Naam Waan Chiang Mai

... had me thinking "the gears in this thing must be f*cking strong"). Sleeping is very difficult when this oscillating tube of metallic banshees is moving.
I considered masturbation but thanks to my rust-fan the curtains were blown out from the bed in sporadic gusts, so somebody would probably have received ominous snapshots of a grimacing man yanking his crimson crowbar (If I could get the curtains to move faster maybe I could provide a flicker-show, like those slitted ...

... almost fell out! However, our guide actually DID fall out! So we kept on going for a bit through the rapids, but then thought perhaps that we should actually stop and wait for our guide, so, being all responsible, we paddled to the shore, and waited for our guide to run along the shore and catch up to us. After that initial bit though, the rapids were a somewhat of the baby sort... but it was fun nonetheless.

Then we ...

... was right at home; everyone could tell straight away (and politely pointed out) who was the cook in the relationship! I was totally out of my element but managed to halfway pretend like I knew what I was doing. We learned the secrets to pad thai, green and red curry (even making the paste by hand!), glass noodle salad, spring rolls, fried bananas, and our favourite dessert - bananas in warm coconut milk. We were splitting ...

... It was a lot of hard work, but so worth it in the end! We started with an elephant trek, before a 3 hour hike up to a hill tribe village...all with the help of our awesome guide ton- or tony as we called him! We spent the night at the village, where we had a great moment where we met one of the village elders who sung some traditional songs for us, asking for our group to sing a song for the village, we responded in the only way we knew how... giving them ...

Our trek was certainly an amazing experience - I think our highlight thus far of the trip. We were picked up very early from the guest house and both of us were in foul moods. Our guide, Deang, provided us with **** rucksacks and we didnt have time to eat much so we were not very excited. We huddled into the back of a taxi/tuktuk thing with 7 other people (mostly german, which does not sit well at 8 in the morning :s) and began the long drive to our ...

... 2 week old baby. There was another elephant hanging around which had had its foot blown off by a land mine. After hanging out with the mothers and babies for a bit we headed to another enclosure to watch a herd being feed bananas, sugar cane and cucumbers. It was then time for us to have a go at feeding and we headed over to the feeding platform where a herd was eagerly awaiting our arrival and our bananas! We were instructed to put the bunch of ...

... mats and pillows..we were basically sleeping outside as the bottom of the walls and roof were not attached..we had a simple dinner and quite a lot of beer and started shrieking when a thunderstorm started and we had to run back to check our stuff. Unfortunatly our hut was not bug or waterproof so our stuff was now muddy and drenched...we were given blankets and beckham started a much appreciated fire and we sat around playing games..one consisted of smearing our faces in charcoal ...

... for designer pure silk clothing, but I know it ain't that cheap! I am so thrilled! The top for my outfit was a bit snug, so they are going to rush and fix it for me tonight. They are so lovely and so accommodating (really all Thai people are, they are really wonderful) and I can pick it up tomorrow morning before we leave. I bought the mango cheesecake from Starbucks that Strawberry had recommended. I wanted one of the prepaid cards and had to use up 100 bhat. The card is so cute ...

... run. Really nice and relaxing - could feel myself sweating all of the impurities out of me. However, as John rightly pointed out, this would make us tired for our trek in the afternoon! We got out and were told that the trek would start from the hot springs! It really did take it out of me, and I felt pretty light headed (Great, I thought, that I don't have food poisoning but I do have dehydration!).

Set off on the trek which, according to the guides, was "Up ...

... s reminiscent of Oxford Circus on a Saturday afternoon. It's very large but in terms of the merchandise we're actually a little disappointed and we come away with nothing and find a nice restaurant on Ratchamanka Road "La Fontana" for dinner. We walk back to our hotel via the night Bazaar (which is nice and relaxed after the madness of the Sunday market). Day 27: It's the last day of our time in Thailand. Today we visited 'Central Airport Plaza' - basically for ...