Hi everyone!

Apologies for not updating sooner. We caught a flight to Chiang Mai from Laos, and ended up going straight to sleep when we got there. Such a pity we couldn't change our flights to stay here longer, but it cost a lot to change.

We went on tour next day, first to an elephant camp, rafting trip, ox ride, buffet lunch, long neck hill-tribe, orchid garden/butterfly farm! We arrived at a place where they showed us how they make paper from elephant dung! Interesting, they wash,bleach, rinse and dry it. We all went a little crazy in the shop, and bought lots of elephant dung products. Then we arrived at an elephant camp, we all had mixed feelings when we arrived here. It looked like the elephants were well taken care of. When we arrived we had chance to come close and feed some of the elepants bananas. We found it sad that the baby elephant was tied with chains to mother. Then we watched a show were the elephants danced, and did few tricks like kick a ball. Some crazy people in the audience volunteered to have an elephant massage. Quite dangerous as elephants can change their temperments quite quickly!

After the show we rode on the elephants, Jayne and I on one! Was so much fun, but we had a speedy elephant who over took everyone and decided to go a different path. The man riding our elephant decided to take different route to everyone else! Then we fed him sugar canes (maybe we fed him too many), after I fed him he sneezed all over me! Hmm..was great riding through river sitting on elephant. Definatly one of the highlights of the day!

After that we went bamboo rafting, we were so relaxed, and told not to take our cameras as it was raining, so enjoyed views instead and watched local people riding their elephants! After that we went on an ox ride! They sure are strong animals! We had lady riding them and sounding like she was communicating with them, while being bashed around the cart. Interesting experience. Also we passed through a little village, and lots of children came running out of their homes to sell us braclets.

After that we had a fantastic buffett lunch. Then carried on towards long neck Karen village. We also had very mixed feelings about visiting this tribe. Since the coup in Bangkok apparently a few of this tribe have fled into the jungle in fear of being caught by police. They are recent imigrants into Thailand from Burma. They have no legal status in Thailand and are expolited as curiousities by camera toting tourists like us! They have brass rings around their neck which depress the colar bones, and the neck appears to look stretched. This is done from early childhood, adding a few rings at a time until adulthood. The rings are not removed for sleeping or bathing. They say that the purpose of these rings would protect the women from being bitten by tigers. When we arrived there our guide encouraged us to take pictures but we didn't feel it was appropriate especially a young girl of about six, who looked extremely miserable!

After that we went to Orchid/butterfly farm, and made our way back to the night market. We stayed in night market for while and stocked up on last bits and pieces from Asia. The next day we couldn't find a post office that was open, probably because it was Sunday and we had to lug everyhting on overnight train to Bangkok.

Went for lunch then I had few beers before we got on the train, to help me sleep, and forget about the possibility of seeing a rat! We went to party carriage and had mini disco, was so funny! Next morning we arrived at airport in Bangkok!