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Well my last blog only took you to the end of the southern tour, I still have the northern one to talk about.
Day 1: arrive in Bangkok centre hotel, met my group and tour leader Charin, went out for dinner in Bangkok near Cosan road, had a few drinks and headed back to the hotel as I had to sort my flights and accommodation for Khao Lak.
Day 2: The next morning most of the group went for a walking tour with Charin round bangkok, I wish I had gone but needed to wifi to sort flights. By the time the others got back I had finished my bookings and we laid by the pool until it was time to get the sleeper train. Several members of our group were not feeling very well on the train, we found out later that we had all got food poisoning from breakfast, i thought that I would be ok not realising that it was food poisoning at the time as I had already been in Thailand 2 weeks so was used to the food.
Day 3: we arrived at our hotel in Chiang Mai however no one really felt like doing much, I was ok until the afternoon, then I too became ill. Luckily my symptoms were mild and after a day or so I was ok.
Day 4: today we leave to start our Hilltribes trek, only half the group are going as the other half are still too ill and will join us tomorrow. We had a 3 hour car journey before the trekking began, after that we trekked for only 1 hour 30 mins approx, but that was enough! I was ok mostly apart from a headache, however it was all downhill and very steep! Once we arrived we just collapsed onto our beds which was a thin mattress on the floor, we stayed there until we were called for dinner, we tried to eat but were all still too unwell. The toilet was Asian style in a shack outside, I managed to hold on until the morning when it was light and I could see what I was doing which was just as well as one of the girls had to go during the night and reported seeing a giant spider staring at them.
Day 5: we all felt a little better however out of 7 of us only 4 were well enough to do the trekking as today it meant trekking for 4 hours! Today was really tough as when it went up hill it was very steep with narrow tracks and the same for downhill, there was very little level ground. By the time we reached our destination we were shattered. We then had a short rest before we got to ride the elephants for about 25 mins, however during the 25 mins you are clinging on for dear life because there is nothing to stop you falling off and there was a shear drop on one side. So apart from think inking that you may die any minute it's fantastic. After the elephant ride we arrived at our 2 nd fester nation where we met the rest of our group.
We went for a dip in the river, couldn't really swim as the flow was too fast, after the swim we got dressed and made some bamboo candle floats to light and float down the stream for later. Every time I put a flower in mine the bamboo dripped on me!
We had dinner that the locals had prepared for us which was very nice, then floated the candles down the river and let off some fireworks, however after a while we had to stop as the farmer told us it had scared his buffalo as they are not used to fireworks as they are a luxury in Thailand. After the fireworks we sat round the fire drinking and playing games. We were just about to go to bed when we got invited to the local church where we had to sing a Christmas carol which was a disaster as none of us knew the all the words to one whole song and we definitely were not harmonious.
Day 6: went on a bamboo raft for 4 hours today, the best bit was when we hit the rapids! After rafting we got a car ride back to the Chiang Mai hotel where we immediately jumped in the shower, it felt so good to get clean again. We went out for dinner and had pizza, after pizza we went to watch Thai boxing.
Day 7: today I decided to have a Thai cooking lesson, which was great fun and the food we cooked was very tasty. After Thai cooking I picked up my washing and went to do a bit of shopping round the markets with Robyn and Carla. Tonight we get the sleeper train back to Bangkok.
Day 8: as the train was reasonably on time I decidedly to have breakfast with the others before heading off to catch my flight. This afternoon I catch my flight to phuket then catch a taxi to Khao lak, where I will be fore the next 6 nights.
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