and I haven’t even enjoyed one bit of the trip yet. I’ve spent my money on flights, travel insurance and some backpacking gear but there is still scuba insurance, vaccinations, visas that I need to get before we fly out on the 1st April. You can see how expensive this is going to be and it is only going to get worse.

So I’ve decided to compile a list of things that I did to save money for our backpacking trip (there are many other things you can do so this list is by no means exhaustive).

I will list what I did, how much I saved, a little bit more detail and my tips and tricks for you. Finally see my summarised Top 5 Tips and Tricks to take away from this blog post if you forget everything else.

– We moved in together. We saved ~£300 per week (£3,600 a year)

Andrew rented his own apartment that costed him around £700 a month (£450 – rent, £50 – internet, £30 – water, £80 – council tax, £80 gas and electric). We decided to move in together and by doing so it meant all  our rent and bills were divided by 2. This was really useful for us because it meant we got used to being in each others company and saved us money immediately.

Tips and & Tricks for you: Could you save some money by buddying up with a friend to share the cost of living? Could you downsize from a double bedroom to a single bedroom? Instead of living on your own could you move into a houseshare?

– Shop around for your household utilites. We saved ~£540 a year with £130 cashback

We had a go at trying to save some money on our gas and electricity. This involved going on some comparison websites like moneysupermarket.com or confused.com. Eventually we settled for Martin’s Money Saving Expert. It’s actually really easy and he explains the process step by step. It worked out that we would save £300 a year by paying less money per unit of electric and gas we used. I also got £30 cashback for switching. Another thing is we got British Gas to come out and see if we were eligible for free loft insulation. They also offer cavity wall insulation but we already has this. A staggering 25% of the heat is lost through the roof, so if your house is not well insulated you are just paying for heat that is doing nothing but going straight out of your roof.

In addition, we decided to re-negotiate our internet package and opted for a slower internet speed, which was still Fibre internet so it was a good compromise. This saved us £20 a month.

Tips and & Tricks for you: Get a free estimate to see if you are paying the right amount for your gas and electricity. Could you easily switch and start saving? Could you turn down your thermostat by 1°C and potentially save £90 a year? Check whether you are eligible for free loft or cavity wall insulation. Could you re-negotiate your internet package for a better deal or because you are a loyal customer?

– We took our homemade lunches into work. We saved ~£45 per week (£540 a year)

Every Sunday I spent the afternoon or evening cooking batches of homemade lunches for the both of us to take into work. I then froze these on the day and then I would take them out the day before to defrost. I really enjoyed this because I love cooking. Even though my canteen at work was subsidised I always felt that I could make my own food that was even yummier. Andrew use to spend around £7 a day on his lunch and for me. With a bit of organisation we only spent maybe once a week going out to buy lunch.

Tips and & Tricks for you: Could you swap your takeout lunches for something you have cooked yourself at home? If not, could you make a little bit more for your dinner and have the leftovers as your lunch the next day?

– Change your mode of transport to work. We saved ~£20 per week (£1,040 a year)

For me I took the bus into work because it meant I didn’t have to pay for parking in the city centre where I worked. A weekly pass meant I could use that pass and have unlimited travel. Andrew took my car instead of his gas guzzler that does around 25 miles per gallon so he saved a lot of money on diesel. It was a bonus that it doesn’t cost me anything extra to add him onto my insurance policy.

Tips and & Tricks for you: Could you car share with a colleague from work? Would it be cheaper to get the bus into work?

– Cut down on your daily coffee/tea beverage. We saved ~£20 per week (£1,040 a year)

It’s easy to nip into Costa/Starbucks or your local coffee shop in the morning or afternoon for some caffeine. It’s convenient but it really does hurt your wallet. A little every day adds up to be a lot in one week. We both halved our visits. We both worked out the maths and decided to halve our visits.

Tips and & Tricks for you: Could you bring your own coffee/tea in your own travel mug? If you often go out for catchups could you go somewhere else like your canteen? Could you get your daily fix from your work canteen for cheaper? Use your loyalty cards to get a free drink after a certain amount. Take advantage when they do a 2for1.

– Get practical Birthdays and Christmas presents. We saved ~£200 a year

We both told our friends and families to give us things we needed for our backpacking trip. A simple ask and we got a multi-tool (£60 new), Eagle Creek Pack it Cubes (£30 new), Cocoon grid it organiser (£50 new), Convertible Pants (£50 new)

Tips and & Tricks for you: Ask your family and friends the same as we have done. Explain the situation and I’m sure they will be understanding. If you don’t know what you will need then ask for a gift card.

– Have less takeaways and meals out. We saved ~ £780 a year

Not only did this save us money but it also meant we were healthier by not exposing our bodies to all the MSG and the fat and oil in all those takeaways. We had one less takeout and one less meal out per month.

Tips and & Tricks for you: If you are going to eat out could you go for an early bird deal that is cheaper? Do they do deals such as 2for 1 with a loyalty card, or deals on a particular day such as a burger and drink for £9 or curry night on Tuesdays for £7?

– Start looking for deals and use your loyalty/cashback cards. We saved £466 a year

There are a number of thing we did:

• Cinema – we took advantage of the 2for1 Orange Wednesdays. With us going on average one a month, this saved us £8 per month.
• Started using our loyalty cards – With £50 worth of Boots points on my card I used this to buy things we needed for out trip like insect repellent. I also asked my mum for her Tesco Clubcard vouchers so I could turn them into 4 times their value online and his equated to a meal out each month.
• I learnt to use cashback websites which pay you a small percentage based on your total spend if you click to your shopping destination via the link on their website. This netted me £200 in total that went straight into my bank account.
• I also started using my M&S credit card more because I converted my points into M&S vouchers at the end of the month which was around £10 in vouchers.

Tips and & Tricks for you: Put your loyalty cards in your purse/wallet and remember to use them. See if there is a special discount if you buy something online. Ask your sister/brother/cousin to go shopping with you and use their student discount.

– Ad hoc items – We started using Freecycle and Ebay . We saved ~£300 a year

Buying big ticket items is expensive and I started using sites like Freecycle, where people list things they don’t want anymore for free and it is first come first served. Some are good quality items whereas some just do the job. Most of the time I wasn’t bothered by the brand or aesthetics, I was just interested in it doing the job (I broke 2 vacuums in one week!) I also used Ebay to buy a few things such as a computer desk. You can get items relatively cheap because only people who live nearby will be able to bid (postage would be too expensive) and the only option is to drive over and pick it up.

Some examples are below:

Tips and & Tricks for you: If you don’t know how to use those sites, don’t buy it at full price, wait until there is a sale. Do you have a social news at work where people post things they want to sell and you could get them for a good price?

Phew…..as you can see there are many ways to save money for your travels or backpacking trip.

To summarise here are my Top 5 Tips:

1. Spend less or make your money go further
2. Cook your own lunches
3. Live with someone and share the costs
4. Cut down on those daily Starbucks caffeine fixes
5. Reduce the number of takeaways you have

How did you save money? Give me some more tips as I can save more money for my travels next time! Leave me a comment below.