Hello all,

Really sorry i've been useless with this blog for so long... My mum has told me that my blog fans are calling out for some more witty stories of my travels so here is another attempt ;) Since finishing my volunteering and having some time to chill in Chiang Mai (which is when I last updated my blog) it's all been go go go and I haven't spent more than about 3 days in each island/town so haven't wanted to be inside sat in slow frustrating internet cafés. Been veryyyy busy indeed considering it's been 2 months and I've travelled across 3 countries so I have lots to report. Will break it down though in to the different places to make it a bit easier reading for you all so you're not dying with boredom by the time you finish reading!

After Beckys arrival (and after screaming at each other solidly with excitement for about 10 minutes - despite only having seen each other 3 weeks before) we went on a glorious fun saturday night out in Chiang Mai then got up really early the next morning, checked out and headed to the meditation retreat! We lugged our ridiculously heavy bags on to a tuk tuk (a thai hearse looking taxi thing) and across Chiang Mai to a temple the opposite side of town. On arrival we discovered that the meditation retreat was not on Sunday-Monday but was infact on Tuesday-Wednesday (silly out of date lonely planet!!!). Instead of making a wasted trip, we requested to join a Q&A session that we saw happening in the temple meeting room. We discreetly snuck in to the room and admired the rather handsome monk talking and answering questions at the front. We quickly realised that we were most definitely not meant to be there and had joined an Australian 'Management Project' group (who had all paid a lot of money to be there). We were very much welcomed though and ended up staying for quite a few hours, stealing the limelight and leading the group discussion and Q&A, and joining the management group for lunch! We sat and had lots of jokes with the monk for ages who most definitely took a fancy to our cheeky charm and signed us up to the Tuesdays meditation retreat for free (saving us 10 pounds which is an awful lot on a travellers budget!!!).

As we had a few days to wait before the retreat, we decided to get a tuk tuk to the bus station that evening and get a bus to Pai, a little town just north of Chiang Mai. I was told how beautiful the journey was from Chiang Mai to Pai but the wiggly roads were a little too much for my stomach and so the view I was promised turned out to infact be the inside of a not so beautiful paper bag for 3 hours!!! However, when we arrived I felt a lot better and it was now the evening! We checked into this cute little guesthouse and had a wander down the main cobbled street of Pai! It was such a cute, hippy, beautiful little town full of stunning people and with amazing street food down the whole street and little stands with gorgeous hand made jewellery everywhere! Me and Becky were so chilled out we found ourselves walking so slowly we were practically walking backwards! We had a well needed early night and got up relatively early, ready to explore day time Pai. We were set on the idea of getting push bikes to explore but were told by many people we wouldn't be able to get very far atall with just push bikes so decided to hire mopeds (for just £2). We did stop and think whether it was the best idea when we were handed over the mopeds with no instructions what so ever (particularly as neither of us had ridden a push bike since we were about 10 let alone ever ridden a moped/motorbike ever in our lives! Also didn't help the stress levels that Becky has never in her life had a driving lesson so has less road awareness than a squished hedgehog!!!) Anyway... After Becky burst in to tears while I cried laughing, we got on our wobbly way and headed off. Once we'd got the hang of it, we really enjoyed it and made our way up to the top of the waterfalls! On the way up, we stopped off at a little fishing village and sat in the sun and had some lunch (amazing avocado salad). We continued on to the waterfalls where we had been told to do a set of slides! We were up there for a while and noone had done them so me and Becky decided to be show offs and go down! Becky went first and as noone had done it for a while, everyone was staring! She went down very smoothly and after sploshing in to the water, came up hands in the air screaming! Little did she know her bikini top had come undone and her boobies were on show to everyone present at the waterfalls hahahaha (not one of her proudest moments I don't think). We both slid down a few more time (bikinis securely fastened) and chilled in the sunshine for a bit then made a move to our next destination, the hot springs. Embarrassingly a Chinese man (on a push bike) who had been enquiring with us about hiring mopeds left the waterfalls at the same time as us and stayed ahead of us for about 15 minutes until it flattened off (see I was being safe and slow mummy o:D )

We really weren't sure what to expect from the hot springs but they were extremely hot (surprisingly!)!!! They were so hot that at the top it was 80 degrees C and there were women boiling eggs in the water!!! It was way too hot to even put your foot in any of the springs until we got right to the bottom ones! Someone how the little Chinese man on his push bike caught up with us at the springs (such a machine) so we bathed in the springs for a bit with him then headed off to our next destination, the canyon!

On our way to the canyon it started to pour it down with rain! It really was not pleasant and was pretty painful cycling in the rain! We parked up at the canyon, embraced the rain and went to look round! The views were absolutely amazing and some of the drops off the edges were amazing! It was very obvious from the lack of fencing and health and safety that we were in Asia! At the canyon we met some new 'moped friends' and arranged to meet up with them for a drink in the evening (despite having a bus to catch to Chiang Mai at 6am the next morning!). Despite planning a quiet drink, (as we all know) quiet drink plans rarely ever stick to quiet drinks and the return bus journey back from Pai was as tough as the one there (just a lot more self inflicted on the return journey!).

