We spent pretty much the whole day travelling today, as we didn't arrive at our hotel in Bangkok until 6pm. We checked into Rikka Inn on the famous Khao San Road. We put our bags in the room then headed straight out to book our travels for the next few days. After going up the main street we went in several travel agents looking for the best price. They explained to us that as it was their Queens birthday at the weekend, it was a national holiday so all overnight trains were booked to Chang Mai for over a week which meant we'd have to get a bus. We saw a friendly looking english couple in the street so I asked them if they'd done any of the tours, which unfortunately they hadn't. After wondering around for a bit longer we sat in a cafe on the side on the street and saw the same couple. We joined their table to eat dinner and chatted for ages. Our first taste of thai food probably could've been better! After harry and I decided to go to book some travels, we ended up booking a bus for the following evening up to Chang Mai. We dropped some things off in the hotel then went back to meet Jess and Conrad. We had another drink there then all walked up the crazy khao San road, looking in the market stalls as we went. I bought a chocolate pancake when we got to the end, we then headed to the cheapest bar we'd seen and had a few more drinks while playing card games. The boys were really keen to go to a ping pong show, so started bartering. When satisfied with a good price we got in the tuk tuk with a driver who called himself 'Schumacher'. It was a crazy ride through town and felt completely surreal. The show wasn't exactly to my taste but its just one if those things you have to do in Bangkok, after a bit we all got a taxi back to the khao San road. Harry had a footlong subway, Conrad had a maccdonalds, Jess and I had street cooked pad Thai. The street food was amazing and at less than a pound for a huge portion it was great value. I was way more impressed with this than the dinner we'd eaten earlier. After food we swapped contact details and planned to meet up the following day.

This morning harry and I were rather fragile from our first night in Bangkok. We went to Starbucks for breakfast, where I had a banana chocolate chip muffin and harry had a mocha frappichino. After breakfast we walked back down the road to seven eleven so we could buy water for the day. We packed our bags then checked out, leaving our main rucksacks in the luggage storage. We'd mentioned to Jess and Conrad about meeting up, so went to their hotel and just as we were walking up the stairs they were there. We all decided we'd head to one of the market malls for the day. We got a taxi to platinum mall, where first stop was the food court. Jess and I had waffles with fruit drinks, while harry had a KFC and Conrad had a duck and rice dish. We then walked in and out of the different stalls looking at all the clothing. Jess, Conrad and I bought some tops with really nice designs. We headed over to a different section of the mall where bags were being sold, we just wanted to see what the prices were like. After crossing a very busy road, Conrad and harry bargained for a few pairs of boxers each. We then realised it was getting late and the amount of traffic meant it would probably take longer to get back. After looking for a while we found a tuk tuk, so hopped in. When we got back to khao San road we said bye to the others then quickly went to get our bags and head to the office where we waited to be collected for the overnight bus. We transferred to the bus station by minibus then waited at the extremely busy platform area until our bus arrived. Overall, we weren't sure what to make of Bangkok, it was good fun, with not much to do during the day but loads to do at night. The problem was it had a distinct smell which wasn't very appealing, it was incredibly dirty, humid and generally overcrowded. Anyway we got on the night bus, which on first impression seemed much nicer than expected, especially as we even had some free food and drinks! Chiang Mai here we come!!

