Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
So we've headed up to the north of thailand via the old capital of thailand - Ayutthaya!
Ayuttyaha was a 2hr train journey from Bangkok and i think we would of been better off walking with the speed of the train! stopping at every possible place on route, train stops seemed to be just a couple of paving stones on the floor, no signs, no stations, no guards!
Ayuttyaha was again another sight seeing place, an island cut off from thaliand by a surrounding river. It was capital until a massive fire burnt the place down and had to be rebuilt but this meant for large ruins of the old temples. With a 2hr round trip of the island we decided to take to it with push bikes (spot the tourist). Which in itself was great fun especially with the lack of road laws! Apart from this the floating market had to be a highlight, clues in the title to what it involved. The bike ride was also a good time for a bit of sun intake with the temperatures hitting 35+ degrees. Penners is now paying the price with alot of peeling going on in the shoulder region!
From here it was a 12hr sleeper train journey up to Chiang Mai, however sleep wasnt easy to come by with the bumps and stops chucking us around.
We arrived in Chiang Mai early doors so had the whole day free. We visited the tiger kingdom and monkey school. We choose to get in the cage with the big tigers instead of the babys and wow are they powerful! Their backs are just pure muscle and paws are massive, as tame as they seemed, it still felt like they could go for you any second! And watching them play fight was enough to realise how hard they were!
Our 2nd day was the trip we'd been looking forward to, a 3 day jungle trek and elephant riding! The tour guide made it out to be quite a pleasent walking experience but after the first 4hr uphill climb in the rain we'd realised what we'd signed up for! We had a 30minute ride on the elephants half way up the mountain which was pretty cool, these animals are serious eating machines! then it was off to the first tribes huts to spend the night, the huts consisted of bamboo floors and banana tree leaves for a roof, so we were quite optimistic on how wet we'd get in the rain but they held up okay! The 2nd and 3rd day was the same sort of thing treking across the jungle mainly uphill again. And then to finish we got on a bamboo raft down the river to the end of the trip. While walking we'd stop at certain waterfalls which we could get under and slide down which was a good way to cool down and have abit of a laugh. Even with the constant wet feet, muddy footpaths, sleepless nights and rain the views we saw and the trek itself was unbelievable and a must for anyone who goes to chiang mai!
We've got one more night here and are going to make the most of it and hit the town hard!
Its then off to Chiang Rai and onto Laos...
- comments
Mumsie Fantastic, thanks for taking the time to give us so many details, almost felt like i was there with you instead of in not so sunny and cold Hindhead.