We went straight to the meditation temple from the bus station, had some lunch (noodle soup) at a local restaurant then started the meditation introduction session. Everyone was very baffled at how we had already bonded with the monk and how he knew our names but it made us feel like VIPs! After a little introduction, we made our way to the retreat! Little did we know it would be as strange as it was! We turned up and it felt like we were going in to rehab! It was a gated compound with rooms surrounding one half (that looked like cells from the outside) and we all had to wear fully white clothing head to toe! As neither Becky or I had white trousers, we had to buy there huge XXXXL fisherman trousers from the temple. It was really confusing knowing how to put them on and so I ventured out in to the courtyard to be embarrassingly told by another girl that I had tied them wrong and the material was just dangling down at the back exposing my whole bare bum cheeks! Very very humiliating and inappropriate for a Buddhist meditation retreat! Anyway on our agenda for the few days we had lots of chanting and meditation practice. We expected to be listening to monks chant but when we entered the hall and all sat down on our little mats, it turned out it was us that was meant to be chanting! Me and Becky got a serious case of giggles as it was definitely not a time to be giggling! We got in to the swing of it though and have been singing the chant for the rest of the time in Asia!!! We learnt that there were 4 different types of meditation... Sitting, Lying, Walking and Standing. We we're taught to focus on our breathing and then on to just one object! Its definitely a skill and takes years of practising to get used to! We couldn't get our head around the walking one! Everyone used to practise it around the centre and it looked like a spiritual mixture of Shutter Island and Shaun of the dead with everyone slowly and spookily walking round dressed head to toe in white baggy clothes! All our meals were provided for us but before eating we had to chant about how we should only eat for survival and take no more than is needed (I break that rule EVERY meal time). We then had to sit in silence while we ate which was also pretty awkward. We meditated all day on the first day until about 9:30pm then were woken by the gong at 5am the next morning! We had to get up and see what it was like to give aims (Explained in my Luang Prabang blog ;D). As I knew about this from Laos, I was star of the class! It was very different here though as there was one monk and loads of us offering aims - it's fair to say he wasn't going to leave hungry! We then had breakfast (in silence again) then practised chanting for the rest of the day (and took some cool photos of us looking really spiritual - see photos section ;))! We had meetings with the monk in small groups to discuss how the meditation had gone for us! Becky (the most unsleepy person I know who) had slept through pretty much the whole 2 days and had a bit of a Freudian slip and when asked what her favourite meditation was, she answered 'the sleeping one'. Obviously being the star students of his class he really didn't mind and found it rather amusing At the end the monk even asked us 'So what are we doing later?' and gave us his Facebook name writen in a book titled 'Anyone can go to heaven... Just be good'. As you can imagine, this behaviour was very baffling after spending 2 weeks in Laos teaching monks with extremely strict rules!!! We thought it would be rather amusing (and possibly like Hangover 2) to invite him on a night out with us in Chiang Mai but decided against the idea!

Once we got back to Chiang Mai, we booked an overnight bus for the next evening and another cooking course as Becky really wanted to do one! We wandered round the market then had an early night! We stayed in a bit of a dodgy place that (after checking in) looked at us blankly when we asked for the key to the dorm!! There was no key! But it only cost us £1.60 for the night to stay there so what could possibly go wrong!? :s.

The cooking course the next day was really good! I made all different dishes and got another recipe book so twice as many dishes for all your hungry stomachs when I get home.

The night bus to Bangkok was horrendous! The bus broke down about 3 times and in the end we had to change buses at about 2 in the morning! We found the cheapest place we could find in Bangkok (like the classy travellers we are), had a nap, then went to explore Bangkok. We ended up being there for a few days longer than planned as we needed to sort out our Vietnamese visas and they had to be approved over the weekend! We had a few nights out in the infamous 'Koh San Road' (the 'backpacker land' of Bangkok) which was a very strange place indeed. All the bars lined the street and when it got to about 2am, the whole street turned in to a street party with music everywhere and people dancing! On one of the days in Bangkok, we got a tuk tuk guide round to see lots of different place including Thailands oldest buddha statue (at over 300 years old) and Thailand's tallest Buddha (which was REALLY tall). We got a boat trip to what we thought was the big Bangkok floating market but it turns out we were scammed! The 'floating market' was 4 little boats floating past selling some Bangkok merchandise and shouting 'Floating market, floating market'. It was interesting though to go down the river and look at all the thai houses on stilts and the beautiful temples! Bangkok was ok I guess but very much a big, smelly city with lots of sleezy men!!! We still really enjoyed ourselves though and made the most of the few days we had there!

Our next destination after Bangkok was the islands (admittedly not as cultural as previous experiences in Thailand) but I'll write about them in my next blog! Will upload a few pics for you all to see from the stuff I've just spoken about!

Missing you all loads xxx