(I'm a bit behind on the blog so going to do a few tonight) This afternoon we decided to book into a Thai cookery course with a lovely young lady called Boom who runs her own small cookery classes at her home in Chiang Mai (Basil Cookery). We started off with a tour of one of Chiang Mai's three large street markets. Boom took us through the mind boggling array of vegetables and other ingredients on offer. I've never seen so many strange fruits and vegetables th...

The plan today was to hire scooters but Alex had a tummy upset and was a little nervous having not ridden before. Although I think it was just an excuse for her to spend 3 hours in a Spa!! and several hours in retail therapy!! Anyway Keith set me up with a local guy and I rented a nice little 125cc automatic scooter and set off to experience the functional disorder that is driving in Thailand. I'd had repeated warnings about the 400 baht (about 9 quid) fine for...

Muay Thai!! We finally arrived in Chiang Mai by plane instead of sleeper train and were immediately impressed with the relaxed slower pace, clean air, beautiful city and it's welcoming locals. After a warm welcome from Keith at Finlays Cottage and settling into our comfortable room we headed into town for some food. We were soon handed a leaflet for Muay Thai and much cheaper than that in Bangkok so we jumped at the chance to go that evening. What a great exp...

Well we didn't go to the Thai Boxing last night as we got there so late and at 45GBP (tourist price of course) a ticket we thought we'd leave it for another night. Instead we ended up on the (in)famous Khao San Road which was packed full of tourists, cheesy bars, market stalls and western eateries. We had a foot massage, some fantastic chicken kebab type thing from a street stall and plenty of beers in a few of the bars whilst we people watched. This time I succ...

We really didn't know where to go for dinner on our first night (yesterday) despite all the people I tried to get the inside track from and we were a little apprehensive about our first meal :) We ended up taking a taxi to the Silom area and after quite a walk we found a nice place, sat on the street side and had some amazing food!! We met a nice English couple who pointed out that we were in fact right opposite Patpong (I swear it was by chance!). I decided to...