We woke up early in the morning on Thursday 16th April, having had about 4 hours sleep after staying up to watch the Champions League games. We quickly packed our stuff for the trek into the mid-size back packs the hostel had provided, and left the rest of our luggage with them.

The truck arrived to pick us up at about 9, them we went off to a hotel to pick up some other trekkers. Once at the hotel we had to wait for about half an hour whilst another truck came to meet us with more trekkers. We didn't really mind the wait though as it gave us a chance to get to the corner shop, having missed breakfast earlier on.

Once the other truck arrived we breifly met our travelling buddies. There were 17 of us in all, and 2 guides. There was a family and a couple from Australia, and another family and 2 couples from France. The 2 French couples were from Gex and Lausanne respecitively, both of which we had visited during our stay with Amy's family in Gex.

Once the trucks got going we travelled for about an hour to a small market town, where our guides bought the food supplies for the next few days, and Amy bought a hat to keep out the sun. Half an hour later we were on our way through some mountainous windy roads that made Amy and I feel a little sick, but we stopped for lunch just before it got too much for us. Song Kran was still going on in the local area, and the kids on our trek were all splashing cars whilst we ate.

Once we had eaten we continued on up the roads to a beautiful waterfall, where we all got to have a quick swim. We both went directly under the waterfall, which was quite soe due to the wight of the water. Pretty soon afterwards we were all gathered back on to the trucks, where we continued on for half an hour until we got dropped off at the starting point of our walk.

The first days walk involved about 3 hours trekking up and down hilly jungle paths. We even got to swing on a vine at one point. After the first couple of hours, which were quite tough going, we got on to a dirt track for the rest of the way, which was much easier.

We arrived at the Karen tribe village at about 5 o'clock and dumped our stuff in our room. Everyone was staying together in the same room, on mats with mossie nets above. A few of us got a shower in the river, then Amy and I had a quick nap whilst most other people took a look around the village.

In the evening we woke up in time for tea, then got chatting to everyone around a campfire afterwards. Everyone was really tired after the days exertion though, and I think Amy and I were the last to bed at about 9pm. Later on at night I woke up in the pitch black and had to navigate my way to the outside bathroom. It was really nice out though as the stars were so clear. Five minutes later Amy wanted to go, but I had to accompany her as she didn't want to go in the dark alone. Wuss.

On the second day we were up at about 7am for breakfast of toast and pineapple (which we seemed to have with every meal), before our guide showed us around the local village. It was really interesting seeing the villagers go about there business, but it seemed a little intrusive haveing a group of foreigners snooping around taking photos of everyone. Still I'm sure they are used to it as it probably happens every day.

Once we were done in the village we set off on the next leg of the journey. We walked for about 4 hours up some pretty steep hills in the morning. Some of the kids had catapults, so we were all having a go with them. The young guide we had seemed to e particularly good with it.

In the early afternoon we arrived at the elephant camp. We came down a steep slope to reach it, and Amy and I could see one of the eephants wandering around on our way down. Whilst the guides cooked our lunch we all got to have a paddle in the river with the elephants, and we managed to feed them some bananas. One elephant in particular must have had 100 bananas. After lunch I played foot-volleyball with a some of the Australian family, before the elephants were ready to go.

As we had quite a few on our trek, most people had to share an elephant between 3 people, so Amy and I sat on the seats, whilst Adrian - One of the Australian boys - sat on the elephants neck. The ride probably took 40 minutes, and it was great fun, but I think our elephant had a cold as it kept turning it's trunk to sneeze on us, which was gross.

Once we got off the elephants we only had about 15 minutes walk to reach the village we were staying in. This village was the same Karen tribe, but it was much bigger than the village we stayed in the night before. The accomodation was much the same as the night before, so we dumped our bags and went swimming in the nearby river. All the kids were jumping off the rocks into the river, and we eventually persuaded Amy to have a go. It was good fun.

In the evening our guide told us there was a game of football organised, so about 12 of us went to have a kickaround. There were no locals there at first so we started a game alone, but before we knew it there were more and more villagers, and soon we had a game of 15 a side. Amy was in goal and made some good saves. Later on everyone went back to get food, but I stayed for another hour or so with the locals, and I scored the winner.

After tea there was another bonfire, but everyone headed to bed pretty early again for the early start on the bamboo rafts in the morning.

We were up around 7am again for breakfast, then we set sail on the rafts at about 8:30. There were 7 of us on each of the 3 rafts including the guides and locals, and the men had to paddle with big bamboo rods. It was good fun, but quite a long slog with 2 3-hour sessions and a break in between. We had the odd small rapid to tackle, but otherwise it was just a relaxing float downstream.

Once we arrived in the last village, we stopped for lunch before getting back on the trucks and heading home. We stayed for one more night in our hostel in Chiang Mai, before getting up the next day and heading to Pai...