We arrived at Chiang Mai bus station at 6am and having slept most of the journey we were feeling pretty good. The only problem was neither of us had a clue where we were going next. After trying to work it out, we gave up and asked a friendly looking guy waiting for his taxi. It turned out to be a good choice as not only did he speak English but he spoke fluent thai and was with his friend who lived in Chiang Mai. We got a taxi to their hotel, met them their, where we then got in another red truck/ car/ bus like taxi to a guesthouse in which the girls friend worked. After looking at the room and deciding to stay we all had breakfast at the cafe next door. Breakfast was perfect, harry had eggs benedict with bacon, I had French toast with honey. We had a nice time chatting to Shaun, he taught us some helpful thai phrases and suggested places for us to visit. After we'd all finished they headed off, so we had showers then got ready to have a look around Chiang Mai. We first went to several travel agents to book a day tour for the following day. After booking a tour we looked around about five of the hundreds of temples in the city then walked to one of the markets to have a look. We didn't buy anything at this one but it was our first taste of a traditional market in Thailand - small streets with lots of people and very little space! For lunch we wanted to try more thai food, so went to a restaurant nearby, harry had black bean chicken noodles, I had koi soi (a soup with chicken, noodles and crispy things on top). We walked around the city a bit more, getting lost on the way wondering in and out of all the interconnecting streets. When we eventually worked out were we were we decided to head back to the hotel to do some research on where we were going next. We decided we didn't have enough time to travel Laos so booked a direct flight to hanoi. In the evening we spent ages shopping at the night market in the Tae Pae Gate area. We did lots of research into the prices of certain items preparing for future markets. We each bought a fabric bracelet with little elephants on and I bought a bright blue pair of floaty cotton trousers also with elephants on them. We had a small ish dinner then carried on shopping until about 11pm. On the way back to the hotel we picked up some water and snacks for the trek the next day.

We were up early Saturday to make sure we were ready on time to be picked up from outside the hotel. We had breakfast at the same place as the day before, harry had the same but I decided to go for an omelette. Our tour guide Dong came to the hotel to collect us then took us onto the air-conditioned minibus. It was an hours drive from here to our first stop at the elephant centre. We got off the bus and saw the elephants straight away, after taking a few photos we crossed a dodgey looking bridge to the platform we had to use to get on the elephants. Harry and I ended up on the biggest one, we had to stand on his head to then climb into the seat on his back. The guy steering the elephant sat on his head. We went for an hour long trek through the jungle, as it had rained the night before it was slippery and very muddy. We were quite nervous passengers as it wasn't the smoothest of rides! When we got off the elephant we fed them bananas and took photos with the tiny baby elephant. It was a good experience but we weren't sure how well the elephants were treated. The next activity was bamboo rafting, we got changed into our swim stuff then went down to the river to wait for our rafts to arrive. There were four of us to a raft so harry and I teamed up with pascal (from Switzerland) and a German guy. Our captain of the raft was a bit crazy (and only 17 years old). We straight away realised our raft was significantly lower in the water than the other rafts. The whole hour on the river from here was hilarious. Just after setting off on our cruise the steerer spotted a pineapple floating so decided to paddle all the way back upstream to retrieve it. Harry had to lean out into the water to get it then I had to keep hold of it for the entire journey, which was a challenge with my flip flops in the other hand! The two others on our boat hadn't bought changes of clothing so were standing up trying
to stay dry.... needless to say they both fell in several times. The captain had to dive in at one point to rescue the German guys shoes, another time he dropped his shoes which meant us waiting for the shoes to catch up with us. We then ended up taking out the bamboo posts holding up a bridge. We had to get off the raft while he took it through rapids which were too strong, then we got back on. It was quite an adventure but we were all happy to be on land when we finished. After drying off it was a short journey up the road to the lunch stop, where we were given a selection of three different thai dishes with rice. This was our first experience of Thai toilets and was probably not going to be the last. After lunch we drove up to the Karen hill tribe village. Dong showed us around their village teaching us about the uses they had for the plants growing around them. Some of them were used for removing dirt and cleaning wounds, or for food, another one if you ripped it a certain way you could blow bubbles! He showed us the sweets they ate and an example of an old lady who ate loads, making her teeth all black. We also watched another lady weaving a scarf in their traditional way, it was really complicated but the pattern it produced was amazing. Next we trekked through rice padi fields and a jungle to get to a huge waterfall. Unfortunately it had rained too much so we couldn't swim in the waterfall. Again we had to cross a dodgey looking bridge to get to the other side where there were little bamboo lodges we could sit in. After relaxing here for a bit we crossed back over the bridge then carried on the trek through more jungle and rice fields. This time we came out by another hill tribe called Mae. We looked at the goods they had for sale but didn't buy anything. Dong showed us the way back to the minibus, where we got on and slept pretty much the whole hour long journey back to Chiang Mai city centre. We went out to a restaurant for dinner called Johns place. It had a rooftop seating area, which although it was raining had amazing views over Chiang Mai. The food here was the best we'd had so far, harry had pad thai with chips and I had chicken cashew nut curry. I had a chocolate roti (pancake type thing) from the street then we went back to the hotel where we went to bed as it was quite late.

