The second stage between Mae Kha and Sop Kai has the same distance (49k) but a smaller elevation (2250m instead of+ 3000m) than the 1st stage. It will be important to manage efficiently the series of running days. After a first and tough day it will be interesting to see how the shape is. Hopefully the night will be good and relaxing in the quiet village of Mae Kha. In the morning a beautiful sunrise will escort us on the way up to the mountains that overlook Mae Kha. We will take the opportunity to look at the beautiful village down and the Chiang Mai valley further. We will enjoy this magnificient view and the wild nature that will surrounds us.

After leaving Mae Kha we will cross some rice paddies before attacking a walk up in the jungle to Doi Pha Dam (1370m). The track is straight and steep in the forest. It looks like a long ordeal or rather a tough pilgrimage, because after reaching the summit we will go down to the sacred temple of Wat Prabat Si Loi. The temple is popular with Thais for its beautiful and lonely surrounding and for its famous Buddha footprint. I tried to understand the origin of this footprint by discussing with a local person. Unfortunately I need still to take few more Thai lessons to understand exactly the full story!

Leaving Wat Prabat Si Loi we will run down a beautiful and wild dirt road to the valley of Pha Daeng. We will enjoy a splendid scenery of the surrounding mountains before entering this little and quiet valley. The original vegetation is perfectly mixed with crops (mainly rice) and the Karen tribe villages. It creates a beautiful atmosphere.

Anyway, it’s not complicated, leaving Wat Prabat Si Loi, it will be an explosion of beauty. We won’t limit ourselves to few beautiful pieces. Like for a gourmet menu, we will taste every meals: rice terraces, rivers and gorges, preserved villages, jungle and bamboo forests, mountain sceneries. On the next 20k we won’t miss anything.

Approaching the jungle out of the valley of Pha Daeng, progress in the jungle will not be easy although the trail there will have been cleaned few days before the race. It will be quite an adventure to cross it. After this jungle we will tackle the way up to the Hmong tribe village, Mong Ngoa. The difficulty of the ascent will succed to the difficulty of the track; the mountains sceneries will succeed to the dense and confined atmosphere of the jungle.

Arriving in the Hmong village of Kai Noi, we will have few last kilometers gown to do until reaching Sop Kai. We will spend the night in this small Thai village alongside the beautiful Mae Taeng river.