Hey everyone,

Sorry for the delay in posting blogs on here but we have finally managed to find high speed internet so I have now put up the pictures from Bangkok and will do the Chiang Mai pics in a couple of days.

We ended up spending 6 days in Chiang Mai, in which time we managed to cram a lot in. The first night we went to a lovely restaurant recommended in our Lonely Planet book, which now seems to be our bible and Rob is particularly keen to try out every restaurant, hostel and activity listed, and we do get very nervous if we decide to do something not in the book! Haha! The restaurant was right by the river and we decided to treat ourselves to the fish on the menu (it was the most expensive thing at 200 Baht, which is 4 quid for a whole fish meal!) The next day we decided to have a look round town and did the obligatory 'temple tour'. We hired a minibus truck thing for 2 quid each and the driver took us to all the main sites in Chiang Mai and drove us round for about 6 hours, which for the price is pretty good. However, after seeing 5 or 6 gold buddhas in the sweltering heat and climbing 300 stairs up to one particular one we have now found they all pretty much look the same! Rob likes to say we are 'templed out', which pretty much describes how we feel about them now, although we have found that every place we hit has at least 2 or 3 so we are sure to be seeing a few more.

The following day we decided to go on an all day cooking course which was a really fun thing to do, I don't think either of us realized how much we would enjoy it. When we arrived we went into the market where we were shown and told the names of all the fresh ingredients we'd be using , luckily we weren't using any of the dodgy looking dried out fish heads or pig intestines the were also on offer to buy. We then went back and our tutor gave us different Thai fruits to try, some of which were lovely and some disgusting! We then learnt how to make chicken in cashew nuts, hot and sour prawn soup, Thai fishcakes and Thai green curry (from scratch, we even made the paste.) After we made each dish we then got to try it, which was the best part as the food was delicious, even if we do say so ourselves! So hopefully when we get back we will remember how to make it and you can all sample our new cooking skills.

The next day we booked a 2 day, 1 night elephant training and trekking trip into the jungle.
After a 2 hour drive into the middle of the jungle we were showed round the tiny tribal villages and shown round a school. We were then taken into the jungle for our trek, the trek was a non touristic route and was basically walking through the hills of the jungle with no path, we slipped about a hundred times and although the views were fantastic we found that I was just concentrating on not falling over and was not enjoying it. Our guide then told us there was another 2 hours trekking like that and then a break and then another 3 or 4 hours of trekking in even worse conditions, he also said that this course was for the much more advanced trekker so Lou decided it would be too much (although she thinks the boys would've found it too tough but they wouldn't admit that!) So we turned back and still had to trek for another half hour like that, but when we got to the path we found it much more relaxing as we could chat and ask questions and take in the scenery which was beautiful. We walked for about 4 hours and our guide stopped to pick us herbs and fruits to use for dinner and told us what they were. We then arrived at our camp which is where the elephants were. We learnt how to ride the elephants with no basket and learnt how to control them and tell them what to do. At first we were petrified but we quickly got used to it. We then took them off for a ride in the jungle and then we washed them in the river which was amazing. We stayed at the camp and it was really in the middle of nowhere, it was just us 4 and the tribal people who ran the camp and our tour guide. We could see every star in the sky and after dinner we fed the elephants a midnight snack! The next day we took the elephants out for a walk down the river and then went in a mud bath with them which was really funny. It was so nice to see them being treated so well considering the other night we were in a bar in Chiang Mai centre and a man walked in with an elephant (that sounds like the start of a joke!) and he wanted us to pay him to feed him, apparently they steal them from the jungle and then use them in tourist areas to make money and they are really badly treated so as surreal as that was to see it was very sad. After we said goodbye to the elephants we took another trek back to the road where we were picked up and taken to a river in the jungle. We did white water rafting there and bamboo rafting which was good fun but we were a bit tired by this point.

After all of this we decided to take a couple of days to rest and we moved onto Laos last Mon and have been having a great time here but as I have now finally found decent internet I will update you all on Laos and what we have been up to here in a couple of days, before we move onto Vietnam which will probably be just after Rob's birthday on sat.

Much love and missing you all very much,

Lou and Rob xxx