After a busy day on the trek we were ready for a really chilled Sunday. We moved hotels to one just around the corner then went to macdonalds to meet Molly (and for harry to get breakfast). We spent the morning wondering around looking for the Sunday market, we found the road it was meant to be on, but when we asked someone they said it started at 4pm. We carried on wondering around the city centre, finding a couple of small markets to look at and had fruit shakes. We went inside one of the many temples and saw some monks praying - they were completely still. Afterwards we realised it was lunch time, so found a little cafe where we all tried some new thai food. Luckily we all liked the new dishes and stayed for a while chatting. We carried on down the Sunday market road where we found a couple of the food market stalls were already open. Molly and I had some fresh mango and harry bought a fried potato stick! After walking back to the top end of the street near where we were staying we said bye to Molly then got a few bits from 7/11. We went back to the hotel to chill and watch hangover 3 before going back out to the actual Sunday market! When we came out of the hotel there was a stage where some young girls were singing and dancing for a huge audience. This was part of the Queens birthday celebrations (which was the following day). We sat and watched for a while, although we couldn't understand the songs! The entire Sunday market street was filled with market stalls selling all sorts of products. In the middle of the street were different people performing different traditional thai acts, including dancing, singing and playing instruments. We spent a bit of time looking around the food section of the market, where I had sushi for dinner and bought banana bread. In the next food section harry had his dinner, including pad thai in an omelette! We walked back to the stage to watch another act perform while harry ate his whole meal with chopsticks! After he finished we walked back to the night bazar market which we had been to the previous evening. We had fun bartering for several items and came away with some lovely presents for family and friends, as well as a vest top and more boxers for harry and a handbag for me! After a successful evening we went back to the hotel.

In the morning we got up quite late then rushed to sort our bags out before checking out of the hotel. It was raining again today so we decided it wasn't worth going up to the huge temple as we'd just get soaking wet! We had breakfast at a really cute little cafe and spent a while planning the rest of the trip. After breakie, we walked around parts of Chiang Mai we still hadn't seen, finding a hairdressers. Eventually this meant after nearly four months harry had his hair cut! The lady did an amazing job cutting his hair, we were really impressed! We wondered along the streets looking at some of the bits they were setting up for the queens birthday celebrations that evening.

We left Chiang Mai on the overnight bus to get back to Bangkok, to then fly to Vietnam the following afternoon. We were dropped at a bus stop quite a walk from kao san road, but luckily we'd met a couple (Kim and Dan) on the bus, who knew where to go! We went for breakfast with them, then they left for their flight. As we only had the morning in Bangkok, harry, Riika and I planned to visit Chinatown. We didn't realise it would take over an hour to walk to the bus station to leave our bags in lockers. When we eventually got to the station there weren't any lockers and it was too hot to carry our bags all the way around Chinatown. As we had seen quite a bit walking through it to the station we decided to find a cool place to sit, have a drink and play card games for an hour before harry and I had to leave to go to the airport. We got the MRT and then the sky train to the airport which actually worked out much cheaper than getting a taxi and wasn't too confusing! We got to the airport in plenty of time to check in, get lots of free wafer biscuit samples from duty free, have a subway for lunch then go to the gate. Vietnam airlines was a really good airline to fly with and we couldn't believe we got a free meal included on the flight- what a nice surprise!!