chiang mai part two

Sitting on top of our elephant
View of the valley
Elephant cleaning station
Heading towards one of the elephant feeding stations
Elephant stopping for a snack
Me on top of the elephant
Elephant looking like it dropped the handler off it's head?

Paddy fields that weren't yet filled with rain water
Walking threw the river
walking through the river
In the village (i think it was the Karen tribe)
Village hut
Village
Village
Group shot next to the oldest house in the village

Waterfalls we went for a dip in, quite refreshing actually

Bamboo rafts
Climbing aboardOur guide (he was shy)
Elephants working on the river banks
Our raft was slowly sinking
The raft ahead hit the banks
The raft ahead
Their raft fell apart Going down the river
Going down the river
I was pushing at the end. It was really difficult standing up on the raft. Especially as the others were trying to push me, because i looked to dry supposedly.

Wat

Wat
Bell
Chiang mai in the distance
Chiang Mai
How rude
...the bells, the bells...
Me and a shrine

Big golden buddha
Buddha
Golden series of buddhas
Golden buddha
Jade buddha
Stairs down to the main road

Hostel sitting type room
My room was overlooking the pool

Swimming pool

Me looking surprised

After a few drinks
Me looking ridiculous trying to play pool
Drunk
Buckets!

One day trek to hill tribe villages

Trekking around the north part of Thailand is quite popular with tourist. Everyone you speak to says that they did some trekking and really enjoyed it. I booked onto a one day trek. I dont think i could handle more than that, what with the heat and humidity.

Our trip started early in the morning. We drove for around two hours and stopped at the side of the road. A wooden structure on stilts was built next to the road and there were elephants standing around next to it. We got into pairs and jumped (literally) on to the elephant. The guide sits on the elephants head in front and wiggles to make the elephant move. They also have a stick with a large mettle point on the end that they use to stick the elephant with if it's being particularly uncooperative. Our trek would last around an hour. We would occassionally stop at these platforms were older thai women would try and sell us bananas for the elephants. The elephants needed no encouragement to make a detour to these platforms and would often stop and stick its truck up waiting for bananas. We bought a few bunches and fed the elephant along the way.

The elephants have huge mosquitos that fly around their ears. They are absolutely huge!!! They are at least the size of a house fly! I sat nervously watching to make sure one didnt land on me!

Chiang Mai Wat

The next trip was up to the temple that is on the side of a mountain overlooking the city. We rented motorbikes. I was not going to ride a motorbike in Thailand (we shared motorbikes luckily). Basically anything goes in Thailand. The roads are crazy and you see all sorts on the road. There are a lot of motorbikes that have been transformed into moving snack bars, pickup trucks that have been transformed into taxis, etc. You also see a crazy amount of people on a motorbike at one time. The worst was i saw a motorbike with a man holding a baby over the steering wheel. The mum sat on the back while two kids were hanging on the side. None of them had any form of head protection!!! Crazy. I have seen loads of young kids hanging onto bikes.

I was sharing with Mark, he drives a motor bike in London and he definitely knows how to drive. He was weaving through the traffic, like a seasoned Thai pro!! The road up to the temple has 99 bends in the road and each was pretty sharp!!! When we finally arrived I was a bit relieved to be there in one piece (nothing to do with Mark's driving, just being on a motorbike in Thailand).

We were pretty high up and there were good views over chiang mai. The Wat was pretty spectacular and is supposedly a mini grand temple (Bangkok). There are numerous Buddhas and even a large gold one. We walked around for a while and took loads of pictures. We got a lift up that we had to pay for (us being tourists) and it took a few minutes to reach the top. Coming down we took the stairs and it was actually quite an easy walk. God knows why a lift is required for tourists?

Chiang mai is a really nice town and I'm glad i spent a whole week there. I wasn't bored and made loads of new friends!!!! I left them all there and they went onto Laos. Sad times.