Dawn on the Doi Suthep Trails with a Dog Who Never Gets Tired

My alarm clock is a red Thai Ridgeback breathing on my face at 5:40. Khao Tom has never once overslept, not even on the cold mornings in January when I would happily stay under the blanket until noon. By six we are on the lower trails toward Doi Suthep, while the city is still blue and the temple bells are somewhere far above us.

He came from a farm outside Mae Rim, and I think the farm explains everything. He loves to climb. Steep, rocky, rooty, he does not care. On the flat parts he walks beside me like a perfect gentleman, weirdly polite when other hikers pass. On the slopes he becomes a deer. I have learned to use a hands-free belt leash so my shoulders survive.

Hiking in Thailand with a dog has its own rules, and I learned them slowly. We are always back before eight, because after that the heat arrives and the ground gets hot on his pads. I carry a collapsible bowl and more water than I think we need, and we stop in the shade every twenty minutes or so. In the burning season, when the smoke sits over the valley in March, we stay home entirely and do games indoors. His breathing matters more than my hiking streak.

Ticks are the other thing. After each walk I run my fingers all over him, ears, armpits, between the toes, because the dry grass here is full of them. Our vet in Nimman reminded me that a monthly preventive and a quick check after every trail is the best habit, and that any fever or sudden tiredness means a blood test, not waiting. I always keep that in mind.

Now, the garden. One Sunday last year I answered a work call for what felt like twenty minutes. When I came back out, the herb bed was a crater, the lemongrass was on the porch, and Khao Tom was lying inside the hole looking incredibly proud and a little bit cooler. I think he was trying to build himself an air-conditioned bunker. We now have a designated dig corner with loose soil and a few buried chew sticks, and the herb bed has a low fence. Most days the system works.

In the evening he sleeps with his head on my slipper. Every single night. When I finally forget myself and wear them to the market the next day, they smell of dog and of the mountain, and I do not mind at all.