First day trekking meant up amd on an oopen top truck for 9.30am. We travelled with a german lad, Klaus, and couple from denmark (Pere and Tina), another british couple (Stuart and Charlotte) and an austrian couple.

On the way we stopped and went to a temple where only one monk has lived for over 10 years...its makes you wonder what they do with their time??!!

Then we travelled on to a stunning waterfall; where we swam, with our clothes on! And after a lunch, rice...of course! We trekked into the jungle for 2 hours until we reached out first village to stay in. These are tribal vilage communities, and have their own beliefs and language. The village we stayed in the first night was the Karen tribe and believe it or not we even know how to say hello in Karen...ace! We all had supper then sat around a fire singing and watching magic tricks and tricking beer...a typical thursday for Gill and I! We also found out that in this tribe girls ask the men to marry them anywhen from 14 years and over 25years you're past it, so guess i'm on the shelf, Gill just squeezes in but no-one was accepting her offer!!!!

We all slept in a communal hut, with beds made of bamboo and mosie bets around us..after the chang beer it was a good nights sleep. In the morning we had breakfast and moved on after half an hour the group parted as some of the group were only doing the 2 days. Klaus, Pere, Tina and us two carried onm and trekked all day through steep hill, near river edges, over dodgy bridges and through rice fiields, stopping at waterfalls and for rests for food. We walked about 15km over tyhe day and then came to our second village to stop. A different tribe where men can have as many wifes as they want....still no takers!!

Again we slept in a communal hut and ate dinner by candlelight, then the heavens opened and rain pelted down from about 8pm through to 3=4am the next morning, the wild dogd howwled in the jungle and very little sleep was had. At one point Gill rolled into me and hit me and screamed 'whats that?', 'i'm scared'...she thought she could hear something in the hut, i ignored her but got told the next moring by Klaus that when he went to the toilet he tripped over a dog and pid that had taken cover!

When we got up we tried to walk to another waterfall but there had been so much rain that the route had suffered land slide and was now in a very high, fast flowing river. So we chilled at a camp and then walkd to a restaurant for lunch. when we arrived there we learnt it was the worst rain they'd had all season, 7 cows had been washed down the river and killed, fresh water and electric cut off and emergency aid was already there...guess we were lucky.

After lunch we went to the elephant camp and went trekking with the elephants, everywhwre was very wet, so it was limited but we ended up with the greediest elephant obsessed by banana's...it was amzing although had a very sweaty bum after it!

Unfortunately due to the weather it wasn't possible to bamboo raft, so we headed back to chiang Mai, showered...how good is that! And headed out for a walk about, found an irish bar to watch some of the world cup...a few gin and tonics later we headed back to a proper bed..up early today to pack and get ready for our 2 and half day tri to Laos. We travel to the border today and on the boat tomorrow...so we may not be in touch for a few days again.

Thanks for the messages, great to hear from you.

Loads of love

Karen and Gill

xxx