Another local bus and we were still surprised that it was an hour late, it was a fight to get on and Pete ended up having to sit on the floor.

We had booked into Cave Lodge in Soppong, once we got off the bus we both jumped on some motorbike taxis to the lodge. The lodge was amazing, they had various different kinds of huts to stay in, we picked the cheapest and opted for the smallest one as it had a lovely view over the river. The room had a double bed that touched 3 sides of the hut and a foot of space down the fourth, it was cute.

Soppong is further up in the northern hills of Thailand along the Mae Hong Song loop, it's a small village but the surrounding area has lots of caves which you can explore. We chose to stay at cave lodge as they organise caving tours.

That evening we were told that the village were having a festival to raise money for the local temple, we decided to check it out. There were loads of people about, all the families of the village had created money trees to donate to the village temple. Women would walk past holding these trees in the air and shaking them about whilst men followed them banging drums and shouting. The main attraction though was up on stage, various women were getting up to sing, we didn't realise until a bit later that it was actually karaoke, only in Asia! We hung out a bit and had a good laugh at the crowd, it seemed that the festival brought out all the village idiots!

The next day we headed out on a caving tour we had booked, it was a mix of caving and trekking, so the day started with about an hour trek through the dusty hills. We arrived at the first cave which was called fossil cave. We were given hard hats which we thought was a bit extreme, we really didn't know what we were getting ourselves into. It was quite challenging, squeezing through tiny gaps and climbing over massive boulders, it really didn't feel very safe but we made it the 500 meters in and our guide showed us some sea shell fossils that had formed there, it was incredible. Unfortunately there was only one way out, the way we just came. Pete struggled a bit getting through some of the tight holes but just about managed to squeeze through by dragging himself along the floor.
We then made our way to the next cave, this one being called waterfall cave, again we didn't know what we were letting ourselves in for. We stopped at the entrance and our guide who didn't speak much English started taking his shoes and socks off and his trousers to reveal shorts. At this point we looked at each other and thought how wet are we going to get considering there was only a small stream flowing into the cave. So we followed suit and took our socks off, we wore our trainers without socks. We got into the first section and left our walking sticks and bags off so that he could hang them up out of the water. Our guide then point to the other couple we were with and said "no camera, very wet". Hmmmm we thought how wet are going to get? The guide disappeared so Kate went down to find him. Pete heard a little scream from Kate and found her waste deep in water, eeekkk! There was about a foot from where the stalagmites finished and the water began, so yes we had to crawl through the water, basically we were wet from head to toe, no one had informed us about this! It was a lot of fun though if a little scary. We made it to the end where your at the top of the waterfall. It was amazing, the drop was 25 meters. Unfortunately again there was only one way out... The way we came. We made it out dripping wet, luckily it was a hot day so we dried quickly over lunch.

We then continued our trek to the next next cave. The walk was very up and down and the earth was very loose and Kate constantly ended up on her bum sliding down the hills. The next cave was called Xmas cave and started off with a very steep climb down (Kate ended up on her bum again) but once we were down, the cave was amazing. The stalagmites where all white and there were hundreds of them, the cave was massive, you could play tunes in the stalagmites, it's like they were hollow. We then made our way back to the lodge. We were glad we had a guide as we were all able to go further into the caves and you would no way be able to find them on your own or want to go to on your own.

Once we were back at the lodge we bumped into a group of people we had met previously and headed to Tham Lod. To get into the cave you have to get a boat so we all jumped on these two very narrow boats and headed into the darkness of the cave. Our guides had huge gas powered lamps to guide us. We got off the boats at the first cave and headed up some steps. The cave was massive, it was so impressive. The guides were pointing out stalagmites that looked like animals or rude body parts, it was very funny. We then got back on the boat and visited another cave which meant having to climb up steep ladders, but it was worth it. Like the caves we had visited earlier in the day they were full of bats. We then made our way to the far exit of the cave by boat and there were thousands of birds entering the cave, you could smell the bird poo as it was everywhere. The noise was incredible, it was so loud. We had a wander round again up ladders but as the hand rail was covered in bird poo you couldn't hold on. But, we made it back to the boat in one piece.

It was a very exhausting day, we were glad to get back to the lodge and have a shower (even if it was cold) and get to bed.