Hello everyone, After a thirteen + hour flight we arrived in Bangkok on thursday morning absolutely knackered! We arrived at half ten in the morning and then had to wait an hour to get through customs at which point it was about 31 degrees and no air conditiong in the airport! So after collecting our bags we got a taxi costing us 650baht (first rip off of our journey!) and arrived safely (miracle with their driving here) at our hostel. When we first stepped out of the airport it was like you couldn't breath. A very hunid atmosphere and the pollution is unbelievable, loads of cars on the roads. We were greeted by very friendly people at our hostel and after sleeping and dumping our bags we went to explore for a bit. We caught a bus into town to Hua Lamphong, the train station, where we purchased tickets for the train journey up to Chiang Mai. We then stayed there to have our first taste of Thai cusine but mainly because the station was air conditioned! After eating we went and bought tickets for the MRT which is their underground system, which were considerably cheaper than our taxi (28baht each, a mere 43p!), for our journey back to the hostel. On Friday morning we were up at half six(!) to get a taxi to the train station to catch the train, which we did by the skin of our teeth. We didn't anticipate therebeing sooo much traffic at that time in the morning and the traffic lights seemed to take about ten minutes to change! So on to Chiang Mai. The train journey was twelve hours (loving the long distant travelling in cramped conditions!). We travelled out of Bangkok and over country and up through the mountains which was beautiful all beit a bit bumpy! It was amazing seeing the temples that were so beatiful amongst the shacks that people were living in. We saw a giant sitting gold buddah on a mountain edge, which I will try and get a picture of on the way home! We were fed on the train for free (how often do you hear of that in England?!) Not quite sure what we ate though, rice definately and some fish or pork or something!We arrived in Chiang Mai where a man from the youth hostel greeted us. We got in the back of his open sided taxi and arrived at the youth hostel on Papraw Rd. We went out after dumoing our bags and had some supper which consisted of four different dishes and a large tiger beer, costing us just over 2quid! Yesterday we had a bit of a lie in as didn't sleep very well but eventually got up and went to look round in the daylight. In the evening we visited the night market which was wonderful. Stalls along either side of the road for about half a mile with people hassling you to buy their goods. Very lively and colourful, will put pictures up soon. After this we ventured to a bar to watch the all important England match, gutted obviously, but was a good atmosphere. Tonight we are tavelling back to Bangkok on the overnight train and will update soon. Loads of love Flora and Chris xxxxxxxxxxxxxx