Tham Luang: Hundreds of metres above the base camp at Tham Luang cave complex, the birds' nest collectors of Ko Libong are combing the Khun Nam Nang Norn mountain, looking for air holes that could lead to the trapped Thai soccer team.
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The vast majority of the huge teams of troops, divers and volunteers have focused their efforts on plans to empty the caves of water, so that the boys can either walk or dive and swim out.
But Chiang Rai province Governor Narongsak Osatanakorn said efforts have been stepped up in recent days to look for open shafts that may allow an alternative route for extracting the trapped boys.
About 30 teams are now combing the roof of the mountain, which is as much as 1000 metres high.
Maann Thonglao is one of eight birds' nest collectors who have joined the rescue effort. He's from the Ko Libong in the far south of Thailand, a tiny island with a majority Muslim population of about 4000 people.
Barefoot, with gnarled hands and feet and standing barely five foot tall, Thonglao hardly looks like your usual burly rock climbing hero type.
He's been collecting and selling the rare and sought after edible birds' nests, which are made from solidified bird spit and are considered a delicacy, for years on his home island, and he and his friends are here to help.
Thonglao says the birds' nests sell for between 10,000 and 30,000 Baht ($400 to $1200) per kilo depending on quality.
But this mission, close to 2000 kilometres away at the opposite end of the country, is not about profit.
Thonglao and his colleagues flew up to the cave rescue effort after seeing the news on television. They organised a whip around the village to raise funds a week ago for their plane tickets and were on their way.
Now, working only with basic ropes and gloves, they are exploring high up on the mountain, guided by locals, and using their specialist skills to hunt for air shafts that could open a path to freedom for the trapped team.
Speaking through a translator, Thonglao spoke to Fairfax Media on Thursday evening after a 12-hour day that included long stretches of tramping high up on the mountain.
"Normally we work at about 300 metres high [to collect birds nests]". But on this job, we are getting as high as 500 or 600 metres".
"We found a couple of holes [on Thursday], we tried to get into them but they were dead ends. But we have two more holes we will try tomorrow [Friday]."
Asked why he and his fellow birds' nest collectors had travelled from one end of the country to the other to join the search, Thonglao shrugs: "we want to help the kids, we saw the news, they have been trapped for too many days".
The section of the cave where the 12 boys, aged 11 to 16, and their 25-year-old coach are trapped is about 400 metres up inside the mountain, so rescuers are now focusing their efforts on sections of the terrain that rise up to 600 metres.
Mai Sei local Chakgrid Rukkapao, who usually works as a car mechanic and who is a Thai gymkhana car racing champion, has joined the volunteers in the mountain top search for similar reasons.
The hours are long and difficult, Rukkapao said, with heavy ropes to carry and hot, humid conditions – at base camp, the apparent temperature spends much of the day over 40 degrees - and he hasn’t much experience of this sort of climbing.
“I don’t like hiking, this is the first time I do hiking, but I want to help the kids, so I focus on that,” he said.
Asked if he is afraid, so high up on the mountain, Rukkapao fixes me with a steely stare: “no”.
Like millions and millions of Thais, and people from around the world, his only focus is the safe return of those boys.
