Hello! Sorry it has been so long… Hope everyone is well. I'll start from where I left off!After last entry I went to my meet up hotel and checked into my room. Was sharing with a girl called Clara but she was on a different tour. But we went to Jatujak Weekend Market which I think is the biggest market in the world. Was enormous, so busy (with Thai's not many tourists) and very cheap. Then went for a swim in the hotel (pure luxury now I look back) before meeting my tour group!! Was very pleased with my group. Chris, Alice & Jenny, Neil & Caroline, Ross & Hailey all from UK and my kind of age range, Meaghan from Oz who looks just like Megan which was quite weird (don't worry Stevens I love you more!) Joe & Sandy from Ohio who are a lovely older couple, and Roger from Switzerland - legend. His pronunciation of 'really good' is basically the tour catchphrase and it's lucky he has a good sense of humour because he gets teased constantly - especially by the girls! Likes his Thai massages that one! Me, Chris, Alice & Jen and Roger went for something to eat in a little place full of Thai's and then went for a few drinks near Khao San Road, looking back its funny how much we covered in the silly topics of conversation that night! Funny times indeed. I got up early to have a swim (got to keep this fitness up haha) and then we went on a long tail boat ride down the Chao Phraya River, and visited Wat Pho (home of the reclining Buddha). Travelled to Kanchanaburi, some of the way by rickshaw (me and my bag being cycled along by one guy on his bike, I wanted to take over obviously! It was pretty hilarious being in between all the mad traffic and a little woof followed me the whole way. Had dinner at Apple Guest Housethen went for a few buckets and had some great games of Snap, and a terrible game of snooker!

Wow the next day was awesome.Went to Erawan Waterfall which is a 7 tier waterfall - and by 7 tiers I mean you can swim in the 'pool' at the bottom of each pier, and you have to climb up steps and slippery rocks to get to each level.See the pictures!I made it to the top with Chris and Roger, took about 3 hours but we swam quite a bit in the different levels.Was so beautiful and just my thing.Could sit behind the waterfall and dive off the rocks and stand underneath the waterfall - the parts that weren't really powerful.Took about an hour to get down although we were on a mission jumping and taking over people as rest of the group who didn't swim or didn't make it up to the top to see the amazing high waterfall were waiting (bothered) not everyone can be as hardcore I guess ;-)Then we went to Tiger Temple which was just a massive money making con with poor angry drugged up Tigers on chains, felt quite an extreme reaction so it was obviously against my personal religion even thought I'm not a massive animal lover.I found it hard not to voice my disgust.I had my pictures taken anyway which is quite hard to justify, apart from that I wanted to see the Tigers close up as they were still so intimidating and surreal.I nearly passed out and as you can see in the pictures at points I couldn't even fake a smile. Being looked after by Buddhist Monks? I don't know what kind of screwed up Buddhist would be involved with it!! Maybe I'm being naive about how bad it was, or maybe the idiots buying the t-shirt and paying loads to have the Tigers head flopped into their lap for a 'special picture' and wondering why the Tigers were pacing around looking slightly less than happy (!) were the ones being naive- who knows!!! Anyway that's hypocritical my rant.

Then we went to the bridge over the River Kwai which was good as we had been to the JEATH War Museum earlier in the day.A train came so we had to squash into the sides. Funny times.This night went for drinks but unfortunately I hadn't had much to eat because I ordered a Thai spicy salad with prawns and realised that when "spicy" is actually quoted on the menu its best to steer well clear lol it was unbelievable my mouth was on fire and my plate got passed round the table - mostly because I didn't want to look like a wimp- no-one else could handle even a small mouthful either though - was pretty funny.Then Roger tried it and was like 'Yes really good" - nutter! So anyway this lead to some extreme drunkenness - my memory fails me, but when I woke up I had an unexplained gash on my foot.*Apparently* we got a moped back to the Guest House so I think this could have somehow been the cause.Hungover times for me and Chris the next day!

We boarded a floating raft house which was just amazing.It was just this big wooden hut floating down the River Kwai with a restaurant/disco room attached.The River Kwai is really wide, we were floating past beautiful surroundings mountains and temples.Had rubber rings off the back so we sunbathed all day and sat in them being pulled along and swimming! Went to some crazy temple climbed 250 steps (or rocks) to get up to it through a dragon and that let in to a cave with monks. Pictures will explain how magical this all was better I think.Slept under the stars (couldn't handle the group room with everyone in their mosquito nets so went open air.And this is when the curious incident of the snoring Thai man in the night time occurred lol.I'll save this story but lets just say it was the funniest moment of the trip so far (and that is saying something).

