So in the past week I've had the opportunity to visit a little town outside Chiang Mai called Chiang Dao. Little known to tourists as it's not in the lonely planet! We took a local bus there which stopped at every little village along the way so it took two hours instead of one! The seats were obviously meant for thais, it was a normal sized bus but rows of three seats on one side and two seats on the other side meant very tiny seats! We arrived at Chiang Dao in ...

I love this city! Where else in the world would you be able to get a meal for less than €2, a cappuccino for less than €1 and fill the tank with petrol for €2.50 (granted it's a small tank and I have to refill every second day or so!) Not to mention living in a country where it's cheaper to eat out than cook your own food (and Thai food is awesome) and to top it all the weather is great everyday! But I do miss some things...obviously most of all everyone a...

Musings on packing for a long term backpacking trip.... Despite having looked up numerous lists of what to pack for round the world trips etc, I still missed out on bringing some things that would have come in handy (thanks to mom and dad for sending over lots of packages with things I realised I needed) Things I've realised I should have packed but bought over here: A scissors - essential item, used for customising clothes (eg when the Thai laundry system tur...

A surprise trip to a boutique hotel for Christmas.....Yes please! So I was staying at my friend Elinor's apartment when I arrived in Bangkok and had planned to spend Christmas with some travel buddies in the city. But it turned out that Elinor's friend who she was going to be spending Christmas with at Hua Hin, a posh beach resort, had just cancelled at the last minute in order to fly home to europe instead. So she was left with a free spot in her booking and as...

I was strangely sad leaving Chiang Mai after living there for the past almost 2 months, even if I am going back right after Christmas! After saying bye and happy Christmas to some friends, I waited at Jai Dii House for my night bus to Bangkok. Luckily I was able to leave my big backpack there until I come back so all I had was a small backpack for the weekend. The overnight buses in Thailand are notorious for theft so if you've a bag in the storage compartment y...