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Up at 8am, hangover from hell!
Literally did not want to move from bed, eyes unoperation! Couldn't even lift my eye lids. Finally after dragging my sorry ass out of bed we quickly got changed and rushed down to get some money out for the tour.
When we got back our guide popped up Mr Goal, smartly dressed, kind of looked like the boffin from Danger Mouse (his little sidekick) lol. He spoke great english and loved to talk to us about thai culture and asked all about us. He showed us a few things along the way, Military Horse Farm and the market for intestines, chicken bones etc, Nice….! We booked out tour with Mundo Tours Thailand, a great company and highly recommended. Rated well on trip advisor and tbh we cant say a bad word about them either.
Our minivan was really cool, because we booked a private tour (just so we didn't have to wait around for others) we had it and the guide to ourselves. They had plenty of water available for us and it was nice and comfy. Time to put the seat back and try an freshen up for todays experience. Still feeling drunk at this point.
After about an hour of travelling we rocked up at the Elephant Camp, as soon as we got off we B lined for the toilets. I heard Kara throw up as soon as she got in there, apparently it went everywhere. Covered most of the toilet, seat the lot! ha ha bless her. But she came out feeling better, whilst I just still sat there hating life.
Once we had sorted ourselves out we were taken down to see the elephants, they were everywhere. Huge ones, baby ones, hairy ones, tusky ones lol we bought two lots of bananas and sugar cane and they were gone in no time. We got some great pictures. After giving a little tip to the Mahouts, James was lifted up by there trunks, and sat on the elephants back. The pictures give the impression he has a big trunk himself! ha ha. Not a lot of people agree with this but they all seemed happy, I didn't see them hit once and all looked in good health. Plus they just love Bananas and had a constant supply by all the tourists.
After a while they all went down to the river for a quick bathe, they were splashing around and squirting water through there trunks. Such a cool thing to see, they all then came back up ready to start the show.
The show consisted of hula hooping, playing the harmonica, painting, doing tricks and moving things around. Giving us a look into how the elephants used to be used for transporting things etc. There was even an elephant who was taking penalties, he was actually a pretty good shot! The show lasted around 20 minutes, after each trick they would all run over to the crowd for some more treats. It was hilarious to see the people in the front rows abused by the trunk trying to sniff out Bananas lol.
After this we then went for our ox cart ride, we were taken up the road to a little tribe settlement. This was pretty cool and we bought two hand made bottle holder bags, pretty handy to save having to hold it all day. Plus it keeps it cooler for longer, added bonus and 100 baht for 2 we couldn't go wrong.
We had to wait around a while to be taken back, this time by elephants. We had a female elephant, she was happy just plodding along making a few stops for bananas and sugar cane. We stocked up again at the village so knew this would keep our elephant happy :-) we went back down the road and into the camp, we then headed across the river to the hillside. Through the woods and along a dusty track, our elephant seemed happy and she definitely enjoying the snacks we brought along. The whole trek took around 45 minutes and was awesome, although you kept bobbing from side to side with every step she took. As we came back through the river we noticed a lot of floaters! Elephant pooh just floating down the river, ill skip having a paddle in that thanks.
Once back we were taken for dinner, time to feed our bellies and start to fight back against the hangover! At several points along the journey we were feeling pretty rough, we just had to deal with it. It was great food and you could eat as much as you wanted, it was all thai but the selection was good. James had massaman curry, sweet and sour chicken, basically everything on the menu. I opted for some noodles, chicken and veg.
After this we met up with our guide again and he took us down for the bamboo rafting. We had two little men driving (well pushing us along). It reminded us of a cheap version of a Gondula, without the floating houses and small canals of Venice lol. We went around 4/5 kms down the Mae Tong river, our driver took a few pictures for us and let us have a little go. He was quite funny, an kept saying honeymoon and other typical random quotes. We passed another elephant camp on the way down the river, the elephants were playing in the river and being bathed. One decided it would be funny to squirt us multiple times, that trunk can hold a lot of water. We found it hilarious, but Kara took the brunt of it and ended up drenched! We soon arrived at our stop and were greeted by our guide, we then went off to see the Karen Long Neck village.
The government and the King have helped relocate them and the other tribes in the village. One tribe was quite involved in growing opium and weed, sometimes they still try and make a sneaky batch inbetween there corn fields. Naughty tribe people. We bought some sweets (candy) for the children in the village, they loved it! Some were very timid whereas others went crazy for it, an literally jumped around shouting with excitement. We seen the long neck women, they get a ring for every year until they are 25. The weight of these things in crazy, how do they sleep?? Sweaty neck comes to mind! It was a cool experience and they were really friendly and didn't mind having there picture taken, especially after we provided all there children with sweets. Literally felt like the child catcher, Children…. Lollipops!
Once we had left and bought ourselves a mini longneck woman keyring we shot off to Tiger Kingdom in our mini van. This was awesome, Tiger Temples ok but this was unreal. The conditions were better, the place is clean and the tigers look healthy and happy. We paid to have some time with the small tigers, we've seen a lot of big and medium sized ones at Tiger Temple so thought the small ones would be abit more fun. They definitely were. Kara was a little intimidated by this, I don't blame her, we're walking into a cage with around 7 tigers in! We had a little walk around and took some pictures, they had 4 white tigers which looked amazing. So rare but beautiful to see. We caught a big tiger taking a cheeky bath in his pool, literally crashed out loving life! We then went for our experience, the small ones were so lively and always messing about. Play fighting and generally upto mischief. The ones we spent time with were 6 and 7 months old, the size difference is crazy for just one month. They grow so quick! Our guide (Tiger Temple dude) was cool and got some great pictures for us, the tigers soon started messing around so the trainer got a stick with some leaves for them to play with. They were all chasing it around and trying to grab it, jumping over each other to try and get it. Amazing to see how quick they are and agile, one jumped up onto the log to get a better view. This gave us a perfect opportunity for some great pictures!
After this we walked back to the reception area and took on a Mango smoothie, were getting an addiction for these! Had a little look at the souvenirs and met our guide. He asked if we wanted to go see anything else, but still fighting the hangover we decided to head back an try and freshen up.
We got back in under an hour, traffic was quite bad due to rush hour and roadworks on the main road. As soon as we got back it was nice to crash in our room. It was an amazing day and the hangover didn't ruin it at all! We chilled for a while in the room and knew we had to do something to finally shift feeling like this. Only one thing for it McDonalds!!!
So we dusted off our helmets, climbed on the purple pocket rocket and headed off to McDs! The traffic was still quite manic, but with thai style driving we were in and out with our food and back at the hostel in around 15 minutes. Perfect :-) time to tuck in! It was heavenly as you all know McDonalds murders hangovers, it works every time.
We've been neglecting the blog abit recently, due to the fact we've been crazy busy. Getting drunk and having private lock ins at bars! ha ha plus visiting temples, playing with tigers and feeding elephants! So we're crashed in bed, finally caught up on everything and watched the latest episode of Marvels Agents of Shield, yes we're Marvel geeks! We love it. So now you can all read about our last few days and whats coming next. We are planning to have abit of a chilled morning tomorrow, get up and out early afternoon. Maybe visit Doi Suthep to see the view over Chiang Mai and then head off to our night safari in the evening. Exciting stuff! Were are going up to Chiang Rai on Thursday, staying the night before heading to the Thailand - Laos border at Chiang Khong. Time to leave Thailand for a while and see what Laos has to offer.
J&K over and out!
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