The next day we visited the World Heritage of Ayutthaya (Chris nearly got rabies).Next we got the over night train to Chiang Mai - that was an experience. Thai whisky helped!

In Chiang Mai we went elephant riding.Mine and Meaghans elephant was a very naughty elephant who kept hitting me with her ears and stopping if I didn't feed her bananas, then she stole a whole bunch of bananas from the guys in front which was hilarious because I warned them we were going to steal their bananas but they didn't listen! The elephants really stomp around and going up and down hill is quite scary.See pictures.Then we went bamboo rafting down this river and had water fights, I was rubbish at steering with my big bamboo pole so got very wet! Had group meal in a very pretty restaurant next to the river in the veining, then went to a night market and an Irish pub for some snooker…and drinks.

The next day I did a Bungy jump !!!! It was amazing, I absolutely loved it, the best part was standing on the edge of the platform and tensing up my body with my arms out and just lettering myself fall forward towards the lake below. Completely unnatural. See video when I upload. I loved it.

Then after Bungy jumping me and Chris decided we needed a bit more of an adrenaline rush so we went Thai boxing!We thought it would be a lesson, but when we got there it was basically a big outdoor gym with 2 boxing rings and loads of pads etc. and everyone there looked like they were professionals.People were actually there to train or possilby on a course (with background in martial arts).So there was me, the only girl amongst a big group of thai kick boxers or 6 foot stupidly toned and muscle stacked men kicking the crap out of punch bags and each other.Susie Cooke it was possibly your personal heaven.Was rather intimidating for me though!Only for the first 5 mins though, I decided to pretend I was hardcore as usual.So we got taught some basic punches and kicks ect by instructors who were wondering around the gym and they were good because they realised we didn't know anything. Then the next two hours is a bit of a blur of intense exercise. Every 10 minutes everyone has to do 10 press ups and we had to do hundreds of sit upsat the end. But after some terrible sparring in the ring we spent ages play fighting with the instructors who were throwing us around al over the show and punching me sporadically if i stopped for more than 10 seconds - was so much fun and i appreciated some real interaction with some locals.

The we treated ourselves to a few doughnuts!Ww went out for drinks in the eve with the tour guide (Pui - she is brilliant) and saw some Thai boxing which was down the end of a street of bars and a bit crazy.

Next day was the beginning of our trek experience.We has lunch at a restaurant called Cabbages and Condoms - random.Then we went to Baan Huay for out home stay.We played walked down to the local school and playedvoleyball with the kids.Met a little Thai baby whilst walking though a market, I held him for a bit and he was the cutest thing ever.Then we had an amazing dinner which was all set out outside while the local kids performed some traditional Nothern Thai dancing and music on some crazy instruments which we got to try out afterwards.Then the kids joined us for some games and a young girl talked to me to practice her English, she was so polite.

The next day we got picked up by farmer truck and dropped off for the beginning of our tek. Walked lots on the first day, a lot of uphill.Had lunch (noodles wrapped up in banana leaves which the homestay people had prepared for us) under an enormous and picturesque waterfall.Treked more uphill and reached our tribe village.Wonderful cold shower again!Girl ran up to me ad gave me a gold keyring and then ran off.So I ran and gave her one of my bracelets and ran off!We walked down to the Little Lisu village where the tribe were doing some kind of traditional dance but we were completely bombarded with young children.They just wanted to play and get attention! At one point I dropped a load of coins and they all ran around picking them up and putting them back in my hand.They seemed very happy in their muddy clothes and just wanted to be picked up and swung around etc. And they wanted me to take their pictures and then show them, was very cute. It was surprising because I was worried about the tribes just dressing up and putting on a show for the tourists (we were joking that they had to hide their playstations before we got there etc), but it wasn't like that at all I was very overwhelmed and had a little cry on the way back up to our hut.We had dinner on a balcony next to out hut with an amazing view over the village and then played cards with the tour leaders.Because it was so dark when the lights were turned off and people went to bed I stayed up on the balcony and star gazed because the sky was just indescribable. (We'd had a few beers and commented that the sky was taking the piss out of us - highly amusing at the time!) saw a few shooting stars too.

In the morning we went down to the vllage again and spent some time in the nursery. I absolutley fell in love with this little boy he must have been about 1 or 2 years old and wanted to be sat on my lap and cuddled the whole time i was there. It was difficult to spread your attention... in particular there was this gorgeous little girl wearing tradtional clothing who just stood there and stared at you (whereas the others basically ran and jumped on you at any opportunity) she didnt speak or join in with the others. I got her to colour in a flower a drew but that was the only response she made, she was so shy.I was first in and last out, felt bad leaving them.

Out of time again!Write the rest later, I'm off down south for sunsets and beaches! x x x