Cooking up a storm in Chaing Mai!

Upon sadly leaving Ronen and Rachel we headed to Bangkok domestic airport for our cheeky 50 minute flight whilst our fellow travellers slogged the 12 hour train journey, all we could do was fight over who had the window seat and yes Jon did get it. To be honest other then a few hills there wasn't much else to see. The peculiar thing was hearing an english accent (air hostess) on a local Nok airline, neither of us stopped to ask as we eagerly get of the plane and land in new teritory.

Cooking up a storm

We grabbed our bags, jumped in a cab and headed for 'julies guest house' to our surprise the room had hot water, I was sure I didn't book it but seeing that the price hadn't increased neither of us complained. Our first hot shower in a week, it felt great! Although it's quite hot thoughout the day it's quite fresh in the morning, somehow I dont think cold water showers will really be appealing for another few weeks but they are cheaper. 180 baht for this room, which is around three pounds.

Jon and the gang

Eagerly wanting to see what treks are available (which are a spealiaty in the area) we head to our thai friend on reception who handed us, no joke, 12 binders each two inches thick full of possible options and said 'read read, you look and tell me' we had just arrived and eager to explore and were faced with a immense amount of reading and thinking. So we booked a thai cooking course on an organic farm for the following day and hoped that it would give us a chance to explore our options.

The cooking course cost 900 baht around 14 pounds each and lasted all day, we were picked up at 8.30 just enough time for fresh friut breaky and jumped into the back of a open van and meet the gang we were to spend the day with. A mix of Canadian, (we thought of you Kirsten, there are loads here too)  American, dutch, french and of course Israeli. We headed to the local market first to pick up what the farm could not produce, and Sue our teacher gave us an explaintion about rice and other produce. We found her very funny as most Thais really do have a great sence of humor, she made us laugh all day and taught us how to cook a number of dishes starting with curry pastes using a pestle and mortar and then making a curry with it, Jon made a red curry and I made a green. Dont worry she gave us a recipe book so we'll cook you all a feast on our return including spring rolls wrapped beautifully by myself (daniella) Jon also cooked a mean chicken with basil, sounds italian I know but believe me it's not. Check out the pictures. Both mums would have loved it, we thought of you! The best part of the day is eating it all but failed miserably there was far too much even for us. Ronen my brother would have had a field day!

Organic garden

The cooking day ending and we had finally chosen a trek, it's less touristy and called an eco trek which lasts for three days in jungle spending two nights with local hill tribes and visiting local plantations to see how the eco systems works. A little more expensive then the others but we figure it's worth it. How many times can you ride a bloody elephant!

So the plan is we spend another day visiting monks in local wats (temples) and hopefully a quick trip to the unbrella factory before the trek and on our return set of for Chaing Kong which is were we spend a night before catching our boat to Laos.

Thanks for all your messages and we miss you guys,

Hugh and Diana hope you have found these entries ok,