Today we ventured north towards the border with Burma on an excursion. The plan involved visiting an elephant sanctuary, an Orchid farm and a Burmese tribe called the Long Necks.

Our guide showed up at the hotel in true Thai fashion, 20 minutes late, and introduced himself as Ping Pong, because his real name was far too long. This made us sound like a bunch of racists for the rest of the day, whenever we addressed him. We stopped to pick up a group of 6 American Christians, presumably on some sort of mission to spread the word, and we got under way.

We arrived at the elephant sanctuary just in time to see the mahouts riding the elephants down to the river to give them a well earned cooling off. They all emerged from the river, with a trunk full of water, which they sprayed over the watching crowd. Oh how we laughed!

We moved on to watch the elephant show, where the elephants performed tricks such as playing football (better than the England squad I hasten to add), paint pictures of flowers, and break it down to some banging tunes.

After the show we were taken for a ride in an ox cart, followed by a ride on an elephant. We were looking forward to the elephant ride as it isn't something you'd get to do very often. As it turns out, you wouldn't want to do it very often. Elephants aren't renowned for their comfy suspension, so the ride was bumpy to say the least. Mum screamed most of the way, and was hanging on for dear life. Dad's face was a picture. At one point I found myself staring down the barrel of the elephants trunk and I got a face full of hay. I enjoyed it though - the elephant ride that is, not the hay.

After lunch we took a bamboo raft down the river which was very relaxing, despite mum thinking she'd seen a crocodile. Dad and I were invited to do some of the punting which was good fun, but not as much hard work as the professionals had made it look.

We then took a drive to the Long Neck village. The Long Neck tribe originate from Burma and are called this because the women wear brass rings around their neck.They're pretty much classed as second class citizens and if caught outside their village, they are shipped off to prison or back to Burma. The people were very friendly, and were selling goods that they had made, such as scarves and wooden figures. It was an extremely humbling experience all in all, but one that was well worth doing.

The Orchid farm. Greenhouses full of flowers. There isn't a lot more to say about it really. By now we had all tired and ready to head back to the hotel. Ping Pong's suggestion of going to see some monkeys wasn't popular. This was our last day in Chiang Mai so the evening consisted of finding somewhere to eat, and then back to the hotel to pack and get a good nights sleep.

Mum wants me to add that we are still seeing Christmas trees.

James

Quote of the day "Oh no not another bunch of Bananas" - Tony