Hey everyone!! im in chiang mai at the moment. Ive had a franetic few days. Pure madness!! It all startes with a crazy overnight bus journey from bangkok. Just an hour into the 12 hour trip a canadian girl, looking for the loo, caught on the 3 thai guys operating the bus going through all of our backpacks downstairs. So her mate jesse went down to see what the crack was and got manhandled back upstairs.

Quick sub story: Whenever i see jesse there is always controversey. At the floating market in bangkok a tourist took a photo of a legless beggar. After taking the photo she walked of without giving him a penny. Jesse and i were both infuriated by her lack of respect and had a good 10 minute b**** about it.

Back to the bus: Word spread and at the halfway stop we all checked our bags. Luckily i had learnt from my dads mistakes and had a pacsafe on, with all my valuables on me. Most people had there valuables on them but said there bags had definately been searched (stuff had been moved etc). There was one girl sophie who had $40 and a camera missing. After a group discussion we decided to stay quiet until chiang mai and then confront them. (we didnt want to get stuck in the middle of nowhere)

Jesse however was in a stoner like state of paranoia and ended up hiding in the baggage area to catch them in the act. Sure enough he did and all hell broke loose. Verbals were exchanged before we all ended up bringing our backpacks upstairs cuddling them as we tried to sleep. About an hour later the bus broke down (and with it the air con) Me and sophie were outside having a cig and witnessed the ultimate thai comedy act. The thai guys mechanical genuis involved picking up the biggest branches they could find from the side of the road and beating the back of the bus as hard as they could. By this point, with everything that had happened, we got the giggles which only infuriated the thai guys even more.

Eventually we were up and running, only to travel at the speed of sloth for the next 2 hours (literally under 10 mph). 15 hours after we set of we finally reached chiang mai. From there it was just an hours wait for the police and a further 10 minutes for them to dismiss us (jesse was furious) before i finally made the guest house.

That day itself was pretty quiet, went to a temple with random irish girl where most of our time was spent being harrassed by local children and having the locals practice there english on us which was actually more fun than the temples. That night i bumped into a guy simon who i know from bangkok and we went out with 3 bristol uni students, it was all good fun and in between ignoring the prostitues got chatting to loads of travellers.

The jungle trek started the next day, in my group we had 3 guys, a dutch couple and 3 americans. First up was the elephant ride, this was fun, although a little scary when our driver thingy got off and the elephant went walkabout for a bit. Then we went to a waterfall where i tried to be clever and copy the thai guy by sliding in from the stones. I hit that bone just above your arse and it has quite literally been a pain in the arse ever since. After that we trekked a few hours to the village we were staying in that night. After dinner we witnessed another comedy show,this time from our guides. We played some bizzarre and to be honest, ridiculous games after which evryone had the sense to turn in early. well almost everyone, me and american annie stayed up and got battered.

The group split up the 2nd day and i was with the dutch couple enduring 5 hours trekking. Trekking is hard word but surprisingly fun, our last bit of the day finished with sukkhy's dubious shortcut. It involved a near vertical slope of 300m and a lot of bum sliding, needless to say my skinny ass flew down it.

I tended to fill the hours trekking by teaching sukkhy beatles songs, although i ran out on the last day and moved onto oasis and even a donny osmond. Anyway on the 2nd night we played drinking games, which is where i introduced river to thailand. Within half an hour they were all battered, im so proud!!! After a fire by the waterfall (ruined by rain) we played a thai game. Now from what i can gather it is just some f*cked up way for the thai's to justify happy slapping.

After the final trek on the 3rd day we had lunch. Sukkhy asked me to teach him an English dance. Seeing as squatting up on strictly come dancing wasnt on my prep list for thailand i had no choice but to teach him my sisters famous granny rave. So there i was, in the middle of the jungle, granny raving with a thai guy. Priceless!! After that we finished with a nice gentle bamboo raft, well until it monsooned for the last 40 minutes. So that was it for thejungle, definately one of the best things ive ever done. Last night a few of us went to the night market and theres a few of us going thai boxing tonight.

Chiang Mai is pretty full during the day though. Unless you like temples (which i dont) or want to get up at 8 in the morning for an overpriced day trip where you spend most of the day travelling (again, i dont fancy it) then there is naff all to do. so for that reason im getting out of here tommorrow. Im heading to the south islands via a overnight bus, plane, another bus and then a ferry to ko samui. Its a long haul and is hould get there sunday night. Ive met a few people who are down there already and the plan is to chill on the beach during the day and party at night. Cant wait!!