A New Mae Suai Dam.

Steve Merchant

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Dec 11, 2009
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Making a connection in Mae Suai with some friends coming North from Phayao I took the quiet country route, 3023, out to Fang and connected with the 109 at the oil depot. From there I had a lazy slow ride passing through several villages who intensively farm the small river valley on the right side of the highway. Garlic the big product (or maybe it's shallots) in neat terraces and corn on any other land they can find.
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Close to the top of the climb the road switches from left side of the valley to the right. The coffee shop here owned by Akha is a great stop, not a cheap one, expensive cakes but good coffee.

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In past years the big valley, now on your left, has suffered the most awful burning I have ever seen but as yet it's not too bad, although it's early days.
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On around the main road a big repair job is going on to fix what I assume was a landslip during the destructive rainy season. Once off the twisty bits I expected a straight downhill ride to the 118 junction but just as you hit the flatter section a massive construction site appears on the left and it's quite obviously a dam site. Huge. Trucks in the distance looking miniscule being maybe a kilometer away and a large amount of machinery is at work moving thousands of tons of soil and rocks.
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I was stunned, had no idea this was going on in what I consider to be my local district. Building work too, a canteen /restaurant, a big office/headquarters and what looked like garages. Sorry about the lack of good pictures, it wasn't easy to a good position amongst all the dirt, moving trucks and rough roads. I will have to go back try again.
 
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