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Upon arriving in ChangMai we stupidly decided to save the TukTuk fare and walk, with our bags, to the town centre. This took about an hour by which time I was drenched in sweat and I think we saved about a pound. Definitely not doing that again! We found a cool hostel half the price of our last one! After walking around town for ages we settled on booked a 3 day trek from our hostel to leave the next day. After lunch and a rest under the fan in our room we headed to visit the Wats (temples) which were again very beautiful, but I think once you've seen one they start to look very similar! The Sunday Market had started so we spent a long time wandering the streets on the way back looking at all of the lovely souveniers and clothes! Tried some street food...well, drink. Everyone here seems to drink a green coloured juice, but it tasted like the smell of cut grass!! Not so nice. Mine was passionfruit and beetroot juice and that was very yummy! We also tried black jelly in condensed milk, but after one sip we decided that wasn't for us either and had to throw it away! Later on we ate noodles in the food market with all the Thais - they dont seem to cook at home much!
We expected to be with a big group for our trek but it ended up being just us and our guide, Bier. She seemed to be more interested in mushroom picking and photography than walking, but was lovely all the same! Elephant ride was first on the agenda which was AWESOME! Funny seeing all the tourists there doing exactly the same thing, but I was excited anyway! Did you know elephants are hairy?! We shared an elephant and I got to sit on its neck for the final half of the ride. There were some pretty steep hills so it got a bit scary at times!
After lunch we started walking, just in time to sample the monsoon rains for the first time! We didn't have waterproofs but luckily our bags seemed to hold most of the rain out! We passed an awesome waterfall on the way, looked at a lot of mushrooms then arrived at our village hot and tired! Bier taught us how to cook Thai Red Curry for dinner so there's no need for a cooking course which is nice!
The second day of our trek was much harder walking! We had a different guide, because Bier was too tired and her feet hurt! He was very speedy and took us through the jungle at lightening pace, often disspearing off somewhere or up a tree to find something interesting for us to look at! We stopped at some rice fields to eat our packed lunch (noodles, wrapped in banana leaves to make a parcel, very cool!) Managed to get to the last leg of the walk pretty much unscathed, but I knew taking the most clumsy, least stable person in the world through a wet jungle down steep hills was never going to end well! I managed to slip off of a log crossing a river right near the camp, bruising both my injured knees pretty spectacularly! Luckily there was another pretty waterfall to take my mind off it, and Bier got to work on her photography making us pose together for many shots in the waterfall - very embarassing! There was a deadly snake a few minutes walk/wade away, which ollie decided he had to see! I stayed away, sensibly, and looked at the photos when he came back! That night I cooked Green Thai curry, pretty much on my own! Unluckily they don't really understand the concept of vegetarian here, so all the food had chicken stock and oyster sauce in. I managed to get a few mouthfuls in but I have to say I avoided the food after that! We spent the evening trying, and failing, to teach Bier and the owner of the camp card games!!
The third day of the trek was hard work again, but downhill at least. We only walked a couple of hours then went rafting down the river on cool bamboo rafts! After lunch we drove the long journey back to our hostel then headed straight on the bus station to buy tickets for the overnight bus to the Laos border - it's all go here! Having a few hours to kill, we headed to a vege restaurant and set up shop! I think they were a little bemused by us repacking our bags, drying our clothes, changing and attemped to wash in their bathroom but they didn't seem to mind (we did order lots of food and drink in the meantime!)
The bus jouney was long and uncomfortable. At 2am it stopped at a restaurant and after watching the locals from the bus we figured out our free food voucher worked here! Straberry fizzy pop at 2am isn't really what you need but Ollie seemed happy enough!We arrived in Udon Thalong eventually around 8:30, ate ice lollies for breakfast then caught the bus over the Nong Khai where we decided to stay the night!
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