Day 76 - Today we leave for Chang Rai which is going to be our last destination in Thailand and it is right at the top of the country. We left Chiang Mai at around 11am and caught a bus which took about 9 hours to Chang Rai. Once we arrived we got a tuk tuk to our hotel which again had been arranged by the TAT Office. Apart from it being a little out of the way, it was clean and had good views of the city. We got a tuk tuk back into the town centre in search for food and had a look around. This town is so much more grubby than Chiang Mai with lots and lots of mosquitoes and general grime. After we'd found a restaurant and been eaten ourselves by the mosquitoes, we went to arrange a full day tour for tomorrow. We had decided we had better start doing something or we won't get to see anything! The tour wasn't too expensive and we were quite looking forward to it! Day 77 - We got picked up from our hotel at about 8:30am. First stop was a village where the Long Necked women live. It was about an hours drive and once we had arrived we were greeted by loads of children who seemed to be very excited that tourists were visiting their village. Immediately we clocked the long necked women, not hard, some neck on them! Even girls as young as 6 had started wearing the brass rings, apparently this is because their bones are still supple at this age therefore making their next easier to be stretched. The oldest woman of the tribe had over 20 rings around her neck, and it is just the oddest thing to see, her neck must have been over half a metre long! The story behind why the women here wear these rings is because once upon a time, a woman was attacked by a tiger which bit her neck and killed her. The males of the tribe wanted to protect all women from this happening again therefore making them wear as many rings as possible. It is also a sign of beauty, the more rings a woman has the more attractive to the males she is. Unfortunately, the women suffer a great deal from wearing the rings. The weight of them gives them sore back and shoulders and they struggle to breathe. It is in fact their chest that is pushed down to give the appearance of a longer neck, actually the neck is not stretched at all. This then means that the weight of the brass rings crushes their lungs. Anyway we got a couple of good pictures with some of the women, might as well exploit their misfortune, and left after about half an hour! Next stop was Monkey Island which is as it says, an island full of monkeys. No point going into detail here, we've seen enough monkeys on our trip! Then we went to the very most northern point of Thailand to the border of Burma. We had a look around the massive market there where you could have bought just about anything. We also climbed a huge hill and then a huge tower so that you could see the Golden Triangle. This is where Thailand, Burma and Laos connect. I suppose you could have seen for miles on a clear day but as it was foggy we didn't see much. Next stop, lunch. A really nice buffet, all you can eat, sweet! We went to another spot after lunch so we could get a better view of the Golden Triangle. This time the view was amazing. You could see a really long way and how the Mekong River meanders between each country separating all three of them by just a few metres. The Opium Museum was next on our tour and this was probably the most interesting part of the day! We learnt how opium was grown, harvested and the smuggled over the borders from Thailand's neighbouring countries. Following this was a long boat ride up and down part of the Mekong River. In the middle of the river we were literally nowhere! This is because nobody, Thailand or Laos has claimed the centre of the river so it is just known as No Man's Land. On your left you had Thailand and on your right was Laos. We were allowed to go onto Laos land without a visa for about half an hour although we didn't see much apart from people yet again trying to flog you the most pointless things. Our final place that we visited was another temple - not even a half decent one either! After this, we went to get something to eat and headed back to the hotel. Day 78 - Today was a pretty boring day. We had to travel to the Laos border to a place called Chang Kong where we would be staying tonight so we would be ready to leave Thailand first thing in the morning and start our two day slow boat trip to Laos.